Cinematography by director

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https://www.criticker.com/films/?filter=e57512

Films etc on which the director served as their own director of photography.

Soderbergh is probably the most well-known and prolific (23 films and counting). He is also just about alone in doing so among directors of big-budget action movies. Robert Rodriguez is back at it again. I doubt the underrated Peter Hyams has another one in him (you may interpret that as a challenge, Mr. Hyams).

There is that most independent of filmmakers, Jon Jost, who's been doing it all himself for fifty years and whose films look and play like no one else's.

Chantal Akerman. Still hurts.

I didn't know Doug Liman used to do it sometimes. Go holds up. Almost certainly the only '90s Tarantino rip I can say that for. He hasn't made anything nearly as enjoyable since. Maybe the first half of Edge of Tomorrow.

Vincent Gallo and Shane Carruth are the only ones who also write, edit, star in, and compose the music for their own movies. Carruth has been unable to get another film made and has seen fall apart two different projects he'd devoted years to (this one also hurts). Gallo's inactivity is self-imposed and since The Brown Bunny has opted not to distribute at least one and likely two or more of his own films, in part due to understandable antipathy towards the idiocy of the press in general and film media in particular. I don't know where I'm going. I guess: it's hard to find real vision in the American cinema these days, for many sad reasons.

(Not that more hats necessarily means greater vision, of course.)

Well, there is also Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead: the former writes (most), the latter shoots, and they both act/edit/direct. No acting in the yet-to-be released Synchronic, I understand. But the cast list includes such promising B&M creations as "Church Cult Member", "Conquistador", "Skeleton Man", and "Tom".

Many definitely missing. Omissions much appreciated!

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Vincent Gallo and Shane Carruth are the only ones who also write, edit, star in, and compose the music for their own movies. Carruth has been unable to get another film made and has seen fall apart two different projects he'd devoted years to (this one also hurts). Gallo's inactivity is self-imposed and since The Brown Bunny has opted not to distribute at least one and likely two or more of his own films, in part due to understandable antipathy towards the idiocy of the press in general and film media in particular. I don't know where I'm going. I guess: it's hard to find real vision in the American cinema these days, for many sad reasons.

Wow. Carruth just gave a scorcher of an interview on this very topic. I adore him so.

What sort of advice are you giving a filmmaker at this early stage of his career?

I want Nick to have whatever he wants, but I’m not saying that’s a Hollywood deal with Warner Bros., where you’re stuck at a fucking shingle outside their lot. The guy has more ideas than they have. They’ve got money, and they don’t know how to spend it. I know I need to back down from this conversation but I don’t give a shit. No matter what happens in the next 30 years, this guy is a storyteller with a lot of stories to tell. I can’t say that about a lot of things that I might enjoy this year but won’t remember.

You made some headlines last year by declaring that you were quitting filmmaking. Is that still the case?

The short answer is yes. I’ve got one last project in front of me. I shouldn’t say anything about it. I’m still defining the edges. But that is it for me. I’m not going to say I’m doing a project and then hope Paramount gives me a deal or whatever the hell. I’m not doing that anymore. There’s a thousand other things I’m interested in doing in life that I don’t talk about, because they don’t matter to film Twitter. I have interests and I’m going to go there. I’m not going to spend the rest of my life talking to these assholes and trying to get financing for a fucking bridge loan or whatever the hell they’re going to do. All this shit is stupid. None of it is real. I’m not going to be a guy who spends his life bitching about Hollywood being crass. We already knew that. I just happened to learn how it works. I don’t want to be somebody spending the second half of my life picking and choosing things. I’d love to have a ton of cash. If I did, I’d just distribute this thing, we’d get our money, and that’d be the end of it.

Nicholas Ashe Bateman's The Wanting Mare sounds promising.