Cinematographer Conrad Hall dies at 76
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Cinematographer Conrad L. Hall, a master artist of the camera who was nominated for nine Oscars and won two, has died. He was 76.
Hall died Saturday at a Santa Monica hospital of complications of bladder cancer, said his wife, Susan Hall.
Considered an expert in the use of light, Hall filmed nearly three dozen movies in a career that stretched over 50 years. He won Academy Awards for 1969’s Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and 1999’s American Beauty.
“Every film that he worked on was something beautiful to the eye and very imaginative,” said producer Richard Zanuck, who was head of production at Twentieth Century Fox when Hall made Butch Cassidy and worked with him on last year’s Irish-American mob tale, Road to Perdition.
“With Road to Perdition, you could virtually take every frame of his work and blow it up and hang it over your fireplace. It was like Rembrandt at work,” Zanuck said. “Connie was not known for speed, but neither was Rembrandt. He was known for incredible genius.”
Hall’s other films included The Professionals (1966), In Cold Blood (1967), The Day of the Locust (1975) and Searching for Bobby Fischer (1993).
His many honours included a lifetime achievement award from the American Society of Cinematography in 1994 and an outstanding achievement award in 1988 for Tequila Sunrise. He served last year as Kodak cinematographer in residence at the University of California, Los Angeles’ School of Theater, Film and Television.
Hall was to be honoured later this month with a lifetime achievement award from the National Board of Review, Susan Hall said.
Born and raised in Tahiti, Hall was the son of James Norman Hall, co-author of the novels Mutiny on the Bounty and The Hurricane. He initially wanted to go into journalism, but after doing poorly in a creative writing class at the University of Southern California, he looked for a new major by flipping through the course catalogue, he told the Los Angeles Times last year.
“It started with A for astronomy, B for biology and C for cinema. I thought ‘Cinema? You mean like movies? Rubbing elbows with stars? Making all that money?’ For all the wrong reasons, I signed up, and then had a love affair with the visual language and learned to tell stories like my dad,” Hall said.
Hall’s son, Conrad W. Hall, followed him in the profession, most recently filming Panic Room.
Here are some of cinematographer Conrad L. Hall’s films:
Road to Perdition, 2002
American Beauty, 1999
A Civil Action, 1998
Without Limits, 1998
Love Affair, 1994
Searching For Bobby Fischer, 1993
Class Action, 1991
Tequila Sunrise, 1988
The Day Of the Locust, 1975
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, 1969
In Cold Blood, 1967
Cool Hand Luke, 1967
The Professionals, 1966
Morituri!, 1965
Rest In Peace, Sir.
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