58 December 2004

From the first harrowing craneshot snaking through a muddyWorld War I trench, A VeryLong Engagement plunges theviewer into an epic, color-

charged vision of battle-torn France.Based on the bestselling novel bySébastien Japrisot, this operaticmotion picture tells the story of ayoung woman’s relentless investiga-tion into the death of her fiancé,

who was condemned by a militarytribunal and sent out to die withfour other soldiers in the bleak “noman’s land” between the French andGerman trenches. Denying all evi-dence to the contrary, Mathilde(Audrey Tautou) stubbornly refusesto believe that her beloved is dead,and enlists the services of a detectiveto find out all she can about the inci-dent and those involved.

The resulting, far-flung inves-tigation takes us back and forth intime: scenes at Mathilde’s home onthe coast of Brittany are set in 1920,but flashbacks transport us to thebattlefield three years earlier and toother locations throughout France.In addition to bloody battles, thestory’s ambitious sweep includesscenes set in rural Corsica, a series ofbordellos, Montmartre, train sta-

Bruno Delbonnel, AFC enlists for A Very Long Engagement, astylized World War I drama that tracks a Frenchwoman’s dogged

attempts to determine her fiancé’s fate on the battlefield.

by BenjaminB

Unit photography by Bruno Calvo

CinematicImpressionism

American Cinematographer 59

tions, a field hospital and a militarycemetery. The narrative involves acast of colorful characters, includingthe avuncular detective, Mathilde’shomespun aunt and uncle, a cow-ardly pimp, a failed revolutionary, aloyal friend and a murderous prosti-tute. In order to delineate the manystrands of this dense detective story,the screen occasionally splits intotwo or more images that convey theexchange of letters and phone callsor remind viewers of important plotpoints.

Despite its scale, A Very LongEngagement is ultimately a love storydriven by a woman’s unwaveringfaith. Director Jean-Pierre Jeunetand cinematographer BrunoDelbonnel, AFC place this simpletale in a world that is more of a per-sonal vision than a historical reen-actment. From the very start,Delbonnel’s richly colored imagestransport the viewer past realismand into what could be called cine-matic impressionism. As the filmreaches its emotional conclusion,the viewer is left with an unforget-table patchwork of multi-huedmemories.

Jeunet and Delbonnel’s lastcollaboration, Amélie, garnered fiveAcademy Award nominations,including one for Delbonnel’s cine-matography. The cameraman also

earned an ASC Award nominationfor his work on the film. A Very LongEngagement certainly attempts tocapitalize on this success; the mam-moth project involved almost sevenmonths of shooting, dozens of loca-tions and a budget of approximately45 million Euros. Warner Bros.demonstrated its faith in the projectby agreeing to co-produce the filmin French and by giving Jeunet com-plete artistic freedom, includingfinal cut. Delbonnel says the designof the film’s cinematography wasaided by Jeunet’s propensity formeticulous preparation. Prior toshooting, the duo worked out andagreed upon a series of guiding prin-ciples that would dictate their use oflenses, lighting and color.

In his own approach to cine-matography, Delbonnel seeks to

limit the variables. On A Very LongEngagement, he used only two nega-tives, Kodak Vision 200T 5274 andVision2 500T 5218; he employed thelatter only when he didn’t haveenough light to use the 74. He is rig-orous about exposure, checking thecalibration of his three light meterswith his gaffer every morning. Herelies upon incident readings, onlyusing a spot meter if he’s dealingwith a bluescreen shoot or someother specialized application. “I’mnot extremely technical,” he confess-es. “I do exposure tests, but fromthere I don’t move; I stay within theresults of my tests. I know that I havethree stops above and three stopsbelow, and I play within that range— unless I want the image to beburned out, when I’ll go five stopsover, or if I want to the image to go

Opposite: Tocreate this moodytableau of thefilm’s heroinewalking throughMontmartre afterdark,cinematographerBruno Delbonneland colorist YvanLucascompositedtogether day andnighttime footage.Daytime footageof clouds wasincorporated intothe scene to givethe formationsmore definition inthe frame. Thispage, top: One ofthe condemnedFrench soldiersmakes his waythrough “noman’s land” onthe World War Ibattlefield in theSomme. Below:To provide a starkcontrast to thebattle scenes,shots ofMathilde’sbedroom inBrittany weregiven a warm,inviting tone.

