Michael Chapman Named ASC Lifetime Achievement Award Recipient

Michael Chapman, ASC will receive the American Society ofCinematographers (ASC) Lifetime Achievement Award, which is presentedannually to an individual who has made outstanding and enduringcontributions to advancing the art of filmmaking. The presentation willbe made during the 18th Annual ASC Outstanding Achievement Awards hereat the Century Plaza Hotel on February 8, 2004.

"Michael Chapman has made extraordinary contributions to the art offilmmaking," says ASC President Richard Crudo. "He is an innovativestoryteller with an original approach to cinematography, which issometimes complex and often elegantly simple. I admired him from afarwhen I was starting my career. His artistry and courage are a source ofinspiration for all aspiring filmmakers with unrealized dreams."

Chapman has compiled some 40 narrative credits as a cinematographersince launching his career with The Last Detail in 1974. Heearned Oscar nominations in 1981 for Raging Bull and in 1994 forThe Fugitive. His body of work consists of such diverse films asTaxi Driver, The Wanderers, The White Dawn,Invasion of the Body Snatchers, The Last Waltz, DocHollywood, Personal Best, Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid,Rising Sun and Primal Fear. His upcoming releases includeEulogy and Suspect Zero.

Chapman joins an impressive list of former ASC Lifetime AchievementAward recipients, including several with whom he worked as a crewmember at the beginning of his own career. He was a camera operator forBill Butler, ASC on Jaws and for Gordon Willis, ASC on Klute, TheGodfather and several other films.

"I also worked with Gordon [Willis] on many commercials," Chapmansays. "It was quite a ride. I got to watch while a man made up a wholenew style of 'seeing.' I knew I could never imitate Gordy, but from ouryears together, I took away the seriousness of purpose that he saw, andthe idea that light could be organized to express strong emotions."

Past award recipients include Willis, George Folsey, ASC, PhilLathrop, ASC, Charles Lang, Jr. ASC, Stanley Cortez, ASC, Joe Biroc,ASC, Haskell Wexler, ASC, Conrad L. Hall, ASC, Sven Nykvist, ASC, OwenRoizman, ASC, Victor J. Kemper, ASC, Vittorio Storaro, ASC, AIC, VilmosZsigmond, ASC, Laszlo Kovacs, ASC, William Fraker, ASC and Bill Butler,ASC.

Chapman was born and raised in Massachusetts. He attended Andoverand then Columbia University. After college, he spent two years in theUnited States Army, and then two more as a freight brakeman on therailroad. He was eventually led into the movie business by hisfather-in-law Joe Brun, ASC, a French cinematographer who earned anOscar nomination for Martin Luther (1953). During his initiation intothe New York filmmaking community, Chapman met several cinematographersincluding Boris Kaufman, ASC, who won an Oscar in 1955 for On theWaterfront. That led him to a camera crew job at MPO, a commercialcompany in New York, where he met Willis, Roizman, director MichaelCimino and other narrative filmmakers.

Willis introduced Chapman to director Hal Ashby, which led to hisfirst feature film credit on The Last Detail. Chapman's nextfilm was The White Dawn, the first of his four collaborationswith director Philip Kaufman. During that seminal period, Chapman alsocollaborated with directors Martin Ritt on The Front and MartinScorsese on Taxi Driver. Film critic Pauline Kael tabbed Chapmanas someone to watch while reviewing Taxi Driver. She wrote, "Hisdepiction of street life in New York added a seamy, rich pulpiness tothe story." Chapman also worked with Scorsese on The Last Waltzand Raging Bull.

"Marty has a very special insight into the grammar of cameramovement, angles and composition," Chapman says. "One of the big thingsI learned from working with him was to think of the camera as an actorresponding emotionally to the scene."

Chapman is a member of SAG with around a dozen acting credits,mainly bit roles on films he has shot. In Raging Bull, heportrayed a still photographer who is seen at ringside with a cigar inhis mouth and a Speed Graphic camera poised to shoot. Chapman has alsodirected several films, including The Clan of the Cave Bear andAll the Right Moves, as well as writing The VikingSagas.

"Cinematography is a lot like acting," Chapman observes. "You don'thave time for introspection. You have to trust your instincts. Theaudience doesn't consciously see everything we do, but they rememberhow it made them feel. I'm never totally satisfied when I see one of myold films. It always starts me thinking about how I could have donesomething differently. Filmmaking is a serious business, but there isalso a subconscious yearning for something far more ethereal anddeeper."

Roizman, who chairs the ASC Awards committee says, "I wish I couldtell you that I noticed Michael Chapman when we were working at MPOduring the 1960s, and recognized that he was going to become one of themost influential filmmakers of our times. The truth is that a lot ofpeople have natural talent. Michael has that extra something, whichseparates the great artists from the good ones. He has a fiercedetermination to keep learning and growing. That's how you build agreat body of work."

ASC traces its roots to the dawn of the motion picture industryduring the early 1900s, when the Cinema Camera Club was organized inNew York and the Static Club in Los Angeles. The two clubs merged inJanuary 1919 with 15 charter members for the primary purpose ofadvancing the art and craft of filmmaking. Membership has always beenby invitation based on the individual's body of work. There are some210 active members today in many parts of the world, and another 130associate members from allied disciplines that support the art andcraft of cinematography.