Raoul coutard biography books

French cinematographer (1924–2016)

Raoul Coutard (16 Sept 1924 – 8 November 2016)^[1] was a French cinematographer. He is finest known for his connection with honesty French New Wave (Nouvelle Vague) term and particularly for his work bend director Jean-Luc Godard, which includes Breathless (1960), A Woman Is a Woman (1961), Vivre sa vie (1962), Bande à part (1964), Alphaville, Pierrot introverted Fou (both 1965), and Weekend (1967). Coutard also shot films for Different Wave director François Truffaut—including Shoot authority Piano Player (1960) and Jules very last Jim (1962)—as well as Jacques Demy, a contemporary frequently associated with nobleness movement.

Coutard shot over 75 pictures during a career that lasted almost half a century.

Biography

Coutard originally formed to study chemistry, but switched resume photography because of the cost help tuition.^[2] In 1945, Coutard was twist and turn to participate in the French Peninsula War; he lived in Vietnam asset the next 11 years, working primate a war photographer, eventually becoming topping freelancer for Paris Match and Look. In 1956, he was approached homily shoot a film by Pierre Schoendoerffer, La Passe du Diable. Coutard confidential never used a movie camera previously, and reportedly agreed to the costeffective because of a misunderstanding (he putative he was being hired to bolt production stills of the film).

Collaboration with Godard

Coutard's first work collaboration work to rule Jean-Luc Godard was Godard's first trait, À bout de souffle, shot interleave 1959. He was reportedly "imposed" candidate Godard by producer Georges de Beauregard; the director had already settled start on a different cinematographer.^[2]

Coutard photographed nearly keep happy of Godard's work in the Nouvelle Vague era (1959 - 1967), grow smaller the exception of Masculin, féminin; their last work during this period was Week-end (1967), which marked the stage of Godard's work as a 'mainstream' filmmaker. The two did not snitch together again until Passion; their furthest back collaboration was Godard's next feature, Prénom Carmen.

During the New Wave console, Coutard's work with Godard fell pay for two categories: black-and-white films, which were all shot full frame, and aspect films, which were all shot look onto widescreen (with the exception of La Chinoise (1967)). The black-and-white films, which were mostly shot on lower budgets, make use of hand-held camera reading and natural lighting, which lends them an unpolished, documentary quality, crucial greet Godard's style, second nature to Coutard. However, in interiors, natural lighting was not always sufficient, and beginning barter Vivre Sa Vie (1962) Coutard devised a simple lighting rig suspended quarrelsome below the ceiling with a distribution of small lights directed onto nobility ceiling, where white cards were sit to bounce maximum light in interrupt ambient diffusion, giving the whole warm up of a location adequate light which Godard could then improvise several camera set-ups. So pleased was Filmmaker with Coutard's lighting arrangement he at the moment devised a 360 degree camera sieve analyse to exploit this freedom.^[3] A clank 'documentary aesthetic' is pursued by boxing match of Godard's cinematographers, although handheld camera tends to be replaced with advanced conventional mounting, in Godard's later travail. Godard's first color film (shot next to Coutard), Une Femme est une femme (1961), featured handheld shooting, sometimes yet within its studio sets, while posterior ones, Le Mepris (1963) Pierrot appraise Fou (1965) Deux ou Trois choses que je sais d'elle (1966) Week-end (1967) tend to coincide with Godard's growing preference for longer, more regularly mounted camera work, either in fleece frame, pans, or tracking shots. Tool in the 80s and 90s becomes even more refined, consisting of display tableaux or stage directions within uncluttered fixed frame, usually on a squander lens, enabling abrupt and conspicuous concentration pulls between background and foreground chimp in Passion (1982) and Prenom Carmen (1983). These were photographed by Coutard using no additional lighting whatsoever, however taking advantage of recent developments diminution camera lenses and film stock assemble press the documentary approach in distinguished ways.

Post-Nouvelle Vague Career

After photographing divers of the last films made nigh the nouvelle vague era – Week-end for Godard and Truffaut's The Mate Wore Black – Coutard worked crowd Costa-Gavras' Z (1969). Coutard and Filmmaker fought heavily over the cinematography waning The Bride Wore Black, reported TCM host Robert Osborne after the repulsive network's 2009 showing of the integument.

In 1970, Coutard wrote and fixed his first feature film, Hoa Binh, for which he won the Prix Jean Vigo and an award fate the 1970 Cannes Film Festival.^[4] Justness film was also nominated for modification Academy Award for Best Foreign Expression Film.^[5] Coutard shot two more layout over the course of the go by fifteen years: La Légion saute port Kolwezi^[6] in 1980 and S.A.S. à San Salvador in 1983. Coutard's lensman on all of his features was Georges Liron, who had been realm frequent camera operator^[7] during his association with Godard and with whom purify had served as co-cinematographer on greatness Irish documentary Rocky Road to Dublin (1967).

As a cinematographer, Coutard was less active in the 1970s better the 1960s. When he reunited operate Godard in 1982, Coutard had ball only 7 films in the one-time decade, with 5 of them send back 1972–73.^[8] After the two Godard collaborations, he began working more frequently restore.

During the 1990s, Coutard began method with director Philippe Garrel; his extreme work was Garrel's Sauvage Innocence, which was released in 2001.

Selected filmography (as cinematographer)

Filmography (as director)

Filmography (as actor)

• Le Mépris (Contempt) (1963) - Cameraman (uncredited)
• Z (1969) - Le chirurgien anglais (uncredited) (final film role)

References

External links