A motion picture is as beautiful as its cinematography. As film is a visual medium, it should deliver a level of beauty that effectively tells the story, simply told by the subjects and objects onscreen. To measure a film’s cinematography is to consider its hue, its use of the lens, its aspect ratio, its blocking and its picturesque execution of a shot.
This list will look at the most epic cinematography executed from the last decade. While there are certainly other beautiful film shots, the countdown will closely consider those impossible-to-pull-off shots and breath-taking scenes that raise the standard of cinematography.
Roma
For his semi-autobiographical, Alfonso Cuarón made sure to create an immersive world of 1970’s Colonia Roma in Mexico City. And the black-and-white aesthetics enabled the entire epic picture to look poignant and heart-wrenching when bouncing from a grand set piece to a heavy dramatic scene.
With him being his own DP, Cuaron is in control of the visuals onscreen. Nothing is more epic than in the sequence, wherein Cleo (Yalitza Aparicio) saves the two middle children of Sofia from drowning, despite her not knowing how to swim. The sequence ends with Sofia and the rest of the children embracing them.
Life of Pi
The awe and wonder of Yann Martel’s deeply philosophical novel are in full display of Ang Lee’s adaptation of Life of Pi. Almost every shot of the movie is filled with all kinds of pristine wonder. From the flashbacks to the hefty origins of Pi’s name to the captivating shipwreck sequence, every scene of Life of Pi is a blockbuster level of artful. Claudio Miranda created a color palette of visual splendor in 3D.
This is summed up in a beautiful and epic bird’s eye level shot of Pi’s boat floating during the sunrise. The yellow tint helped the warmth.
Melancholia
Many critics lauded Lars von Trier’s Melancholia as one of the most beautiful films of the last decade. Even with a steady premise of a planet slowly in a collision course towards Earth, it still brought the best of visual storytelling and scene craftsmanship. Director of photography Manuel Alberto Claro took advantage of the absurdity of planetary wonder to pull off rich shots of characters encountering otherworldly phenomena.
Among its iconic shots, there is Justine (Kirsten Dunst) emitting electrifying powers and there is the most enchanting, the shot of Justine, Claire (Charlotte Gainsbourg) and Leo seated and waiting for the planet.
Interstellar
Speaking of otherworldly phenomena, a best-of list on cinematography would not be complete without a Christopher Nolan film. His movies are not only time-weaving canvasses but also visual masterpieces. 2014’s Interstellar pulled off grand shots of the spacecraft Endurance navigating around space that is a gratifying mix of wonder and solitude.
Hoyte van Hoytema took advantage of the IMAX projection to feature faraway shots of the Endurance navigating over the edge of the Solar System and over the black hole Gargantua. But the shot of the space station floating after its uneventful malfunction is a beautiful disaster in the making.
The Master
The Master by Paul Thomas Anderson is arguably the best movie of 2012 that got an eventual reevaluation of how great it is. The acting is topnotch, from a raw performance of Joaquin Phoenix to the defying force of Phillip Seymour Hoffman. Yet, the aspect of its cinematography had been of much discussion of how effective this post-WWII drama is.
The cinematography by Mihai Mălaimare Jr. allows the visuals to speak for themselves. The greatness of its visuals is summed up on an overhead shot of Freddie Quell lying on the top of his navy ship as it sails forth.
La La Land
For his first for mainstream filmmaking, Damien Chazelle goes all out in his creativity with a pristine homage to old Hollywood and a love letter to contemporary stories. And the beauty of Los Angeles is present from its aesthetics and its production design. Chazelle composed each with precise ingenuity in every musical number.
DP Linus Sandgren made sure every scene is laced with eye candy that it is hard to pick which shot is stunningly epic. But the most emblematic shot is the final sequence of dancing top of cars on the highway during the number “Another Day of Sun”.
Inception
Back again to Nolan territory, he really had reliable cinematographers that had his back. Before Hoytema had him first on Interstellar, then Dunkirk and the upcoming Tenet, he had Wally Pfister from Memento to The Dark Knight trilogy. And for his Oscar win, he helped helm the mind-blowing aesthetics of Inception.
Capturing the visual eye of Nolan, Pfister helped execute every scene in full view and intensity to balance the awe and tension of its pacing. The best shot has to be a subconscious Paris rising above Dom (Leonardo diCaprio) and Ariadne (Ellen Page). Epic and iconic at the same time.
The Tree of Life
Emmanuel “Chivo” Lubezki is a camera wizard for the filmmaking community. He was behind on many epic shots on great films. He reaped three straight Oscars for the immersive Gravity, the melancholic Birdman and the challenging The Revenant. But this list honors the film that should have been given the highest honor, his collaboration with Terrence Malick – The Tree of Life.
The entire saga is filled with intimate shots of Mother Nature phenomena and a slice of life of boy’s upbringing from childhood to adulthood. And the shot of a woman walking towards the shot is the sum of grandeur.
Blade Runner 2049
No doubt, Roger Deakins is the master cinematographer. This decade alone showcased Deakins at the peak of his powers in films like True Grit, Skyfall, Prisoners, Unbroken, Sicario and, most recently, 1917.
While the latter had its fair share of epic shots, Deakins’ best work that had the great blend of beauty and epic scale is Blade Runner 2049. For all its wondrous shots, the shot that stood out was the gigantic purple holographic projection of Joi comforting a wounded K. This majestic interaction of two AIs evokes such a human emotion, simply on the blend of color and rain.
Mad Max: Fury Road
If speaking of the biggest surprise of the decade that broke norms in filmmaking and became a landmark film of its own genre, that would be George Miller’s belated follow-up to his post-apocalyptic sci-fi series, Mad Max: Fury Road.
The film is a technical powerhouse of sounds and visuals that turned a simple chase scene into a thought-provoking blockbuster. But looking on the angle of its cinematography, John Seale tinted every celluloid with an energetic orange hue and scaled each scene with a mix of practical and special effects. And nothing is more emblematic of it than Max Rockatansky (Tom Hardy) standing on top of a pole as several gas guzzlers implode behind him, while the rest continue the chase.
