Polanski has always had a keen understanding of the precise moments in a story to introduce camera movement. In The Ninth Gate, the director adopts an appropriately jerky, handheld style when Corso returns to the bookstore at night and makes a horrifying discovery involving his partner. “Roman is not very fond of Steadicam,” Khondji says. “I think it’s overused in movies right now, although there are certain movies in which it is integral to the camerawork, like The Thin Red Line. John Toll’s cinematography on that film was fantastic, and the use of the Steadicam is vital to the story. But whatever the type of camera movement, I believe it has to come somehow from the director. Whether a director has a lot of experience or very little, the energy of the camera is always generated by his vision of the story. This is a very important idea that only came to me after years of experience.”
Khondji’s standard camera package handled all of his needs on the shoot. “I always use a main studio camera along with something lightweight,” he says. “On this film, the main studio camera was the Arri 535, combined with a Moviecam SL for handheld work. For the lightweight camera, I always use either an Aaton or the SL — they’re both great cameras.”
When Corso expands his book-sleuthing into the old worlds of Spain and Portugal, the film takes on a startlingly different feel from the busy urban look of the New York scenes. “In Spain, we wanted to feel the heat and the contrast of the sun,” Khondji explains. “I’ve always had different feelings toward those two countries — to me, Spain is more rich, gold and joyous, while Portugal is more cold, blue and dark, with a lack of light. We shot in Sintra, Portugal, which reminded me of Paris. It’s a very mysterious place on the outskirts of town, surrounded by eucalyptus trees and old castles.”
Khondji used no lighting augmentation at all for a striking, sun-bleached shot in which Corso searches for an antique bookstore down a narrow street in Toledo, Spain. “More and more, I just prefer to use the real daylight,” he comments. “I use the skylight as a toplight, then negative fill to create contrast. For me, this is much more effective than using artificial light.”
The cinematographer used Kodak stocks for the entire production, employing the 50 ASA EXR 5245 for daylight scenes, Vision 320T 5277 for nights and interiors and Vision 320T 5248 for overcast weather. “I always remember film stocks more than anything, because each film stock has a meaning for me,” Khondji says. “About 95 percent of what I shoot is on Kodak, since I know those stocks quite well. Even if they come out with a stock I don’t like, I can express my concerns with them, much like I do with Brian Newman, the head of Cooke lenses. They’re very warm with cameramen.”
When Corso finally locates the Spanish bookshop, he is bemused to discover that its owners are elderly twins — but the sharp-eyed viewer will notice something oddly symmetrical about the scene. “The owners are the same guy doubled,” Khondji reveals with a smile. “We used motion control to shoot the scene. I started experimenting with that technique on City of Lost Children to create clones, and we basically did the same thing with the Duboi effects house in Paris. Roman could have found twins, but I’ve learned to recognize when directors become obsessed. It’s always a positive thing, never negative. The obsession can take the form of lighting, set dressing, the way a certain actor does something. Roman noticed this Spanish production coordinator named Jose Lopez Rodero, and he began giving him strange looks. He’d walk around him and say, ëOh, you could do the scene.’ Jose told Roman he didn’t have a twin, adding that he surely would need one for the scene. But Roman liked his face. The more he looked at him, the more he believed this was the face he needed in his film! It was a joke at first — the guy didn’t even want to do it, and our producer was skeptical. But it went on and on until we ended up actually doing the scene with motion control!”
Polanski’s fondness for classic movie effects is manifested in a scene set on a train, in which Corso finally confronts The Girl, who has been shadowing him throughout Europe. Lights from outside the train wash over their faces as Corso’s reflection (created in post) flickers on a window. “Outside the set, we had a huge drum made, because I needed the effect of lights crossing outside a speeding train,” Khondji explains. “The drum was made out of slices of different mirrors. We put an HMI light on rollers, made it spin, then pointed it into the drum. It’s a very old technique, but Roman loves things like that. He’s very skillful and talented — he could do any job on the set, be it camera operator, cinematographer or designer. He reads Scientific American and is very good with technology. If he needed a very complicated lighting rig, he would find a way to do it himself. He’s very much into the new techniques, but he really loves the old tricks as well.”
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