A Serious Man – Larry’s Office

[jamesblann]

Hi Roger,

I remember reading an article some time ago where you went into the challenges of shooting Larry’s office in A Serious Man. Watching the film again recently i’d forgotten how much variety in look you built into those scenes across the film, as Larry’s situation deepens it really helps reflect the changing mood in a subtle way. I can’t find that article now (it may even have been a post on this forum) but i’d love to know how you approached lighting here, how you maintained consistency in each scene and what your biggest challenges were on that location.

Thanks,

Topic

[Roger Deakins]

Broad question. Given we were shooting on location – facing west and not on the ground floor – there were many issues with the changing daylight. I mainly controlled the light using reflectors outside the windows, to both bounce light off and to cut any direct sunlight. It also helped that the Coen brothers had storyboarded the scenes and I could judge, within reason, which angles to shoot at a particular time of day.

[jamesblann]

Thank you for the reply! And yes, to be fair it was broad.

Do you remember if you were you using ND gel on the windows much/at all? There is nice range of balance of exposure between inside and outside from scene to scene in this space so I was wondering how you approached that, and also whether you had any lamps outside or was it pure bounce?

Thanks again,

[Roger Deakins]

I did use ND on the windows for some shots but I can’t remember exactly which ones. I would often have frames made to fit  the windows and cover one set with an ND3 and another with ND6. I found that gave a range of options and the adjustment made quite quickly. If there was the budget I would have hard gels cut to size but that was only rarely possible and there would have to be a solid reason for going that route. On A Serious Man we were working with a minimal budget and the windows in that office were quite large. We might have only ‘pasted’ soft gel directly onto the glass using soapy water.

[jamesblann]

Thanks, Roger! I’ve actually never heard of hard gel, I suppose if you’re looking for a more long term solution that sounds like a way to go, if you have a bit of budget going spare! I’ve recently been on a commercial where we had a lot of big windows in very bright countries and I was often butting up against the natural 4′ width of gel rolls, with net’s textured look sometimes being too visible. It’s one of those things that’s always a bit of a headache. Thanks again for your replies.

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