Marat/Sade is a 1967 adaptation of the Peter Weiss play, The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton Under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade. The film, adapted by Adrian Mitchell and directed by Peter Brook, used the full title in the opening credits,...
From Time Out Film Guide The script credits list Kurosawa’s writer Shinobu Hashimoto, Professor Alan Turney, and John Bird – which just about sums it up. This is a highly eccentric spy fable about a ‘yellow dog’ (Japanese private eye) who comes to London on a mission, only to find himself working in rather...
The film depicts the sexual competition between three roommates — the aggressive, womanizing drummer Tolen (Ray Brooks), the shy, paranoid schoolteacher Colin (Michael Crawford), and the neutral artist Tom (Donal Donnelly) — when a young girl from out of town, Nancy (Rita Tushingham), enters their London world. Directed by Richard Lester Produced by...
The Bed-Sitting Room is a 1969 British comedy film directed by Richard Lester and based on the play of the same name. It was entered into the 19th Berlin International Film Festival The film is set on the third or fourth anniversary of a war which lasted two minutes and twenty-eight seconds, including signing...
From David’s autobiography, Was Clara Shuman a Fag Hag? The preparation for the Lodz Festival in 2004 was the first time I’d thought to give a non-flippant answer to the question “What are your favourite films?” They are of course the four anti-war pictures, and favourite for no reason other than what they are about. How I won The...
Help! is a 1965 film directed by Richard Lester, starring The Beatles — John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr — and featuring Leo McKern, Eleanor Bron, Victor Spinetti, John Bluthal, Roy Kinnear and Patrick Cargill. The soundtrack was released as an album, also called Help!. Directed by Richard Lester Produced by...
A Delicate Balance is a 1973 drama film directed by Tony Richardson. The screenplay by Edward Albee is based on his 1966 Pultizer Prize-winning play of the same title. The film was the second in a series produced by Ely A. Landau for his American Film Theatre, a subscription-based programme of screen adaptations of notable stage plays shown in five hundred...
Used People is a 1992 American romantic comedy film directed by Beeban Kidron. The screenplay by Todd Graff, adapted from his 1988 off-Broadway play The Grandma Plays, takes a humorous look at a highly dysfunctional family living in the New York City borough of Queens circa 1969. Directed by Beeban Kidron Produced by Peggy...
Surviving in David’s papers was this account book which gives a detailed list of the feature films and TV commercials he worked on after leaving Transport until the height of his early career in 1976 and Joseph Andrews. It contains only one reference to London Transport, in 1962 , undoubtedly acting as a freelance.
“My first picture with Tony was made in France with an entirely French crew, apart from myself and an editor I didn’t like. Oscar Lewenstein had uncovered a screen-play by Jean Genet written many years before, to while away one of his sojourns inside a French prison, that Genet himself had forgotten about…....
“I think it is terribly pretentious for people who are cinematographers to go around and say they looked at a painting by such and such a bod. Nothing irritated me more than, when I was doing Catch-22, Mike Nichols said I want it to look like Andrew Wyeth, that sort of thing is a...
David first used the technique of reflected light rather than direct lighting on a documentary film he was doing about London Transport buses (All That Mighty Heart 1962). “And it had a scene in Welwyn Garden City. In some house there was a housewife tidying up and vacuuming before getting on a Green Line bus....
“The visual style of the film is the province of the lighting director, David Watkin, whose work on Charge of the Light Brigade particularly impressed Nichols. Watkin has the disarming habit of, when being asked a direct question, answering with “Well-…” and then leaving the room. He has spent a great part of...
Speaking of his attitude on set, “What it meant was that I would light a set, watch a rehearsal and then I would actually go to sleep, because it is the one thing you can do on a film set that makes you less tired. Fortunately I don’t snore and I also wake up...
“I have been apprehensive only twice in my whole life. The first was when I arrived at that bakery in the Mile End Road, there was a car park and I saw all these trucks and lorries and generators. I saw the mass of a feature film unit for the first time that morning...
Out of Africa (1985) Based loosely on the autobiographical book by Isak Dinesen (pseudonym of Karen Blixen) published in 1937. The movie received 28 film awards, including seven Academy Awards. David Watkin won the Academy Award for Best Cinematography for his work on Out of Africa. Director: Sydney Pollack Cinematography: David Watkin Camera and...
I feel very fortunate to have met David. As it transpired, it was towards the end of his life but the man was so full of vitality that you could never have guessed he was ill. I was introduced to him following the completion of a film I’d made on a small boy in...
Directed by Hugh Hudson Written by Colin Welland Cinemtography by David Watkin Executive Producer: Dodi Fayad Chariots of Fire is a 1981 British film loosely based on historical events surrounding the British athletic team before and during the 1924 Summer Olympics in Paris. The story follows Harold Abrahams, a Jew out to overcome prejudice,...
