by John Calhoun
Unit photography by George Kraychyk and Eli Reed
Photos courtesy of Universal Studios

Though Cinderella Man is better defined as a movie about a boxer than a boxing movie, when the film focuses on the ring, it’s all about the fisticuffs. In this true story of pugilist James J. Braddock (Russell Crowe), who was laid low by injuries and the Depression only to stage a spectacular comeback and beat Max Baer for the world heavyweight championship, the drama lies not just in who knocks out whom, but also in whether Braddock and his family will survive.

“Jim Braddock was fighting for one reason: he wanted to get his life back,” says director of photography Salvatore Totino, whose work on Cinderella Man marks his second collaboration with director Ron Howard. The blows being delivered therefore needed to have a feeling of weight behind them — to pack an extra punch. “I really wanted the viewer to feel as though he’s in the ring,” says Totino. “I kept wanting to get in there and box, and Ron wouldn’t let me do it.” Still, the cinematographer managed to insert himself into many key moments. It helped that a lot of the action was caught with handheld cameras, one of which was always operated by Totino.

The cinematographer also worked with Clairmont Camera in Toronto, where the picture was shot, to develop a special punching-bag camera that was dubbed the “tire cam.” He explains, “It was basically a big tire covered in foam with a mount on the inside for the camera, and with Plexiglas on the front to protect the lens. There are a few quick moments of the opponent getting hit, and Russell was actually hitting the camera. It was suspended off a bungee from the top and bottom with truss rings so it wouldn’t sway around too much. There was a little monitor in the back of it so that I could see, and I had a handle to hold the back of the tire and control what the punch felt like; it could be a big pan for a big punch, or, if I held it tight, it was like a combination of a left, a right, and a left hitting you in the face — it didn’t spin your head around, it just sort of knocked you back a little.”

As it happened, Totino and his collaborators had plenty of time to develop and test such elements. After a number of false starts with various directors and leading men, Cinderella Man was finally set to go with Howard at the helm, and Crowe and Renée Zellweger leading the cast, at the beginning of 2004. “I went to Toronto in January to start prepping the film while Russell trained in Australia,” the cinematographer recalls. “And then the injury occurred.” The injury was actually a re-injury of Crowe’s left shoulder, a problem that had shut down another project, Flora Plum, a few years earlier. This time, however, the production could wait for the injury to heal, and the filmmakers were given the luxury of extra prep time. Cinderella Man finally started shooting in April 2004, continuing through August.

The decision to shoot in Canada rather than New York and New Jersey, where the story is set, was actually location-driven. Toronto’s Maple Leaf Gardens, which was built in 1931 and bears a strong architectural resemblance to the original Madison Square Garden (built on Broadway between 49th and 50th streets), was vacant, up for sale, and at the production’s disposal. This meant that the boxing sequences didn’t have to be concentrated into one part of the schedule, and that Crowe and the other actors could take breaks from the grueling bouts. “We would box for two days a week, maybe three, and then we’d go out on location,” says Totino, who notes that Toronto also served the production well in that regard. “It was easy to find locations in Toronto that sort of matched New York City in the Thirties. Our movie was probably one of the biggest productions in Canada, and everyone there worked very hard to please us.” Totino brought his gaffer, Jay Fortune, from New York, and a few other key crew from Los Angeles, but the rest of his crew was Canadian.

The story’s prologue is set in 1928, when Braddock was riding high as a fighter who had never suffered a knockout. He was flush with income from boxing and his cab company, and was living very comfortably with his wife (Zellweger) and children in the New Jersey suburbs. “He was in line for the championship,” says Totino. “Then the Depression hit, and he lost everything. He also became prone to breaking his right hand.” The film moves ahead to 1933, and we discover Braddock sharing a dark basement apartment with his family, vying with hundreds of other destitute men for work on the New Jersey docks, and fighting the odd match with his injured hand. At his lowest point, Braddock was decommissioned from boxing and was forced to go on relief to help pay his bills.

Then the transformation that gives Cinderella Man its title began. The boxer’s manager, Joe Gould (Paul Giamatti), got him a one-off fight as a last-minute replacement opponent for Corn Griffin, the number-two contender for the championship. To everyone’s surprise, Braddock, his hand healed, rallied and won the match. Other fights followed, and by 1935, the boxer found himself going up against Baer (Craig Bierko), a legendarily vicious fighter who had killed two men in the ring. By then, Braddock’s comeback had made him a popular hero to Depression-scarred fans. Though he could only reasonably hope to go a few rounds and stay alive in the ring with Baer, he went the distance and was declared champion.

In developing a style for the picture, Totino and Howard looked at many visual references, ranging from the obvious (Raging Bull and other boxing movies) to the less obvious (including Pasolini’s Accatone and John Woo’s Hard-Boiled). “The images and references were more to invoke a feeling,” explains the cinematographer. “We weren’t looking at them as literal references, but as motivational references. Working with Ron is a creative flow; it’s like turning on a faucet that doesn’t stop. Sometimes you don’t fill the glass, but the faucet keeps running.”

Howard wanted Cinderella Man to have a natural, even gritty look and feel. The intention was neither to soften the hard realities of Depression life nor employ overly flashy techniques. For example, says Totino, “it was very important for me not to do overly stylized lighting for the boxing scenes. I looked at what sort of lighting was on the actual fights, and we’re very, very close to what that was. I think if you start to be tricky with lighting techniques on a picture like this, it can detract from the story. Lighting should not stand out on its own, unless you’re doing a very visual piece.” The cinematographer, whose credits include the features Any Given Sunday (see AC Jan. ’00) and Changing Lanes as well as hundreds of commercials and music videos, is no stranger to bold visual stylistics. “But not on this one,” he notes. “I was there to help tell the story.”