Director of photography Peter Levy, ACS climbs aboard Lost in Space for an outlandish interstellar odyssey.
In the mid-1960s, producer Irwin Allen's television show Lost in Space chronicled the futuristic exploits of the cosmos-hopping Robinson clan (so named as a nod to Johann Wyss' oft-filmed adventure yarn Swiss Family Robinson). Thrown far off course into a distant galaxy, the Robinsons found themselves doomed to wander from planet to planet aboard their saucer-shaped ship, the Jupiter 2. As they tried to find their way back to Earth, the family's weekly adventures usually focused on the show's simpering villain, Dr. Zachary Smith, his arm-flailing Robot sidekick, and young genius Will Robinson, all of whom were often harassed by aliens resembling garden vegetables. Closer in spirit to the whimsical Flash Gordon serials than the quasi-scientific seriousness of Star Trek, the Lost in Space series alternately enthralled and puzzled American viewers for three seasons with its winning formula of low-tech visual effects and gee-whiz wonder.
Things have changed over the last 30 years, however, and New Line Cinema's big-screen action-adventure spectacular of the same title, directed by Stephen Hopkins (The Ghost and the Darkness), is now poised for liftoff. Although the basic premise is the same as that of the television show, the motion picture version presents an entirely new Robinson clan led by actors William Hurt and Mimi Rogers (as parents John and Maureen), Jack Johnson (Will), Heather Graham (Judy) and Lacey Chabert (Penny). Also along for the ride are Gary Oldman (as the treacherous Dr. Zachary Smith) and Matt LeBlanc (Major Don West).
Lost in Space's long-running production entailed hundreds of extensive visual effects sequences and nightmarish logistics for Australian-bred cinematographer Peter Levy, ACS. No stranger to the rigors of effects-heavy filmmaking, he had previously collaborated with Hopkins on A Nightmare on Elm Street 5, Dangerous Game, Predator 2 (see AC Jan. '91), Judgment Night and Blown Away. The cameraman's other credits include The War at Home, Short Changed, With Prejudice, Ricochet, Cutthroat Island and Broken Arrow. When asked how long he toiled on Lost in Space, Levy replies with a grin, "I was on it for 9 or 10 months we shot for 120 days."
LiS was filmed entirely at England's Shepperton Studios, and while many cinematographers would kill to shoot a film on a stage, where everything can be controlled, Levy quickly found himself going stir-crazy. "While shooting on location, I've thought, 'Gosh, I wish I was in the studio,' he explains. "But after two weeks in the studio on Lost in Space, I couldn't wait to get out in the fresh air! Both situations require a different mindset. On location, you have to be flexible enough to find a visual style that suits what's available, whereas in the studio, you don't have that restriction. If you don't finish one day, you can just pick up where you left off at seven o'clock the next morning. I never understood why musicians would always want to record in Jamaica the inside of every recording studio must be pretty much the same but you do pick up a certain vibe on location. The drive to work affects you, and on location I'll key into that feeling faster, while in the studio I have to manufacture it internally. It's hard to drive to the studio every day!"
Shooting in 2.35:1 anamorphic with Panavision gear ("my equipment of choice for the last 10 or 12 years") helped Levy give LiS an expansive look that would encourage audiences to take the picture seriously. "Shooting anamorphic is like sending a message to the audience that I'm painting on a large canvas," Levy offers. The cinematographer notes that other subtle photographic cues can also have an affect on viewers. He explains, "Something Gordon Willis [ASC] said a long time ago stuck with me: 'By shooting [at] a fixed depth of field, you get a consistency of depth of field, which contributes to visual harmony.' So I like to work at a consistent stop, especially in the studio. Although this approach limited the range of lenses we could use, I chose a reasonably deep stop for depth of field T4 which gave the focus puller some range and utilized the best part of the lens. I would light all of my sets to T4, except the surfaces of the various planets [that the Robinsons visit]. The audience may not be aware of it, but this is one of the components that adds up to a visual style and helps bind the film together."
To give LiS the proper sense of a space opera, Hopkins and Levy knew they had to imbue the few scenes set on Earth with a sense of warmth and nostalgia so audiences would understand why the Robinsons are so desperate to get back home. Key among these was a short sequence set in the Robinson's retro-Modern abode the night before their fateful space flight aboard the Jupiter 2. "Our emotional brief was to make Earth look cozy and desirable, so I lit the house set to make it feel as nice and homey as possible," Levy recalls. "I used warm practical sources, soft light coming around corners, and fairly flattering light on the actors. Outside the windows, we had some old-fashioned painted cyc backdrops of the distant futuristic Houston skyline, with little peanut bulbs flashing on the tops of the buildings to add some depth. I then hung a lavender net in front of the cyc to diffuse things and suggest that there were layers of atmosphere between the house and the city."
Like many of the picture's sets, which were envisioned by production designer Norman Garwood (Time Bandits, Brazil, Glory, Hook, Cutthroat Island), the Robinsons' home was based on ovals and circles, and constructed to feature numerous curved surfaces. "The broad approach was to do what people in the 1960s thought the future would be like, rather than what we know to be modern today," Levy says.
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