Fram

e gr

abs

cou

rtes

y of

Écl

air

Labo

rato

ries

(fr

om V

isio

n P

rem

ier

rele

ase

prin

ts);

phot

o of

cran

e by

gaf

fer

Mic

hel S

abou

rdy.

All

imag

es ©

2003

Pro

duct

ion

s/W

arn

er B

ros.

Fran

ce 2

004.

60 December 2004

black, when I’ll go six or seven stopsunder. I’ve always used Kodakstocks, including their print stocks,because I know them by heart, andthey correspond to my way of work-ing. I lock things in early on so that Ican focus on lighting and not worryabout technique.”

For Delbonnel, the release-print stock is an integral part ofhis cinematographic design.“Everything is linked, and on this

show I worked with Vision Premier[2393] in mind from the start,” hesays, adding that he and Jeunet hadto fight for that print stock becauseit’s more expensive.

Although Jeunet givesDelbonnel considerable freedom inthe lighting of a sequence, the direc-tor is adamant about one aspect ofhis films.“Jean-Pierre wants to see asmuch as possible in the frame,” saysDelbonnel. “One of his guidingprinciples is to show everything; hedoesn’t like complete darkness, andthere is almost none in the film. Anexample is a sequence set in a smallshed where the condemned soldierseat at night. I wanted to play italmost abstract, with just the facesvisible, but Jean-Pierre wanted toshow a little of the background. Toget the feeling he wanted, I loweredthe contrast a bit so that we still hada sense of the space. In this film, wewent further toward darkness thanwe had before; we even did a fewshots in silhouette, where Jean-Pierre agreed to let things go dark.”

Another signature trait ofJeunet’s work is his systematic use ofwide-angle lenses, often placed veryclose to the actors. Short focallengths yield a more exaggeratedperspective and greater depth offield than longer lenses. For theviewer, the increased perspective

heightens the three-dimensionalquality of camera moves, while thedepth of field keeps more in focuswithin the frame.

For Very Long Engagement,which was shot in Super 35mm2.35:1, Delbonnel used ArricamStudios and Lites and an Aaton 35-III, all outfitted with Cooke S4 lens-es. He used no diffusion on the lens,as he prefers to diffuse with lighting.He notes that the Cookes also natu-rally soften the image.“For this film,I felt that the Cookes correspondedto my lighting, and the brand alsooffers a great range of short focallengths: there are eight lensesbetween 14mm and 35mm.Working with Jean-Pierre, we couldhave returned all the lenses above32mm to Technovision — if theyhad rented to us by the lens, wecould have made some savings!”

The picture was shot princi-pally with 21mm, 25mm and 27mmlenses to give it a strong visual coher-ence. Delbonnel stresses, however,that it’s more difficult to light forwide lenses than long ones. “Withshort focal lengths, there’s a feelingof depth, but the background is a lit-tle soft. It’s not a beautiful softness,though, so you have to rework thebackground lighting. You can’t justadd fill light, because the imagequickly becomes flat. Because you

Right: Frenchsoldiers huddle

in their rainytrench, a.k.a.

BingoCrepuscule.

Delbonnelsought to lend

these scenes an“oppressive”look and feel.

Below: To helpcontrol the

lighting for thetrench, a 460-

square-footframe wassuspended

above it to blockout the sun. Theframe was hung

from a 70-toncrane and could

be tilted tochange its

orientation.

Cinematic Impressionism

American Cinematographer 61

can’t create depth with soft focus —for example, to isolate a face fromthe background — you have to do itwith lighting.

