And/Or

And/Or

Sven Nykvist (1922 – 2006): Tributes



In Reverence of Light and Darkness
Sunny Joseph, Motion Picture Photography 1983

I learned one of the most important lessons in cinematography from Sven Nykvist. It is his idea of simplicity. He commented in the 1990s, "It has taken me 30 years to come to simplicity. Earlier, I made a lot of what I thought were beautiful shots with much back-lighting and many effects, absolutely none of which were motivated by anything in the film at all. As soon as we had a painting on the wall, we thought it should have a glow around it. It was terrible and I can hardly stand to see my own films on television any more. I look for two minutes and then I thank God that there is a word called simplicity.”

Today, when we look at Nykvist’s masterly works like Cries and Whispers (1972) or Sacrifice (1986), we are reminded of the strength of that simplicity.

Along with Subrata Mitra, Sven Nykvist was a pioneer in the practice of bounce lighting. On the making of Winter Light (1962) he writes, “When Ingmar and I made Winter Light, which takes place in a church on a winter day in Sweden, we decided we should not see any shadow in it at all because there would be no logical shadow in that setting. We sat for weeks in a church in north Sweden, looking at the light during the three hours between 11 and two o'clock. We saw that it changed a lot, and it helped him in writing the script because he always writes the moods. I asked the production designer to build a ceiling in the church so I wouldn't have any possibility of putting up lights or backlighting. I had to start with bounced light and then after that I think I made every picture with bounced light. I really feel ill when I see a direct light coming into faces with its big nose shadow.”


Cries and Whispers, shot so elegantly by Nykvist, is an all-time textbook for me. When I saw the film for the first time at the FTII, I was so moved that there was tears in my eyes. Yes, I was moved by the film as well as the cinematography. I still remember the reds, blacks and whites of the film. When the final scene opens up in the garden it is a pure moment of magic. The viewer too experiences the brief moment of joy and peace of the character. Nykvist won his first Oscar for Cries and Whispers.

I would share with you an incident which occurred during the International Film Festival of India in 1984, at Mumbai. There was a retrospective of Bergman’s films and Cries and Whispers was screened. The actor Erland Josephson was attending the festival too. A few minutes into the screening, I saw a man getting up and running out of theatre. It was none other than Josephson. Following him I saw another man getting up and running out. It was Subrata Mitra. I was curious and followed Dada. Both Josephson and Dada were running to the projection room. I could hear Josephson asking the projectionist “Where is the red? Where is the red?” It was obviously a dupe print made in the Archive, and the reds were looking a muddy orange colour. Josephson was very upset and Dada tried to explain the problems of prints and projection in India. I was astonished to see an actor reacting this way to the quality of an image 10 years after his participation in the film. Josephson explained that Bergman used reds in the walls and floors as if to evoke the feeling that the story is happening inside the four chambers of the heart.

Nykvist lights the sets and operates the camera himself. To quote Nykvist, "When you are operating the camera, you forget all about the other people around you. You just see this little scene and you live in that and you feel it. For me, operating the camera is a sport and it helps me do better lighting. I prefer to shoot on location because in the studio you have too many possibilities, too many lights to destroy your whole picture."

Sven Nykvist’s Sacrifice was the cinematographic inspiration for my own work in Piravi (1988) directed by Shaji N Karun. One part of the pre-production homework we did for Piravi’s shoot was a little strange. A print of Sacrifice was available in Trivandrum, and Shajichettan arranged a screening at the Kalabhavan theatre. Both of us sat through the film silently. I was a bit surprised that the screening was exclusively arranged for us, and that made me watch the film more attentively. Above all, by that time Andrei Tarkovsky was my most favourite director. Talking about Tarkovsky, Nykvist writes in his book In Reverence of Light, “He first and foremost wanted to communicate emotions, moods, atmosphere by images, not by words. He wanted to impart a soul to objects and nature.”

It is also my strong belief that a cinematographer’s primary duty is to impart a soul to the characters, objects and nature through diligent lighting and composition. This, of course I learned from Sacrifice.

