Time

　　3:00PM-4:30PM, Sunday, August 14, 2022

　　Venue

　　SKP RENDEZ-VOUS

　　No. 87 Jianguo Road, Chaoyang District, Beijing

　　Content

　　For the salon series at the 12th BJIFF, we could not be more humbled to invite the world-renowned filmmaker, Sir Roger A. Deakins, a British cinematographer.

　　Sir Roger A. Deakins is undoubtedly a British treasure in cinema. In a career spanning nearly 50 years, Deakins has scooped numerous international film festival awards: 15 Oscar nominations, two Academy Awards for Best Cinematography, and five BAFTA Awards for Best Cinematography, etc. With images of great tension he creates and the camera style in a class of his own, Deakins is well respected among the global filmdom. In 2013, Roger Deakins was knighted as part of Queen Elizabeth II's New Year Honors, making him the only British cinematographer to be so honored.

　　Anyone who loves film must have read about the works he has shot.

　　In the realm of mainstream commercial films, Sir Deakins has always been a sought-after collaborator for leading directors across the global. He has worked with directors, such as the Coen brothers, Denis Villeneuve, and Sam Mendes, on a number of masterpieces including No Country for Old Men, Sicario, and 1917.

No Country for Old Men poster

　　The Centered Composition and Symmetry, mirroring, and silhouette are all technically commonly seen in Deakins’ works, as shown in Blade Runner 2049, which earned him the Academy Awards for Best Cinematography in 2018. The marriage of these techniques makes Deakins’ films rich in images and emotionally penetrating. In this film, the character is placed in the center of the screen to emphasize his identity as the protagonist, while the dusky sand and empty world as background effectively convey a futuristic, apocalyptic atmosphere that immerses the viewer.

　　Deakins’ poetic exploration of the future world gives the film a strong philosophical atmosphere and has had a far-reaching impact on the aesthetics of subsequent science fiction films.

　　

　　Blade Runner 2049

　　His dedication to well-designed tones and scenes allows Deakins to show a unique artistic temperament even when directing commercial films. Skyfall, a collaboration between Deakins and Sam Mendes, is the most high-profile and critically acclaimed installment in the James Bond series in recent years. One of the key reasons for this is credited to Deakins’ insight into personalities of the characters in the film and his ability to capture the features of the urban landscape in which it is set. Look to one of the film’s classic scenes, the positive and negative characters are fighting in a high-rise building in Shanghai, with a giant blue jellyfish swimming slowly in the city lights behind them. Deakins uses dark blue neon light to set off the crisis lurking in a grim city by contrast, while toning down the violence in fight scenes, hence making fight scenes, which are particularly common in Hollywood action films, more artistic to watch.

　　

　　Skyfall

　　As a master cinematographer, Deakins is capable to make the frame more unique through the subtle design of colors and shots, and at the same time integrate his skills with the film’s narrative. The Shawshank Redemption has been in the list of Best Movies of the Year on Douban, an interest-based social networking platform in China, for years, which would not have been possible without Deakins’ flowing cinematography synergizing with narrative. Even in the 90s, before the full development of techniques and equipment for photography, Deakins used a lot of high angle shots in the film, and used lighting equipment to imitate the natural light of the sky, creating a realistic style. These ingenious designs allow the audience to connect the characters with their environment, enriching the immersive viewing experience to the greatest extent possible while highlighting the social and cultural implications of the film.

　　

　　

　　The Shawshank Redemption

　　It doesn’t take much imagination to see that Deakins has already acquired consummate skills in cinematography. But in fact, behind the screen world, he has another little-known identity – still photographer. Between motion and still, photography and cinematography use different ways to record reality and express emotions. Deakins is quite capable of switching between the two.

　　In 2022, Roger Deakins published his first book of black-and-white still images, Byways, which draws the viewers’ attention to the field of still photography again after more than 50 years of extraordinary experience as a cinematographer. It is also the first time that Deakins shares his life experiences and creative inspirations in still photography with Chinese readers.