“Jean-Pierre wants everythingto be pretty sharp. I’m thereforeobliged to work at a closed-downstop, at least a T4/5.6 in interiors;otherwise, it’s too hard for the assis-tant. But even with a 21mm, if you’redoing a close-up of an actress who’s50 centimeters away from the cam-era, you’re going to get some softnessin the background no matter whatthe stop. You need to close down theaperture just to keep both the noseand ears in focus!”

Wide lenses are traditionallyavoided for close-ups, because theheightened perspective can makefaces bulge in an unflattering way,especially when the actor is close tothe camera. Yet A Very LongEngagement is rife with beautifulwide-angle close-ups of Tautou.Delbonnel explains that each face isrendered differently by a given lens,and before shooting Amélie, thefilmmakers sought the ideal lens forthe actress. “We did tests to find outthe focal lengths and the cameraheight that suited her best. Jean-Pierre doesn’t like to have a cameraat eye height, so there’s always aslight tilt up or down. With a shortfocal length, a tilted camera quickly

becomes significant in terms of per-spective. We found the slight tiltangle, usually a tilt up, which was thelimit that Audrey’s face can take. Wesaw that her face worked well withthe 25mm and 27 mm. The 21mmstill works for her, but you have to becareful; the 18mm doesn’t work, nordoes the 35mm.”

The close-ups in A Very LongEngagement have a peculiar intima-cy, with the actors’ gaze often almosthead-on into the lens. Delbonneldescribes Jeunet’s camera positionsas “inquisitive, almost peering intothe actors’ soul.” The director likeseyelines very close to camera.During dialogue scenes, the crewsometimes taped a foam cushion onthe camera side, so that the offscreen

actor could press his face against thecamera to help direct the eyes of hison-camera counterpart. On modernsets, cameras are festooned withwires and accessories, but Delbonnelsays that Jeunet wants a “naked cam-era” to allow himself and his actorsaccess, and to avoid distracting theplayers. This often meant strippingthe camera of its mattebox, a highlyunusual configuration.

Much of the film’s poetry iscreated through fluid camera move-ments. The camera is often on themove, whether creeping around adialogue scene or swooping above abattlefield. Jeunet designs the shotswith extensive storyboards, and heavoids traditional master shots andover-the-shoulders. As is often the

Left: Mathilde’sfiancé, Manech(Gaspard Ulliel)observes anenemy plane ashe seeks refugeby a tree in noman’s land.Below: Thecrew executes acircular dolly tocapture a keymoment in thesequence.

62 December 2004

case on European films, Delbonneldid all of the A-camera operating,and he also operated the frequentcrane shots, which were accom-plished with a Technocrane andSuperTechnocrane. Valentin Mongeoperated the numerous Steadicamshots.

Delbonnel prefers soft light-ing, noting that “it’s essentially aquestion of sensibility. I really lovesoft light, but I have a lot of prob-lems with hard shadows; it must bemy way of seeing the world. Butwhile my lighting is very soft, I wantit to be contrasty.” He adds that hehas a propensity for side sources,and he avoids frontal lighting, evenfor fill.“I’ve seen other cinematogra-phers make sublime images withfrontlight, but I just can’t do it. Everytime I try it, it doesn’t look good tomy eye. So it comes back to a matterof taste.”

The most daunting part of theshoot was the six weeks set in thetrenches. Delbonnel offers, “Wewanted an oppressive sky, with thefeeling that the sky was pushingdown on the soldiers below. We alsostarted out with the rule that therewould be no sunshine in the trench-es, and that there would always besunshine at Mathilde’s house inBrittany.” The filmmakers were ableto hew to their rules with a fewnotable exceptions, including a sun-

lit battle that could not be resched-uled. Although the resultant scene isbeautifully backlit, the cinematogra-pher didn’t want any sequences to be“too beautiful to depict the horror ofwar.”

