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Color Me Storaro
March 13, 2008

Few cinematographers speak about their craft as passionately as Vittorio Storaro, the legendary D.P. who has picked up Oscars for his sumptuous work on such films as Apocalypse Now (1979), Reds (1981) and The Last Emperor (1987), which was the recipient of a glorious re-issue by the Criterion Collection a few weeks back.

 

Storaro is all over the supplemental section of Criterion’s edition of Bernardo Bertolucci’s Last Emperor. In the collection’s most notable featurette, Storaro is on hand to discuss how he applied a color palette to the visual narrative of the life of Puyi, the film’s titular ruler. Relating Puyi’s age and growth to light, Storaro explains his palette as follows:

 

Red = the beginning

Orange = adolescence

Yellow = consciousness

Green = knowledge

Blue = age

White = freedom

 

Pretty colorful stuff, no?

Storaro also speaks of the strong influence the work of Russian painter Alexander Deyneka had on his

cinematography for the film. He points out that Deyneka’s paintings, particularly those from the 40s and 50s, often uses one primary color while the balance of the painting features a black-and-white scheme. This is an idea that Storaro uses frequently in the Communism-drenched prison and re-education sequences in The Last Emperor. The direct influence can be readily seen just be checking out Deyneka’s work, such as this 1944 painting “In occupations.”

 

And so ends today’s art lesson.

 

 

 

Posted by Laurence Lerman on March 13, 2008 | Comments (2)