ROBERT R I CHARDSON I NTERV I EW | FEATURE
QUENTIN TARANTINO ON ROBERT RICHARDSON DIRECTOR TARANTINO SPEAKING ABOUT HIS FRIEND AND FREQUENT DOP AT ROBERT’S ASC LIFE ACHIEVEMENT AWARD PRESENTATION
it is, I give him 80 movies to watch, and he just says, ‘gimme more, gimme more’. We have exactly the same visual grammar and it is so much fun to watch movies together with him, preparing. I remember when we were getting ready for Django Unchained and we would get 35mm prints of Max Ophüls’ The Exile and Letter from an Unknown Woman and we were watching one of those amazing crane shots that went on forever and we were, wait a minute, how does he do that? So we had the projectionist re- thread the film and we watched that sequence again and went back to watch the camera follow her up the stairs and follow her up the railing... and then the actor walks through the wall, and Bob shouts, that’s how he did it, he actually walks through the wall! From Django onwards we use the crane like other people use a steadicam, or a dolly, we use the crane to shoot an insert of a spoon. I mean, once you take the wall out, why not? That brings me back to something Jeff Bridges just said when he was up here. Bob is so much fun to work with. We laugh all day long. Sitting at that table there is his gaffer Ian Kincaid. We yuk it up and make jokes from 5am until 7pm. Every single day. I always had fun making films but I never had so much fun as making films with Robert Richardson, so without further ado, we will watch a reel of his films.
I am here to give the Lifetime Achievement Award to my collaborator and colleague Robert Richardson. I first met Bob when he contacted me and asked if we could get together to discuss Kill Bill which he wanted to shoot. I already had hired two other cinematographers, but I could not NOT take this meeting. I wanted to hear what he had to say so we met in Toi on Sunset and I had chicken pad thai and Bob had 17 espressos. I can honestly say that was the greatest first date of my life and when it was over, I asked him to marry me and I broke off my two other engagements. And that was five or six films ago if you count Kill Bill twice. We have towels in my bathroom with my initials and his initials on them. One of the things about Bob, along with my late great editor Sally Menke, is that Robert is the greatest artistic collaborator of my life. Absolutely. And I’ve learned so much working with Bob. When the sun is over here in the sky, I have learned, and it took me a long time to learn, that we will shoot right into it from this angle and when the sun is over there, we will shoot into it from the other side. One of the greatest things about Bob, and that applies to most cinematographers sitting in the room here, is they have much more of a passion for cinema than most directors, I mean by far, frankly, to tell the truth. And if I am doing a movie, whatever
LEFT From 2005’s The Aviator BELOW Behind-the-scenes shots from A Private War and Snow Falling on Cedars
We have towels in my bathroomwith my initials and his initials on them
MARCH 20 1 9 | DEF I N I T ION 55
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