Cinematographer Martin Ruhe ASC shoots in large format with ARRI Rental’s exclusive ALFA anamorphic lenses on the spy thriller starring Rami Malek.
CIA cryptographer Charlie Heller (Rami Malek) has his life turned upside down when his wife is killed in a London terror attack. Frustrated by the agency’s muted response, he overrides his remit and takes to the field, hunting down his wife’s killers. This is the premise of The Amateur, directed by James Hawes and shot by Martin Ruhe ASC.
Having already worked with ARRI Rental UK on the George Clooney-directed features Midnight Sky (65 mm format with DNA lenses) and The Boys in the Boat (large format with ALFA anamorphics), Ruhe tapped the same facility for The Amateur. He says, “I really enjoyed my previous experience with the ALFA lenses because they are true anamorphics with a 2x squeeze, unlike many large-format anamorphics. I love the rendering, the bokeh, and the softness they have. Close-ups on faces just look so beautiful; they have such a presence on the screen. I shot tests and James loved them, so we decided on ALFAs.”
Ruhe’s choice of camera was the ARRI ALEXA Mini LF. “I operate the A camera myself and usually I have a B camera/Steadicam operator with me,” he says. “I often put two monitors on my camera so I can see what the B camera is doing and tell them over the intercom if I want to change anything. Some action stuff was on a U-Crane and we used a couple of car mounts, but in general the camera was always quite close to Rami because we wanted to experience this world, the places he’s going to, with him. That’s an advantage of anamorphic large format; you can be close to a character and still see a lot of the world around them.”
Perspective perfection
The production carried a full set of ALFA lenses, with Ruhe finding that focal lengths around 50mm gave the best perspective for shots following Malek. He notes, “In addition to the standard ALFAs, we had a few ALFA V1 variants that were tuned to stay sharp further across the frame. There was a 50mm V1 alongside the standard 47mm, a 70mm V1 alongside the 72 mm, and a 105mm V1 alongside the 108mm. The V1s are useful if you want to put people more to the edge of the frame, or you have a big close-up with an eye over on one side of the frame and you want to keep focus on that eye. We also had an 85mm ‘Portrait’ ALFA that I first used on The Boys in the Boat, which goes the other way and is a more extreme detune than standard ALFAs, designed for centre-focused compositions.”
Although the film incorporates significant visual effects, Ruhe reports that the VFX team was happy with the detuned look of the ALFAs. He says, “Often I was shooting at T2.8 so the edges would drop off quite drastically, but they embraced it. They mapped the ALFAs so it was pretty easy and there was never a concern about our choice of lenses. They loved the scope of our look and the two departments worked together really well.”
Of his relationship with ARRI Rental, both in the UK and Germany, Ruhe says, “I love working with all of them, and the positivity behind their lens developments. It’s great that ARRI Rental listens and comes up with these special lens iterations for DPs. They understand the character we want, and that it’s not all about perfection.”
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This article was sponsored by ARRI Rental.
