Baz Luhrmann and cinematographer Mandy Walker get full house after screening Standing ovation Elvis and talk about filmmaking, Monday night at EnergaCamerimage ) International Cinematography Festival in Torun, Poland.
Earlier, Luhrmann received a special award for outstanding director at the festival and invited Walker (their previous collaborations included Australia
) joined him on stage, noting that “we are all connected in making stories.” Accepting the award, the director took time to comment on a short film that was screened during the festival , a short film about filmmakers who have joined the Ukrainian military since the Russian invasion, says Camerimage stands with Ukraine. Helmer said he and Walker watched “a three-minute film about our brothers who were filming in Ukraine. Then we saw them fighting for their lives with guns. We all cried.… Impossible to be here and not feel the emotion. I think the world needs to pay attention to what’s going on.”
at Elvis After the screening, Luhrmann and Walker returned to the stage to discuss the film. The director expressed his commitment to the theatrical experience, which won warm applause. “I said, ‘I wouldn’t make this movie if it was going straight to streaming,'” he said. “We’re making theatrical movies for theaters.”
Walker describes their carefully planned process. “Working with Baz, nothing is up in the air in terms of how we shoot each scene. It’s always about storytelling,” she says, noting that it touches all departments, including product design, hairstyling and makeup. “There, we develop ideas for each sequence. We talk about it in terms of emotion and how we want the audience to experience the moment. Buzz spends a lot of time engaging us all. Some of our testing is in the film …Once we talk about visual language, we don’t think about it, we just feel it. Because we’ve got that language.”
Movie The photographer – whose previous work with Luhrmann includes Australia – also spoke about making Elvis’151 The meticulous work involved in such well-known shows as the Comeback Special. “For people who saw the performances, we accurately reproduced the camera angles and lighting, and even added grain.” She notes that some actual archival footage was also in the final film.
“Baz made a movie my parents loved, and [The Elvis Story] found a new audience,” Walker continues. “It’s that combination — trying to replicate the archival parts of it, but also making it something that appeals to all audiences. To make that visual language work — it’s about introducing Elvis to new audiences in a modern way.”
Luhrmann elaborated, “We have to say what it was like, but young people have to know what it was like. So everything we do is what Elvis did. . Bringing older audiences, younger audiences, all audiences into theaters.” Note that Elvis Presley is currently the highest-grossing non-franchise of the year Running domestic films, $151 million (and worldwide 151 dollars), he added, “I think We’ve done what Elvis would have tried to do.”
