Cinematography Style: Marcell Rév
INTRODUCTION
If I had to compartmentalise him, I’d place Marcell Rev in the camp of the new school of cinematographers who like to elevate on screen emotion visually by using higher contrast lighting with mixed colour temperatures, a darker negative and a combination of large format digital and film cameras.
The crux of his cinematography style comes down to the idea of ‘emotional realism’.
In this episode I’ll look at Marcel Rev’s philosophy on photography and show some of the gear which he uses to execute his vision.
BACKGROUND
Marcell Rev was born in Hungary and studied cinematography at the Academy of Drama and Film in Budapest where he attended a master class led by legendary DP Vilmos Zsigmond.
After starting his career working mainly in Hungary, he’s since transitioned to shooting a lot of US content. He works in short form on commercials and music videos as well as long form on feature films and series.
Some of the directors he’s worked with include: Sam Levinson, his father Barry Levinson and Kornél Mundruczó.
PHILOSOPHY
One of the directors which he’s probably most known for working with is Sam Levinson. They have a tight creative partnership.
When working together Rev tends to get involved from day one, being sent early drafts of scripts when the concept is still in the idea phase.
He likes getting involved before pre-production starts whenever possible, especially when working for a very visual director like Levinson. Together they will start collecting images, watching films and putting together some visual ideas.
“We collect these visual references. We discuss them and by the time we’re getting to like actual prep, we kind of know what the feel will look like.”
Identifying the feel or emotion behind the look is a crucial part of his process. I’d describe Rev’s stylistic philosophy as ‘emotional realism’ - a way of showing emotion in a more visually exaggerated way.
He often uses amped up cinematic choices, like slightly unrealistic coloured lighting for example, which elevates scenes out of complete naturalism, while the characters and story stay rooted in a more realistic approach.
The primary reference they came up with for Euphoria with its individual, ensemble cast members who are all linked together was Paul Thomas Anderson’s Magnolia.
They drew on some of the longer takes Magnolia used which involved intricate camera moves. To execute the carefully choreographed movement they had planned, Rev recruited Jeff Kunkel as his key grip, who had also worked on Magnolia. Surrounding himself with an experienced technical crew is an important part of Rev’s process.
On Euphoria, once they started pre-production with their visual style in mind they then collaborated to develop comprehensive storyboards for the show. Having these storyboards in place was a great structural tool, as it helped them plan out the difficult camera moves required and meant they had a solid plan going in.
Despite being grounded by a plan, Rev also enjoys moments on set where he can be more reactive and make flexible decisions which may go against the initial plan whenever it’s appropriate.
“I mean there are instinctive decisions on set. We always have a good plan. For most of the situations, for the entire first season we storyboarded and we came with a plan, but with Sam it’s pretty easy to change things on the day. If we feel like something would work better.”
An example of a more instinctive decision occurred on the Part One Special Episode in Euphoria.
The majority of the episode takes place in a diner at night in a long scene. Initially they had only planned to shoot a small portion of the scene at the beginning through the glass window from the outside to establish things and then jump inside to shoot the rest of the scene.
After seeing the 35mm film rushes from the first day, Levinson and Rev both liked the glass foreground so much that they decided to cover a significant portion of the scene from outside the diner and then use those shots when necessary in the edit. It was a risky move, since it was a very long scene and they only had a limited time to shoot it but ultimately it added an interesting perspective to the scene which they hadn’t envisioned in pre-production.
GEAR
To achieve a feeling of emotional realism, Rev has used different cameras, lenses and lights depending on the project’s requirements.
He loves shooting on 35mm film and claims it’s his medium of choice for most projects whenever it's feasible. He likes the Arri system and uses the Arricam LT as his go to 35mm camera. He has paired the Arricam with Eastman Double-X 5222 for a classically grainy black and white look on Malcolm & Marie, and almost always uses Kodak Vision3 500T for 35mm colour work.
However he does accept digital cameras are more suitable for other projects.
White God required working with dogs and rolling for extended periods of time to capture the right moments from the animals. In the end they shot about 170 hours of footage so elected to use the Alexa Mini at 2K for practical and financial reasons. The Alexa’s ability to shoot at 800 ASA with less light also helped him for night scenes where he couldn’t afford the large sources necessary to shoot on the less sensitive 500 ASA film stock which he likes to meter at around 320 ASA.
For Euphoria’s first season he elected to mainly go large format digital, shooting on the Alexa 65. He felt this format had a contemporary feel which suited the mood of the show. As the show and characters matured into the special episodes and season two he swapped large format digital for 35mm film.
However with digital he fights to make the image not feel excessively clean by dirtying it up with lots of atmospheric smoke or using vintage lenses such as the rehoused old glass found in the Arri DNAs.
“We found these amazing lenses for the Alexa large format. We tested with the DNA lenses. Arri is rehousing some old glass. I don’t know what they are, maybe Mamiyas or, I don’t know. They just have this amazing feel to it. And I found one particular lens, a 65mm focal length that we ended up shooting like 98% of the show on that one single lens.”
He’s also used other lenses such as Cooke S4s, Zeiss Super Speeds, Kowa Cine Prominar primes as well as zoom lenses such as the lightweight Angenieux Optimo range. He’s used these zooms to do push ins to direct the audience's focus to a particular character or detail in a shot.
As I mentioned, Rev uses light to evoke an emotional realism. He does this in part by mixing strong light sources with different colour temperatures and hues. He uses a lot of large tungsten units, mixed with LEDs and HMIs.
“I mean I love LED lights but tungsten units have a certain quality that you just can’t match, I think. And when I’m on stage most of the time I do direct sun with tungsten units and I just add a little fill or bounce with HMIs and I endorse that colour contrast. For night exteriors I use tungsten lights a lot.”
For one night scene at a carnival, his crew rigged four 20K tungsten fresnels on condors in different positions spread throughout the large set to backlight the scene. He hid tungsten maxi brutes behind booths and rides to backlight them and accentuated the rest of the set by including various practical lights in different colours in shot. He then used a big softbox rigged overhead as a toplight to provide soft, overhead, moonlight-esque ambient fill to the scenes.
To get a warm, cool colour contrast he regularly mixes the warm temperature of tungsten lights with HMIs gelled with a cool Cyan 30 or 60 gel. Even if these colours aren’t really realistic, they create a more emotionally exaggerated look, which suits the tone of the show.
To give a sense of chaos and introduce the space, as well as connecting various characters together at the carnival scene he used a Technocrane which dollied, jibbed and telescoped smoothly at various points during a long take.
A lot of his work is done either with a dolly tracking along a straight axis, or a handheld camera which he likes to operate.
CONCLUSION
Marcell Rev has used his skills and gear throughout his career to sculpt films with a bold visual style which isn’t always overly bothered with reality.
Instead his photography focuses on using cameras, lights and movement in creative and innovative ways to produce a response which appropriately represents the emotions of the story and the characters.