Rodrigo Prieto: Double Oscar nominations for Best Cinematography?
Barbenheimer took the world by storm earlier this year in July when Greta Gerwig‘s “Barbie” and Christopher Nolan‘s “Oppenheimer” — two starkly contrasting movies — both released on the same day.
However, a certain cinematographer is at the center of another contrasting duo: Rodrigo Prieto. The director of photography served as the cinematographer for both Gerwig’s “Barbie” and Martin Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon” in a dual piece of work you might like to dub “Barbies of the Flower Moon” or “Killers of the Flower Barbie.” That doesn’t quite have the same ring to it as “Barbenheimer.” Whatever the case, Prieto is set to have an exciting awards season as both movies are prime contenders for a Best Cinematography nomination at the upcoming Academy Awards.
Warner Bros’ “Barbie” follows Margot Robbie as the titular Barbie who leaves Barbie Land for the real world with the help and hindrance of Ryan Gosling‘s Ken after she suffers an existential crisis. Here, Prieto lights up incredible sets and costumes with sharp colors and clear imagery to capture Barbie Land. There’s also an interesting detail in Prieto’s work. In Barbie Land, the cinematography is head-on, precise, and exacting, the camera moving with choreographed precision and purpose — almost like a Wes Anderson film. It helps to give Barbie Land an appropriate sense of false perfection. Meanwhile, in the real world, Prieto’s camera moves a little more freely and films the actors at an angle. The objects of the frame aren’t centered and exact. They drift from side to side, reflecting the truer, messier nature of the real world. It’s a great detail while “Barbie” also boasts some instantly iconic shots such as the image of Robbie slipping out of the high heels and her feet remaining in the high-heel position.
Apple TV+’s “Killers of the Flower Moon,” meanwhile, tells the true story of the murder of multiple Osage tribe members in the USA in the 1920s. Prieto’s work here lies in stark contrast to “Barbie.” He captures the moodier, sinister tones with aplomb, matching the mood with muted, Earthy colors while ensuring every line on the actors’ faces is captured, highlighting and emboldening their performances. One standout sequence is when Prieto’s camera is stuck to the front of the car that Leonardo DiCaprio‘s Ernest drives. In the backseat sits Lily Gladstone‘s Mollie as the former tries to woo the latter. Prieto captures this vital scene with simplicity, allowing the actors’ performances and the character’s relationship to be the center of attention, while the townspeople around them go about their daily lives filling in the rest of the scene with historic detail.
We are predicting Prieto to reap a Best Cinematography nomination for “Killers of the Flower Moon.” Our other predicted nominees in this category according to our Oscars odds chart are “Oppenheimer” (Hoyte van Hoytema), “Poor Things” (Robbie Ryan), “Maestro” (Matthew Libatique), and “The Zone of Interest” (Łukasz Żal). “Oppenheimer” is predicted to win while “Barbie” is on the precipice of breaking into the top five along with the likes of “The Color Purple” (Dan Laustsen), “Saltburn” (Linus Sandgren), and “Asteroid City” (Robert Yeoman).
If “Barbie” did get in and Prieto did indeed earn bids for both movies, he would be only the third cinematographer in Oscars history to be nominated for two movies in the same year. There have only been three occasions where a DOP was nominated for two movies in one year with one lenser doing it twice.
This is since 1968 when the category was combined into Best Cinematography after it was previously split into two categories for color and black and white cinematography. It was in 1968 that the first such occasion happened. Robert Surtees was nominated for “Doctor Dolittle” and “The Graduate” but he lost to Burnet Guffrey, who won for “Bonnie and Clyde.”
Surtees pulled off this feat again in 1972 when he secured bids for “Summer of ’42” and “The Last Picture Show.” Oswald Morris won that year for “Fiddler on the Roof.” The legendary Roger Deakins was the only other DOP to do this. He was nominated in 2008 for both “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford” and “No Country Old Men” — two westerns, coincidentally. He lost to another western — “There Will Be Blood,” with the winning DOP being Robert Elswit.
Prieto currently has three Oscar nominations to his name. He was first nominated in 2006 for Ang Lee‘s “Brokeback Mountain” but lost to Dion Beebe for “Memoirs of a Geisha.” He then picked up his second and third bids for two Scorsese films: “Silence” in 2017 and “The Irishman” in 2020. “Silence” lost to Sandgren and “La La Land” while “The Irishman” fell to Deakins and “1917.” Prieto is looking for his fourth and fifth bids, respectively, and his first win. It’s interesting, however, that Surtees (twice) and Deakins both lost both nominations when they were nominated twice in the same year. This suggests that history tells us Prieto would be better off concentrating on one nomination. “Killers of the Flower Moon” seems more likely. Either way, it’s van Hoytema who is predicted to win — for “Oppenheimer.”
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