Creating Visual Energy

Anthony Dod Mantle, the award-winning cameraman on films like Festen (Celebration), Dogville, 28 Days Later and Julien Donkey-Boy gives every impression that he cannot quite believe his luck.

A late-blooming DP, the diffident 48-year-old did not leave film school until he had turned 30, spending the early part of his twenties travelling the world.

It was while in India that he began to recognise his growing love of stills photography.

"My mum's a painter and my dad's a scientist," he explains, "and they were always trying me out with anything artistic everything from the piano to painting.

"When I came back from India I applied to the London College of Printing, got in and studied there for three years before getting my degree.

"So I started off in stills photography and then moved into film. I remember shooting my first film project on a CP 16 camera which was a little strange, a little box with a funny long lens and what looked like a spare tyre balanced on top of it."

Encouraged to pursue his growing fascination with film, Dod Mantle found himself in one of only five available places at the National Film School of Denmark, drawn to the country he admits because of a vague, linguistic connection.

He adds, "I was 30 by the time I left there but I was qualified then and familiar with the Danish tradition." That Danish tradition would form the backbone of a filmmaking ideology that shook up cinema in 1990s, and helped establish Dod Mantle's reputation as a master of digital cinematography.

The Dogma Manifesto, published in 1995 with Lars von Trier and Thomas Vinterberg as the two co-signatories, eschewed the traditional artifice of movies, and sought to find a visual truth that would have echoes with the kind of subjects the filmmakers sought to tell.

Challenging the expectations of both audiences and critics Dogma came of age when Vinterberg won acclaim and awards for (Celebration), a Jury Prize winner at Cannes in 1998 and BAFTA nominee. This too marked Dod Mantle's breakthrough, a well deserved recognition for a career that was beginning to blossom.

"It's funny how things work out," he continues, "because for Thomas, myself and a couple of the actors it was really Celebration that shot us out there into the world.

"It had a certain energy and for some reason the technical palette, the cameras I use in collaboration with each other, fitted what we wanted to do in the way we wanted to do it. I could have shot that film in a thousand and one different ways, but it seemed to marry off there and triggered something.

"It wasn't necessarily me saying this is the only way one should do it from now on, that was simply five weeks of my life and that was the palette I chose artistically."

In more recent times that career has shown impressive variety, signalling the cinematographer's own desire not to typecast as some sort of digi-cowboy to whom producers turn when they want something shot on the cheap.

"I can be really slow, meticulous and expensive," Dod Mantle insists wryly.

But with recent credits including 28 Days Later - punching well above its weight at the US box office and Lars von Trier's critically acclaimed Dogville, Dod Mantle has begun to ring the changes. And they continue to echo through Millions, currently in production and reuniting him with 28 Days Later director Danny Boyle.

The story of 11-year old Anthony and his younger brother Damian, this comedy-drama explores a fascinating moral dilemma.

As our two young heroes stumble across a near quarter of a million pound haul from a robbery they decide to keep the cash for themselves. The only problem is that Britain is about to join the Euro, so they only have seven days in which to enjoy the loot.

It's a problem that many a cash strapped producer would love, but in the way of British filmmaking this is not a film with a huge budget.

Despite this it is being shot on film - a combination of Fuji 64 daylight type 8522, 125 tungsten type 8532, 400 tungsten type 8582 and the Reala 500 daylight type 8592 as well as cross process Kodak reversal stock.

"I was particularly impressed with the Fuji stocks on a telecine level," Dod Mantle explains, "I've noticed that the 400 tungsten stock might not look so appealing in the low contrasts but when you get it into the telecine, the quality of separation and your ability to work on it is very good indeed."

Filming young and inexperienced actors has, inevitably, placed great responsibility on Dod Mantle's shoulders to make the best use of the limited time available.

"As far as the control goes, dollying and not-dollying and running loose with two cameras, I had imagined a less controlled environment. I feared I would have to run two operated cameras to get what I could get as quickly as possible, then try and grade it as well as I could in post.

"But in fact these boys are performing well, and seem to be quite comfortable with it all. We're choreographing our shots and getting away with it."

It's tempting to suggest, given the financial implications of the story, that prudence is Dod Mantle's watchword on Millions. But he is still willing to give his imagination free rein, and take a chance on creating a given effect.

"One thing we're shooting is a strange night exterior, with sky plates and colour plates put together. It's a sodium light, a very strange look. On the tests I shot at three frames per second on available light just to see what it looked like in that exposure. I lit it with massive Wendys on cranes, with black & white plates mixed in with colour filters, that I would then treat to match the sky. The result is kind of magical."

Dod Mantle's success to date has come about through self evident talent, but also an ethic that makes him a team player. This has led to fruitful working relationships with a succession of directors, from Vinterberg including his latest, It's All About Love - Soren Kragh-Jacobsen (Mifune), Harmony Korine (Julien Donkey-Boy) and Boyle to Dogville's Lars von Trier.

"As DPs we are all individual personalities who have different methods of approach and aesthetic attitudes, even though the story should define 98% of that.

"The whole business of pre-production is finding space for that little bit of yourself, without it becoming an ego thing. There are plenty of examples of films where one sometimes feels that the DP has repeated themselves too much and shown their style, and that can tend to dominate proceedings."

To date, Dod Mantle has been happy to put his ego on hold for the good of the film at large. And his methods have produced results. Recalling the success of Celebration he recounts the seat-of-your-pants style of shooting that gave the film such energy and immediacy.

"On that film I basically told the actors to go wherever they wanted, which was very confusing for them and rather amusing to watch.

"These very well trained actors are so used to coming into a room and knowing where the camera would be.

"I would tease them and lie to them, and say that I would be in one place, and when they actually come into the room I d deliberately stand somewhere else.

"I would deliberately place myself in near impossible situations on Celebration to see what kind of energy that created. That was really one of the constants on that film, creating an odd vitality or energy in the camera that forces situations that would never normally occur."

If DV has been a loving mistress over the years, Dod Mantle admits that his true love is celluloid. The note of awe in his voice when he talks of those great cameramen who have been instrumental in helping his career along is evidence of a sincere appreciation of the medium he is working in.

Roger Deakins BSC was a powerful voice of support when it came to getting representation, and the late, great Conrad Hall offered words of encouragement just when they were most needed.

"When I met Conrad Hall I got the feeling that he knew my work," Dod Mantle says quietly, "he knew the flak and the praise I'd been getting in equal measure. That's the business.

"Without even mentioning all that he looked at me with those amazing eyes, and this lovely handshake which I'll never forget, and said that he felt I was leading a wave rather than surfing it."

Success has meant higher profile projects, bigger budgets and presumably the financial rewards that go with it. But as an aesthete who loves the medium, Dod Mantle gets the biggest thrill out of a new challenge, across as wide a range of projects as possible.

"I still look at whatever projects come my way with an open mind," he adds, "be it a two day commercial, a ten day short, documentary or a feature. I consider them all. Obviously the bigger budgets give me a greater freedom to experiment and develop my craft.

"There are rewards there for me, but I still feel as though I really need to seize and embrace new ideas. I try and do that on every film, and that's a fantastic privilege. As long as it lasts, I'll be very grateful.