Zsigmond received his Oscar almost 20 years to the day after he arrived in the United States. He didn't forget his past as he stood at the podium, thanking György Illes and the other teachers at the Hungarian school who gave him his start.
During the past decade, Zsigmond has photographed a number of films with blue-chip directors, including Maverick and Assassins with Richard Donner (AC Nov. '94 and Nov '95, respectively), and Intersection with old friend Mark Rydell. He has also shot several modestly-budgeted features, such as Sean Penn's The Crossing Guard and Willard Carroll's Playing by Heart (AC Dec. '98). Some of Zsigmond's best work has passed relatively unnoticed, however. In March of 1989, he filmed a series of interviews with Vietnam War veterans, which served as the heart of a memorable episode of the ABC television series China Beach. His footage provided quintessential proof that the soul lives behind the eyes.
Asked how he selects his projects, Zsigmond replies, "My rule is that if a movie doesn't say something of value for the audience, I don't think it's worth making. You only have time to make so many pictures in your life. Maybe 75 percent of the time, you can tell if a film will be worthwhile when you read the script, but I've been fooled on occasion. There were times when I thought something was going to be a good movie, but it didn't turn out that way. There are so many things that have to come together — the actors, the director, the script."
But in addition to his many successes, Zsigmond has suffered a few heartbreaks in his career as well, particularly on Heaven's Gate (AC Nov. '80), directed by Michael Cimino, and The Bonfire of the Vanities (AC Nov. '90), directed by Brian De Palma. Both films were major disappointments at the box office, but serious fans of cinematography would be well-advised to screen these titles for Zsigmond's fine camerawork.
In 1996, Zsigmond earned an ASC Award nomination for The Ghost and the Darkness (AC Nov. '96), a film which included multiple digital-composite scenes coupling separate bluescreen elements of a lion with actors in appropriate backgrounds. He considers the evolution of digital technology to be an important extension of the cinematic craft, enabling directors and writers to tell stories that weren't possible or practical within the limitations of optical compositing.
Zsigmond says that mastering digital post is a skill that every cinematographer must develop, but he cautions that advances in imaging technology shouldn't be confused with the art of filmmaking. Thinking back to earlier times, Zsigmond points out that he shot McCabe & Mrs. Miller, Scarecrow and Cinderella Liberty with a vintage Mitchell BNC camera. "It took two people to carry it, and it had parallax problems," he says, "but we still managed to record some pretty good images. I think the most important thing about cinematography is lighting. That's how you create the mood that matches the story. The ability to light artistically is a gift from the gods. If you have the ability, you shouldn't waste it. You should be looking for ways to improve and grow."
Maybe that gypsy fortuneteller who predicted that Zsigmond would sail across an ocean and become a great artist was indeed prescient, or maybe it was just destiny. The reality is that Zsigmond and his lifelong friend Kovacs took their fate into their own hands, and both succeeded because they had the talent and the will to make it happen.
"When I was student in Hungary, we saw a Western movie with a scene in a Howard Johnson's restaurant located by a freeway," Zsigmond recalls. "A teacher said that such places didn't exist, that the filmmakers must have built a set for the movie. Years later, I was driving on a thruway between New York City and Buffalo, and every 20 miles, there was another Howard Johnson's restaurant. That's when I realized how big the lies were."
During the first decade after Zsigmond left Hungary, the only way he could stay in touch with his former teachers and friends was by writing them letters. In 1969, György Illes came to Los Angeles after a film he had photographed, The Boys of Paul Street, was nominated for a Best Foreign Film Oscar. Zsigmond met him at the airport, and the first words out of Illes's mouth were, "Why aren't you coming home to visit?" Zsigmond subsequently arranged regular visits to Budapest and the film school. "It was still a pretty closed country until about 1991," he says. "We couldn't send the students videocassettes of our movies. The government thought they were propaganda because they showed how people live in the West."
Zsigmond has since organized an annual two-week seminar at the film school in Budapest. The faculty includes top cinematographers from many countries, and students now come from every part of Europe. "I encourage film students who are interested in cinematography to study sculpture, paintings, music, writing and other arts," Zsigmond says. "Filmmaking consists of all the arts combined. Students are always asking me for advice, and I tell them that they have to be enthusiastic, because it's hard work. The only way to enjoy it is to be totally immersed. If you don't get involved on that level, it could be a very miserable job. I only have one regret about my career: I'm sorry that we are not making silent movies any more. That is the purest art form I can imagine."
© 1999 ASC