Great cinematographer (and a solid director)
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — Peter Hyams
octagonproplex — 17 years ago(January 14, 2009 11:20 PM)
Much of Peter Hyams cinematography is absolutely stunning. His striking images using sharp light to outline specific shapes, allowing most of the frame to fall in deep shadow.
His work on "The Musketeer" may be the closest film aproximation I've seen to Caravaggio's masterpieces (Caleb Deschanel's work on Passion Of The Christ was also a great example of that). Seriously, the film may not be great, but his photography is breathtaking.
Just awesome, I love bold cinematography that's not affraid to be dark. Hyams truely is one of the 'princes of darkness' along with Gordon Willis, Darius Khondji, Vittorio Storaro, Jordan Cronenweth and Dariusz Wolski. Brilliant masters of their art, all amoung my favorite cinematographers. Peter Hyams belongs in their estemed company.
Unfortunately most of Hyams great work is not represented faithfuly on DVD, the video tranfers do not do his images justice. Hyams has chosen to work within a very delicate palette of minimal light and deep blacks, contrasting sharp hard light against dark shadows and such. Because of the extremly sensitive nature of balancing such dark photography, and the fact that most of his films are not held in the highest regard, little reverence is given, and no time and money are put into preserving the original image integrity, they end up just being slapped onto a DVD (no frills).
Peter Hyams is an underrated director and a criminaly overlooked director of photography.
He also provides some of the better DVD director commentary tracks, for those intersted in the filmmaking process. -
octagonproplex — 17 years ago(January 23, 2009 10:19 PM)
Unfortunately he's only done a handful of commentaries, all above average though. Capricorn One, Hanover Street, End Of Day5b4s and The Musketeer all feature director commentaries. I'm not sure about Sound Of Thunder, but I imagine if there is a commentary, it probably consist of mostly sobbing sounds. I'd love to hear more comments from him, especially on 2010, Outland, The Presidio, Sudden Deathah hell, all his films really.
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RumourdProd — 13 years ago(December 05, 2012 01:47 AM)
Any tasty insights you can recall?
I thought Presidio was junk; I saw it at a sneak preview. Man, it was horrendously simpleminded. Was too bad cuz I liked Star Chamber and Outland and Capricorn and 2010 and Running Scared's chase scene. -
rascal67 — 13 years ago(December 05, 2012 04:52 AM)
The new blu ray edition of 'Outland' has a commentary by Hyams. Can't really comment on it though because I haven't had time to listen to it yet.
There is something about 'Outland', that I can't quite put my finger on, but I love the whole look and design of the film.there is a stamp of genius on it maybe. It reminds me much of 'Alien' in feelsome of this may be due to Goldsmith's scoreand I enjoy it much more than the ponderous 'Alien'. Connery's presence helps, along with Sternhagen and Boyle; but the way Hyams presents the environment and situation and moves his camera around, makes it appear much more realistic and redolent than what it should be. He makes it feel like what a real life mining colony in the far reaches of our solar system would be like. Some of the computer graphics and monitors can appear dated now, but the surroundings they are presented in more than compensate. Could say much the same for '2010' as well, which wowed me too.
After 'The Presidio', I lost interest in him. Didn't watch any of his other films apart from 'The Relic'.well tried too but walked out. Maybe I should give his Van Damme ventures a shot, but they appeared too run of the mill by then.
I would say that from his 70's up to early 80's work, was when he reached his pinnacle. -
LTUM — 12 years ago(June 13, 2013 06:33 AM)
i like the fact that he DPs his own directiing jobs. i love that
i think more of em should, would do it but maybe they can't lol
that's how i'd be, like peter
"rage to exist"
http://tinyurl.com/c9ush3z -
LJ27 — 12 years ago(November 27, 2013 09:12 AM)
I always wondered how he was the DP on films he directs. Did he have to resign from the DGA or does the studio pay any fines from the cinematographer's union? Not that I have anything against his shooting. I particularly love his work in NARROW MARGIN. Some really dark stuff - but not so dark you can't tell what's going on. I really enjoy most of his films, and I wish they were better represented on video.
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06986 — 12 years ago(November 27, 2013 10:44 AM)
I like a lot of movies he has done but love the way he shoots them and the cinematography work. His movies look and feel better then they actually are which is a compliment to the cinematography. "Sudden Death" was a pretty bad movie but it looked and felt like a better movie because of the excellent cinematography, just as good if not better then "Die Hard:, which made it watchable, and more interesting when it should not have been. I just watched "Running Scared", good entertaining movie(wish they did a sequel) with great cinematography. I like the way most movies in the 70's, 80's to mid 90's were shot, especially ones by Hyams, Badham, Walter Hill, Coppola, McTiernan, Ramis, Hughes, etc the most because they looked and felt like actual movies and engrossed the viewer into the story, tv shows could not duplicate the way they were shot and 2000felt. Now with everything being so HD, crisp, digital, CGI, quick cuts, shakey cam, vibrant, and focusing too much on closeups movies just don't feel very special anymore and look and feel a lot like what you see on HD tv shows, video games, etc. These days they shoot movies just to look vibrant and crisp on HD flatscreens instead of shooting movies to look good all around that look convincing and great on anything.
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dvc5159 — 12 years ago(February 23, 2014 11:51 PM)
He's a craftsman first. I would never consider him an auteur director, but he directs genre films very well to his credit, especially in the science-fiction and action genres.
He is a much better cinematographer than director though, one of my favorite DPs, in fact. There's something about the way he uses light and shadows in his films that stands out among other Hollywood fluff that I just quite can't put my finger on, but it's still jaw-dropping to see most of the time.