　　

　　Cover of Byways

　　For this Byways promotion, we invite Professor Zhu Jiong, associate professor at Beijing Film Academy, curator, and video culture researcher, to communicate with Sir Roger Deakins online. We look forward to energetic discussions between Chinese and British filmmakers at this promotion activity with our audience and readers. We will seek Deakins’ hometown memories from the images of Devon residents working in the countryside, and trace the inspiration of his creations from the British photographic tradition; we will also travel to the seaside and consider Deakins’ exploration of his personal style driven by the ethos of art from his photography of landscapes with no people in them.

　　Furthermore, the salon will focus on the storytelling that is a distinct feature of Deakins’ Byways hardcover. Narrative with still image is a unique combination of Deakins’ life experiences and video creation philosophy. To what extent has Deakins’ filmmaking career influenced his still photography style? How do cinematography and still photography differ in terms of their narrative function?

　　Let’s join the conversation between Sir Roger Deakins and Prof. Zhu Jiong to review the filmmaker’s career and explore the humanism and modernity in video art.

　　

　　Guests

　　Sir Roger A. Deakins

　　

　　Sir Roger A. Deakins, a British cinematographer, and one of the most distinguished cinematographers of our time, is accounted one of the greatest and most influential cinematographers of all time.

　　He has garnered 15 Academy Awards nominations and secured two Academy Awards for Best Cinematography.

　　According to incomplete statistics, Deakins has shot 47 works. Among them, 23 were nominated for the Academy Awards for Best Picture, including 5 wins; 9 were selected for the Festival de Cannes, including 4 wins, and even there was one time that two works competed for the Golden Palm at the same time. His best-known works include The Shawshank Redemption, Fargo, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, No Country for Old Men, The Reader, True Grit, Skyfall, Blade Runner 2049, and 1917. Mr. Deakins is best known for the long-term collaboration with American filmmakers the Coen brothers and British director Sam Mendes.

　　In 2013, Deakins was awarded a knighthood for his services to film in the Queen’s New Year’s Honors list, making him the only cinematographer to be so honored.

 

　　Dr. Zhu Jiong

　　

　　Dr. Zhu Jiong is an associate professor at the Department of Cinematography of Beijing Film Academy, and has been engaged in higher education on cinematography for more than twenty years.

　　Alongside her teaching, Dr. Zhu has been engaged in research on film culture and art curating for a long time. She has published more than one hundred articles in major professional journals on photography. As an image curator, Dr. Zhu has successfully curated photography art exhibitions at major photography festivals in China such as Pingyao, Lianzhou, Shanghai, Dali, and Lishui. In 2016, she curated the “Meditation in Black and White – Straight Photography Exhibition of Paul Caponigro” and “The Alchemy of Light – Tillman Crane’s Platinum Images” at the National Art Museum of China (NAMOC). She was the curator of the 6th Daegu Photo Biennale – Asian Express in 2016, and was nominated for the Redpoll – Best Curator by the jury at the 6th Dali International Film Festival, and the Outstanding Curator at the “Pegasus Cup” hosted by the China Photographers Association in 2015. Also, she won the Expert Recommended Curators Award at the 2017 Lishui Photography Festival.

　　Reminders

　　◇Sir Roger Deakins and Prof. Zhu Jiong will have an online conversation and field questions from the field audience at the Q&A session.

　　◇ The event is free of charge, including admission fee, from start to finish. During the salon, the field audience will have the opportunity to participate in the lucky ticket draw.

　　The WeChat official account of “SKP RENDEZ-VOUS”, Weibo and other platforms will offer a chance to win tickets to the shortlisted films of the Tiantan Award.

　　How to Register

　　Scan the QR code or click the “Read more” link below

　　

　　Bibliography

　　Byways

　　Author: Sir Roger A. Deakins

　　Publisher: Damiani

　　Byways is the first collection of still photography by Sir Roger A. Deakins, a British recipient of the Academy Awards for Best Cinematography.

　　Deakins is critically acclaimed by audiences and among the film industry for his work on films such as The Shawshank Redemption, Skyfall, Blade Runner 2049, and 1917. In his three score years and ten, Deakins returned to the realm of still photography once again and sorted out his past photographic works to publish this book on black and white photographs, Byways.

　　This collection of Deakins’ past unpublished still photographs connects Devon where he spent his childhood, the social vista of post-World War II Britain, and global landscapes, making parallel lines that show the changes in the artistic style of photography around the world over the past century and a half.