The trenches were roughly220 yards long, and Delbonnel madea daring proposal: to build a 460-square-foot frame and suspend itabove the trenches to block out thesun. The weighty frame would besuspended from a 70-ton crane andequipped with a hydraulic system totilt its orientation.“Everyone lookedat me as though I were crazy, but Itold them that it was the only way toshoot when it was sunny and ensurecontinuity. That sunk in pretty

quickly.” With a laugh, he adds, “Iactually asked for two frames tobegin with, but that didn’t godown.”

Delbonnel had the giantframe tinted a slight gray-green tolend an overall cast to the trenchesbelow. The frame served alternative-ly as a light filter or light source.From Transpalux, the productionrented “La Grue,” a huge crane out-fitted with six 18K HMIs that wouldprovide light through the framewhen there wasn’t enough exposurein the trenches. When the produc-tion added cranes to provide rain,the vast location began to look like agiant construction site. For nightexteriors, “La Grue” provided a

Cinematic ImpressionismOne of Jeunet’s

stylisticsignatures is hisunconventional

use of wide-angle lenses for

close-ups. Tomaximize the

effectiveness ofthis tactic,Delbonnel

conducted testswith lead

actress AudreyTautou to

determine thebest lenses to

employ. “Wesaw that herface worked

well with the25mm and

27mm,” thecinematographer

reveals. “The21mm still works

for her, but youhave to be

careful; the18mm doesn’t

work, nor doesthe 35mm.”

64 December 2004

slight backlight, with top fill lightgenerated by three 8K helium bal-loons and, sometimes military flares.

Down in the trenches,Delbonnel further colored the day-time image by adding an 81EF filteron the lens. The resulting imageshad a bluish tint that combined withthe soft greenish fill from the frameabove. When needed, he had hiselectricians carry an 800-watt HMIon a pole in front of the actors “tobring out their eyes.”

When the filmmakers movedto studio interiors — like Mathilde’shome, a string of bordellos, or thedetective’s office — he continued hisstrategy of a soft light coming fromabove. “My gaffer and I developed aluminous ceiling that can be part of

the set,” he reveals.“It’s made of verydense, brushed cotton — the samecotton that set decorators use ontheir sets — and I light through it.The light is spread evenly over thewhole ceiling and it gives a base filllevel that separates the elements ofthe set. There are even some sceneswhere it’s in the shot!”For a day inte-rior, he might set this overhead“shower” at 11⁄2 to 2 stops below key.

Delbonnel uses space lights or5K soft lights to pierce through theceiling. He adds that the units arepatched through dimmers so he canwarm the color temperature quicklyand easily. If the ceiling is out offrame, he sometimes turns off lightsto create a brighter center that helpsseparate the actors below from the

background.On set and on location,

Delbonnel typically keys his lightingwith large sources, such as Dinolights for the Brittany day interiors.“It’s a classical choice that goes backto the work of cinematographerslike Vittorio Storaro [ASC, AIC] andJohn Alcott [BSC]: the bigger andfarther away the source is, the moreyou can work it — cut it or diffuse it.I keep things simple. In general, Istart from a big source and play withthe distance of the fixture and thediffusion in front of it to soften thelight more or less. One great advan-tage of a big source is that it willwrap around a face. I will only usespots in the background. Again, Inever have light behind the camera;

Thefilmmmakers

lent acomforting

glow to bothexteriors and

interiors set atthe house in

Brittany.According to

Delbonnel, “Westarted out with

the rule thatthere would beno sunshine in

the trenches,and that therewould alwaysbe sunshine at

Mathilde’shouse in

Brittany.”

Cinematic Impressionism

in the hospital; and sometimes agreenish brown, as in the trenches.Brown is what ties the two parts ofthe movie together. We didn’t want acompletely unified tone. The color iswarm and rather monochromatic,but we always sought to bring outspots of other colors. For the trench-es, the image is cold and alwaysanchored on the blue of the Frenchsoldiers’ uniforms.”

