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THE BRIDGE (1995)FORMAT: 35mm Anamorphic Location: Italy Lovers, planning to get married, are separated by a bridge guarded by snipers. The snipers are bribed in preparation for the fateful crossing. LOVE AND WARComments by the Director of Photography, Peter Gray This story about two lovers in wartime, is loosely based on an actual incident from the war in the former Yugoslavia in Bosnia & Herzegovina. Much of the detail leading up to the tragedy is unknown, so the director resorted to using ‘artistic license' to flesh out the story. So the film is a dramatic interpretation of actual events, rather than a strictly factual document. THE BRIDGE is the third part of a trilogy of short films by director, Garry Lane, where the story is told visually without dialogue. They are not silent films however, as music and other general sounds help to underline and expand the story. Part one of the trilogy, THE STREAM, and part two, THE LAKE, can be found in the photo gallery via these direct links. As a visual theme, the director wanted to shoot the entire trilogy in the 35mm anamorphic (‘Cinemascope') format, and also in black & white. For logistical reasons, I shot each part of the trilogy with a different B&W negative emulsion. Part one with Agfa,Pan 250, the second with East German Orwo NP77, and this one with Kodak 5222 Double-X Negative. I understand all the black & white film stocks available from Kodak are based on emulsion technology from the 1950's, and are little changed since that time. So they are a little old fashioned by today's standards - a little grainy in relation to their speed rating, with only a modest exposure latitude, and failing to produce very rich blacks in the deepest shadow areas. But for our particular application, I was fairly happy with the final result. And the significantly larger negative area of the anamorphic format helped to reduce the perceived grain structure as well. Finding a suitable location for the film was extremely difficult. We needed a visually-interesting bridge that would also meet our logistical requirements. It needed to be surrounded by taller buildings in a town or village that could double for a war-torn location in Bosnia & Herzegovina. We eventually found something suitable in the mountains in central Italy. The village of Rocca San Casciano was a God send for us. We found this location only a day or so before shooting was scheduled to begin - phew. The township gave us their fullest support for the project, with many of the town's officials and residents going out of their way to help us in whatever way they could. We needed people to stay off the streets, and to close all the windows and shutters to help make it look like a war ravaged village. We also had the help of a local monk who allowed us to shoot in a nearby monastery, another wonderful location. Filming was suspended for one day, as we joined an elaborate annual festival celebration. It was a traditional ceremony that involved the building of giant bonfires in a competition to see which one would burn the longest. We had an a rather visually-interesting location, so the film almost shot itself in terms of good angles and nice compositions. Thank you again Rocca San Casciano for everything!!! Our crew was a mixture of Dutch, German, and Italians. The producers and I were based in Amsterdam, and we brought lighting, grip and sound crews from Holland. The director and lead actress was from Berlin, and we also brought a significant part of the crew from Germany, including the camera crew. The rest of the cast and crew were Italians, more or less equally mixed from the three countries. So an interesting production from this international point of view. It is hard to find anamorphic lenses in Europe, but fortunately Technovision Rome was not far away relatively speaking. They supplied us with a camera and a set of their anamorphic lenses, which performed well. Grip and lighting, including a small crane, came from Italy's second biggest city to the north, Milan (supplied by Movie People). Other support came from Venice, where the production was based. I'm happy to report the film won an ACS Gold Award for the cinematography in 1996. Thank you for all involved for making this a successful and most enjoyable production. This award belongs to all of us!!!! Award: ACS GOLD AWARD for Cinematography, 1996 Invited to Official Competition Program:
Peter Gray
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