Some of us jokingly referred to Sven Nykvist as the KK Mahajan of Sweden. Long-haired, quiet, with those intense eyes and not really known to talk much about the stuff directors wax eloquent about – how colour contrasts change over the course of the film, the chromaturgy of different film-makers, the philosophical reasons for choosing a certain aspect ratio etc. I remember asking KK during a workshop he did with us, about an interview where he and Mani Kaul had talked about the play with contrast ratios in Uski Roti (1969). He replied with his characteristic half-smile, “Woh tu director se pooch, mere se kya  pooch raha hai...”

Nykvist, in an interview (available on the Nostalghia website), is full of reverence for Tarkovsky but he does slip in his complaints about the director. In an interview he said, “As opposed to Ingmar, Tarkovsky had no prior knowledge whatsoever of the location of shooting until he got there and could sit at the camera and plan and direct its movements. This would often take hours. Add to this, that only when Tarkovsky had made up his mind on how he wanted things, could I come in and set the lighting. And since the shots at hand were more often that not extended tracking shots, things could take an inordinate amount of time.”

It is entertaining to hear one of the most respected cinematographers of all time crib about one of the biggest film-makers ever, reinforcing every technician’s privilege to complain about their director – it is immaterial whether you make a film like Sacrifice at the end of it or not.

We watched Sacrifice on a Friday evening at FTII, followed by Directed by Tarkovsky (1988) the next morning. I haven’t felt anything like that in a long time - that was among the most important experiences we had at the institute. At later viewings of Directed by… I would keep looking at the light placements, hoping for some insight into how Nykvist managed to light so beautifully. We spent our colour practicals experimenting with colour reduction like in Sacrifice, done through our own cheap shortcuts at Adlabs. The results were disappointing, and Soman more than livid. Manoj Peter did one of his lighting practicals simulating the shot of the child sleeping, the curtain waving, the levels of darkness changing in the room. Nykvist is what many of us tried to be. A close second was Subrata Mitra.

We were introduced to Nykvist during ragging. All of us camera freshers were supposed to find out what various cinematographers were famous for. Resul Pookutty, tyrant by night and compassionate mentor by day, would catch us in the corridor and tell us gently, “Sven Nykvist is known for bounce-lighting.” Of course, standing in file at three in the morning, performing farshis to the seniors near the stone bench, I couldn’t care less. In the process, the cliché stuck in my head: Nykvist is known for bounce-lighting.

Then came all his films, over the next year or so – The Silence (1963), Persona (1966), Through A Glass Darkly (1961) (with its forever mixed up reels), Winter Light and my favourite, Fanny and Alexander (1982). It was great that the Archive had such an extensive collection of Bergman films. Some people would complain about how Chabria took out the original prints for the F. A. course and sent dupes to FTII for screening. If that was true, I don’t blame him, for I remember seeing a print of The Virgin Spring (1960) freeze up, blister and then burn up into white during a screening in the main theatre. That is one of the most frightening experiences one can have while watching a film (I’m glad it wasn’t during Persona).

Years later, I caught up with many of his films again on DVD, thanks to Sarvodaya video library, as also his work with other directors (including some really bad films). It amazes me just how well Nykvist complemented different directors, be it Woody Allen, Richard Attenborough or Philip Kaufman. He says in his interview in the Screencraft series on cinematography, “A handful of principles have defined my life as a cinematographer. Be true to the script. Be loyal to the director. Be able to adapt and change one’s style. I would also like to say that a cinematographer should direct at least one film. As a cameraman it is very easy to become a technical freak. The experience of writing and editing a film enables one to understand the whole creative process of filmmaking.”

Interesting, especially in the time of digital post, where one deals more and more with technology at every stage. I would like the see the films Nykvist directed – The Ox (1991) and One and One (1978).

It’s funny how you feel you personally know someone whose work you admire, be it an actor, film-maker, musician or technician. All these years, it was good to know that Sven Nykvist was around; and now that he has passed, one is still grateful for the work he has left behind. Great cinematographer,
gentle teacher through all his work we have seen on film.