Delbonnel singles out ÉclairLaboratories colorist Yvan Lucas forhis contribution to the film’s sophis-ticated range of colors. In the 1990s,Lucas made great contributions tothe application of silver-retentionprocesses like ENR, notably onevery Jeunet film that has usedthem.“Yvan is one of the besttimers in the world,” Delbonnelsays, adding with a chuckle,

it either comes from the side or fromabove. I add very little inside the set;I try to build the lighting as a func-tion of the set and the frame.”

Although he avoids lights onthe set, Delbonnel occasionally usesa Kino Flo Flathead 80 with diffu-sion to supplement a large source.“The Flathead allows us to be nearthe actors because it doesn’t heatup.”When using reflectors, he avoidswhite. “I don’t like white reflectionson the skin — you feel them.” Heuses a gold reflector instead, or cre-ates bounce light off a straw gel.

Delbonnel stresses that hislighting is not realistic. “Realismdoesn’t interest me! I strive for anunrealistic approach. It’s veryimportant to me, and it’s why I don’tdo certain films. For example, in thisfilm we have scenes set in 1920, butthere is no gaslight.”He adds that thestrong colors of the film are “anaffirmation that what you are seeingis not reality. We’re not reconstitut-ing a period; we’re not doing sepia.We’re in a world that has existed, butisn’t a reference to other depictions.”

At this point in the discus-sion, the cinematographer pauses topraise Gordon Willis, ASC. ForDelbonnel, one of the landmarks ofcinematography is Willis’ pioneer-ing use of skirted bay lights (or“chicken coops”) to illuminatescenes from above in the Godfathermovies. Prior to production on AVery Long Engagement, Jeunetscreened the flashback sequences ofGodfather II, set in Sicily and NewYork, for key collaborators as a refer-ence for designing a warm colorscheme. The color palette ofEngagement is quite a bit more var-ied, however, and contributes muchto the film’s modern look.

Delbonnel broadly dividesthe film into the “cold” colors of thewartime trenches and the “warm”world of peacetime. The key colorfor the film is brown, “sometimes areddish brown, as in Mathilde’s bed-room; sometimes a yellow brown, as

65

66 December 2004

“I wish I had his film credits!He has an exceptional eye. He’snot just someone who times myimage. I want him to bring some-thing to the image. We talk a lot.There were some rushes where I toldhim, ‘Do this, and if you want to, trysomething else.’ Sometimes he goestoo far, and sometimes it’s betterthan what I imagined.”

In a telephone interview,Lucas explains that Jeunet andDelbonnel asked him to follow theproduction “from initial tests, to hi-def timed dailies, to timing, to thefirst theater screenings, and throughto the DVD.” Using a DiscreetLustre, Delbonnel and Lucas spentsix weeks on the digital intermediate

(DI) at Éclair, where they were visit-ed frequently by Jeunet. “I comefrom photochemical processes likeENR, and I always strive to conservethe grain, the substance of film,” saysLucas. “I’m a little traditional thatway.” He notes that the look of AVery Long Engagement was refinedby a kind of “virtual” cinematogra-phy. “It’s as if Bruno had put morefilters or gels on his lights, but in theDI. We stayed in the spirit of tradi-tional timing, but with a lot morepossibilities. To me, the feel of thefilm corresponds a little bit to ENR.”

A key component of the colortiming was desaturating the imageand then enhancing certain colors.For the peacetime footage, says

Lucas, “we added red to the blacksand desaturated, which yields abrownish hue. We then increasedselected colors, and this added colorwas made more important becauseof the desaturation.”Delbonnel addsthat “once you get past the basicopposition between warm and cold,the color is linked to the nature ofthe set. But [it’s linked] even more tothe [location] of the sequence in thefilm and its proximity to the trench-es or to Brittany.”

When the filmmakers triedheightening several colors in theframe, recalls Lucas,“All of a sudden,the image became normal, so wedecided pretty quickly to onlystrengthen one color. It became the

Cinematic ImpressionismRight:

Mathilde’s darkcounterpart,imprisoned

prostitute TinaLombardi

(MarionCotillard),

provides ourheroine with

crucial piecesof the story’s

puzzle. Duringpostproduction,

flashbackswere

sometimescomposited into

varioussequences as a

stylish way tohelp viewers

follow thenarrative.

