Announcing my next project

As you might have noticed, my blog-thru of A Game of Thrones is reaching its end. At some point I will do the sequel, simply because I've already thought up half the snarky chapter titles, but I don't intend to immediately start that.

This weekend I was helping a friend move, and as we were driving to his new place he asked me who my top five favorite directors were. And I really, really didn't have any sort of an answer for that.

See, the director has a crapton of hats to wear. Take, for example, Skyfall. I really don't think very much of that film's script, but I do think that it's well-shot and well-acted and well-edited, and whether Sam Mendes took a hands-on approach to those parts of the production or just picked the right people, he deserves some credit.  I just don't know how much.

Is The Prestige my favorite film because Christopher Nolan directed it? Or is it my favorite film because of the stellar performances, excellent story structure, and Wally Pfister's magnificent cinematography?

Anyway, while I was sitting there in the car, navigating a gridlock while trying to answer my friend's question (I ultimately came up with Nolan and Spielberg for sure, and played with a bunch of other candidates ranging from Stanley Kubrick to Peter Hunt), I realized it'd probably be easier for me to list my five favorite cinematographers than it would be to list my five favorite directors.

So my next project on this blog is going to be entitled "Such Cinematography." I'm going to go through films, a few scenes at a time, and point out camera-work and lighting that appeals to, impresses, or just downright puzzles me. I already have a list of films I want to do this for, some of which are famous for their cinematography and others where I just noticed things that I want to point out.

And the reason that I'll be going through them a few scenes at a time is either because I have the attention span of an alcoholic badger or because I'm in law school and don't have an infinite amount of time on my hands. You can figure out which is true.