Directed by Barbra Streisand Writing credits: Jack Rosenthal (screenplay) and Barbra Streisand Cinematography: David Watkin Camera and Electrical Department Frank Batt: key grip Garrett Brown: Steadicam operator John J. Campbell: first assistant camera (as John Campbell) Derek Gattrell: gaffer (as Derek Gatrell) Gordon Hayman: camera operator: second unit David James: still photographer Brian Kemp:...
Filming Tea with Mussolini I met David at a party at Franco Zeffirelli’s home in Rome. My son had been cast to play Franco Zeffirelli in Tea With Mussolini (TWM) and I was to be his chaperone (required by law as he was under 18 years of age). We were told about David and...
I knew David for just over thirty years; I first met him in 1977 on a commercial that we were supplying equipment on. About a year later we were to supply equipment on the film Chariots of Fire which David was to light. David had a couple of scenes that needed high-speed photography and...
David received a Lifetime Achievement Award in 2004. The T-Shirt that year quoted David on its front: One tries not to fuck it up. Below are snaps of David’s friends, Peter Macdonald and Madelyn Most at Lodz. Daniel Barenboim “Shortterm thinking, or even worse, thoughtlessness, makes many people think that culture, education and the...
Director: Franco Zeffirelli Writers: John Mortimer (writer) Franco Zeffirelli (autobiography) Release Date: 2 April 1999 (UK) Produced by Marco Chimenz, executive producer Clive Parson, producer Pippo Pisciotto, associate producer Riccardo Tozzi, producer Giovannella Zannoni, producer Frederick Muller, producer (uncredited) Original Music by Stefano Arnaldi Alessio Vlad Cinematography by David Watkin Film Editing by Tariq...
Conception of a new lighting technique Watkin conceived of the idea for a new light which would tackle the problem of light falloff during night shoots. Because of the inverse square law, light from even moderately strong sources starts to fall off fairly quickly as the subject walks away from the light source. Therefore...
British Transport Films was an organisation set up in 1949 to make documentary films on the general subject of British transport. Its work included internal training films, travelogues (extolling the virtues of places that could be visited via the British transport system – mostly by rail), and “industrial films” (as they were called) promoting...
David Watkin interview with Peter Handford This interview was recorded in the garden of Peter Handford on the 1st October 2002, by Barry Coward. In 1985 Peter won an Oscar and a Bafta for his work on Sidney Pollack’s Out of Africa. He also worked alongside David on Charge of the Light Brigade (1968)...
David would, very occasionally, take a little nap on set.. And, on those rare occasions, invariably somebody would have a camera at hand… David found a little cave-like area near the church in San Gimignano, where he could beat the heat and nap. When Baird found this out, he followed suit. I call these...
My meeting with David: I was part of a jury at the 2004 edition of Cameraimage. We were all staying in a particularly depressing hotel where the smell of fried foods was everywhere. In the morning, while I was having breakfast, a man, who appeared both to be of a certain maturity yet also...
One of my favourite memories is him phoning me, hardly able to speak for laughter, to tell me why I wasn’t going to work with him on a film. He was about to photograph a film for Richard Lester who always used two cameras so needed two camera operators. At the time I was...
Directed by Mike Nichols Writers: Joseph Heller (novel) Buck Henry (screenplay) Cinematography: David Watkin Camera and Electrical Department Peter Ewens: first assistant camera Bud Gaunt: key grip Earl Gilbert: gaffer Alan McCabe: camera operator Nelson Tyler: helicopter photographer Harold E. Wellman: photographer: second unit (as Harold Wellman) Ronald B. MacKenzie: electrician (uncredited) Robert Willoughby:...
Directed by Tony Richardson Written by Charles Wood Cinematography: David Watkin Film Editing: Kevin Brownlow and Hugh Raggett The Charge of the Light Brigade is a British war film made in 1968 by Woodfall Film Productions, which held the rights to the 1936 film version at the time. It was directed by Tony Richardson....
Goldfinger (1964) Cinematographer: title sequence (uncredited). Pictured: DW behind the camera. Academy Awards, USA Oscar Winner The 58th Annual Academy Awards Oscar Best Cinematography for: Out of Africa (1985) BAFTA Awards 1987 Won BAFTA Film Award Best Cinematography for: Out of Africa (1985) 1982 Nominated BAFTA Film Award Best Cinematography for: Chariots of Fire...
Some quotes, taken from literally, worlds apart: Jim Ballentyne “This is an exercise in self-publishing, the handsomest I have ever come across. Many a commercial publisher should sit down with it. The design of the whole book, from dust jacket (lovely picture of the author at work!) through page layout to binding is...
David Watkin died at the age of 82 in his mews house in Brighton at 10.15pm on the 19th of February, 2008 This must come as a shock to those of you who did not know of the severity of his illness, or were unaware of the speed of his decline in health. Those...