Below: Seekingrevenge for her

own lost love,Tina seduces a

villainouscommandant

beforedispatching himwith some very

unkind cuts.

rule for the film, but there wereexceptions. For example, in theOrsay train station, we wanted toshowcase the blue-greens of theglass façade and the brown of thecostumes.” Lucas cautions that theamount of coloring required a deli-cate touch. “Obviously, the colorsare not realistic, but if we had goneany further with them I don’t think

we would have been able to includeas many different hues in the film— it would have been too much.Bruno and I always strove forfinesse.”

Delbonnel recalls that thecolors for the trench scenes were thehardest to come by. “We got thecolor by seeking out the clay brownof the earth,” he says. Adds Lucas, “I

can’t even describe the color of thetrenches. I can’t call it green or blue-green. We ended up calling it a clayhue. Our job was difficult becauseeverything is linked to the contrast,and there were also those blue-graycostumes that had to be strength-ened.”

Delbonnel reminds us thatfaces are essential to cinema. For thetrench scenes, he shot tests to find apale, greenish makeup for the actorsthat would remain white when helater warmed up the image digitally.“In the trenches, despite everythingelse, you go to the faces. The faceshave a different tone than the rest ofthe image. That’s why I didn’t wantjust one color, because an imagewhere everything is the same tonali-ty doesn’t direct your eye. In cinema,the viewer’s eye must go towards theactors’ faces.”

For peacetime scenes, Lucasnotes, “We brightened the faces by

Cotillard’sprostitute

adopts an ironicdisguise as

Delbonnelseeks divine

inspiration.

Cinematic Impressionism

68

putting a little gold in the midtonesand the whites.” While working onpeacetime exteriors, the teamsought to create golden browns.“For the split-screens, though, wenever tried to respect the originalcolors, but rather to contrast them.So they are very marked.” To furtherdirect the viewer’s eye, Delbonnelasked Lucas to use Power Windowsto add a slight vignetting to much ofthe film, which subtly harks back toearly silent films.

A Very Long Engagement wasoutput via Arrilaser directly to aninterpositive, skipping the usualnegative stock generation. Lucasobserves that the resultant image is“a little sharper. Even though there’snot a huge difference, you’re a littlecloser to the original negative.” Headds that Delbonnel’s choice ofVision Premier print stock wasessential to the DI, because it ren-ders “beautiful blacks and increases

the apparent sharpness,” compen-sating for the slight loss inherent inthe 2K process.

As Delbonnel looks back onthe production, he takes time tothank the many collaborators whomade it possible: Steadicam operatorMonge, gaffer Michel Sabourdy, firstAC Eric Vallée, key grip BrunoDubet and post supervisor LionelKopp. He also cites Technovision’sNatasza Chroscicki, Transpalux’Didier Diaz and Éclair’s OlivierChiavassa for their support, andcredits Duboi’s Alain Carsoux andhis team for “stunning”visual effects.

Asked about the impression-istic feel of A Very Long Engagement,Delbonnel offers, “In the past, Ialways thought it was false to com-pare cinema to painting. There’sbeen a century of cinema, which isdistinct from photography andpainting. So my references havealways been the great cinematogra-

phers, like Gianni Di Venanzo and[ASC members] Conrad Hall, SvenNykvist and Vilmos Zsigmond.However, the DI is a new step in thecreation of a film. With this process,we can start to work with elementsthat are close to painting, and we canwork on contrast and color relation-ships that were impossible with photochemistry.” ■

69

TECHNICAL SPECS

Super 35mm 2.35:1

Arricam Studio, Lite; Aaton 35-IIICooke S4 lenses

Kodak Vision 200T 5274, Vision2 500T 5218

Digital Intermediate byÉclair Laboratories

Printed on Kodak Vision Premier 2393