“Celluloid is alive-and-kicking”. This is our repeatable sentence, but this time was stated by the acclaimed IMAX cinematographer Hoyte Van Hoytema NSC FSF ASC as a part of his speech winning the BAFTA Best Cinematography Award.

Hoyte Van Hoytema wins BAFTA Best Cinematography Award

The acclaimed IMAX cinematographer Hoyte Van Hoytema NSC FSF ASC won the 2024 BAFTA (77th British Academy Film and Television Arts Awards) Best Cinematography Award for his work on Oppenheimer. Shot using IMAX film cameras, on Kodak color and specially made B&W large format film stocks, the feature represents Van Hoytema’s fourth collaboration with Nolan, following Interstellar (2014), Dunkirk (2017), and Tenet (2020), all of which were also shot on Panavision and IMAX film cameras. Oppenheimer won a total of seven BAFTA Awards, including Best Film, Best Director, Best Leading and supporting actors, at this year’s ceremony. Moreover, this was the year of film, as most of the Best Cinematography nominees were also shot on film (Killers Of The Flower Moon, Maestro and Poor Things). Make sure to read our article (96th Academy Awards: The Cameras and Lenses) which shows the exact cameras and lenses used to shoot those movies.

Hoytema: “Celluloid is alive and kicking”

In his acceptance speech after winning the Best Cinematography award, Hoytema acknowledged the significance of the number of nominated films in the category having been shot on film: “Celluloid is alive and kicking. Four out of five nominated films were shot on celluloid and it proves that film is resilient and wanted more by audiences than ever.” Furthermore, Hoytema told British Cinematographer: “I really believe that the way I see the world is best represented by the way celluloid sees the world. There are different technologies, there’s digital technology and analog technology, they have always been immensely different for me, and when at some point there was a slight threat that film was about to disappear I couldn’t necessarily find myself in digital technology as I found myself in film. We could have a long technical conversation about why that is but there is still not a format that in such a beautifully naturalistic way reproduces light and dynamics and colors as film does as well as the large format because when you shoot on the large format you’re capable of shooting your film in such a high quality that is still not possible with digital technology, so for that you need film. I think celluloid is very important – four out of five films nominated for a BAFTA and a lot more films shot on film that are not nominated. The audience responds differently to films that are shot on film and I thought that was very important to say when I had a chance.”

Celluloid is alive and kicking. Four out of five nominated films were shot on celluloid and it proves that film is resilient and wanted more by audiences than ever.

2024 BAFTA Best Cinematography winner – Hoyte van Hoytema

Watch his speech: 

Most challenging task: Shooting faces on IMAX

Additionally, Hoytema elaborated to British Cinematographer regarding the challenges of shooting with IMAX film cameras specifically on Oppenheimer, which can be defined as the first drama shot on IMAX film cameras: “What surprised me very much is to grade a film and shoot on a large format that is effectively all about faces. To make close-ups consecutively interesting as a filmmaker is one of the biggest challenges you can have because with action scenes you can bring out the big guns, but to shoot emotions and faces and to do that for three hours and still be able to have enough talking power in your last close-up is the biggest challenge, I think. Our job is also not to make things comfortable, our job is to figure out what the best way is to tell a specific story and I don’t think that is by making it easy on yourself”. Indeed, In Oppenheimer IMAX cameras were utilized to shoot faces and close-ups, with a simple yet very powerful style.

Wrapping up

According to our segmentation, 42% of the Oscars 2024 Best Picture and Cinematography nominees were shot on celluloid (explore slide above). The slogan  “Film is alive and kicking” was written in our article covering the making of WW84. Hence, it’s nice to see that this is very true 4 years later. Celluloid is here to stay.