 Like Jack Cardiff, Christopher Challis spent the formative part of his career
associated with the Technicolor company, which he joined in the late 1930s after
a spell at Gaumont-British News. Initially employed as a technician on some of
the early British three-strip films such as The Drum (d. Zoltan Korda, 1938) and
The Four Feathers (d. Korda, 1939), Challis subsequently assisted Cardiff on the
World Window series. He served in the RAF film unit during the war, before
returning to Technicolor production as Cardiff's operator on his films for the
Archers. In 1947 Challis himself shot End of the River (1947), a minor
black-and-white film directed by Derek Twist for Powell and Pressburger, but his
real break came with The Small Back Room (1949), also in black and white,
photographed in an expressionistic, low-key style.
Challis then embarked on a series of major Technicolor projects. Both The
Elusive Pimpernel and Gone to Earth (both d. Michael Powell/Emeric Pressburger,
1950), demonstrate his ability to imbue the landscape with an almost elemental
quality which shapes the lives of the characters who inhabit it. On the latter
production, shot on location in Shropshire, Challis attributes this sensibility
to Michael Powell:
Mickey used to stay with the camera crew, he never really stayed with the
unit. We always had pretty early calls but if on the way to the set, or equally
on the way back at night, we saw something or the weather was odd or strange, he
would quickly say 'we have to use this', so we would shoot. I remember a
sequence with Jennifer [Jones] with the sundial outside the house in the mist.
We arrived at the location an hour before anyone else. It was only just
beginning to get light and Jennifer was there having her make-up done and Mickey
suddenly said 'this weather is fantastic, let's get Jennifer quickly'. So we got
the sequence. That is very much how he worked - using fleeting moments and
weaving them into the story.
The treatment of landscapes, the light coming through the trees, the
billowing clouds juxtaposed against deep blue skies, invoke both tranquillity
and mystical power. The interiors are similarly impressive, particularly the
expressive use of low-key and coloured lighting - the amber light which features
strongly towards the end of the film anticipating the heroine's impending
doom.
Challis proved that he was equally at home in the artifice of the studio with
the opera and dance film Tales of Hoffman (d. Michael Powell/Emeric Pressburger
1951), a logical progression from The Red Shoes (d. Michael Powell/Emeric
Pressburger 1948), this time with no framing narrative. Hein Heckroth's sets
relied on an economic theatrical style which utilised gauze drapes, dyed and
decorated to suit the setting, cellophane and muslin. It was also decided
whenever possible to create optical effects in the camera. The use of light to
achieve such effects was obviously crucial. Challis had the luxury of shooting
everything wild, without sound, which meant there were no mike booms to contend
with, placing all the emphasis during shooting on the visuals: the movement,
colour and spectacle of the dancing. The camera was also unblimped throughout
which made it much smaller and lighter. Consequently, the crew were able to film
on a huge stage at Shepperton originally built at Isleworth for the production
of Things to Come (d. William Cameron Menzies) in 1936. Once again the 300-amp
water cooled super spots used on The Red Shoes were brought into action.
Coloured lighting set the mood in each act, with a great number of filter gels
used on the key and fill lights. Challis explains:
Act I, a light-hearted tale of Hoffman's love for the doll Olympia, is
designed frivolously in yellows, browns and glittering cellophane. In Act II,
set in Venetian courtesan Giulietta's Palace... the decadent richness of the
Borgias with rich purples, blacks and golds. For the last act, which tells of
Hoffman's mature love affair with the consumptive singer, Antonia, the designs
are in cool greys and greens.
The other key three-strip film photographed by Challis during this period is
Henry Cornelius's Ealing-esque comedy Genevieve (1953), featuring the Old Crocks
car race from London to Brighton. While the film eventually proved popular at
the box office, the budget was too small to accommodate the rental of studio
space and so the film was made entirely on location:
We shot under any light conditions. Henry used to come up to me every day and
ask, 'What about the light - can we still shoot?' So I gave him a light meter
with a bit of red tape on the dial and told him that when it goes below the red
tape there was no possibility of shooting. And that's the way we made it.
Challis continued to work regularly with Powell and Pressburger on projects
like the comic operetta Oh... Rosalinda!! (1955), in CinemaScope. To compensate
for the lack of depth, Challis makes a virtue of the horizontal axis which is
broken up by the application of blocks of colour. The comic possibilities of
staging action in adjacent spaces cut off from one another - such as different
hotel rooms - is also explored to the full. The musical sequences are somewhat
confined to a proscenium arch, but the colour and vigour of the execution of
such sequences wins through. This was followed by two VistaVision productions
for Rank. The Battle of the River Plate (d. Powell/Pressburger, 1956) features
striking dawn images of the iron-grey British warships steaming to engage the
German pocket battleship Graf Spee, while Ill Met by Moonlight (d. Powell/Pressburger, 1957), one of
only two British VistaVision films shot in black and white, has a rich glossy
look perfectly suited to a romantic adventure story, much of which takes place
at night. Despite these achievements, Challis was never very happy with the
VistaVision process, noting that the horizontal registration had a tendency to
scratch the film.
By the late 1950s Challis had joined a small group of British
cinematographers specialising in international widescreen productions. His work
embraced a range of different formats and genres from the CinemaScope
swashbuckler The Adventures of Quentin Durward (US, 1955), to 70mm action
comedies in the vein of Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines (d. Ken
Annakin, 1956) and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (UK/US, d. Ken Hughes, 1968). He also
established a close working relationship with the American director Stanley
Donen on films like The Grass Is Greener and Surprise Package (both 1960),
Arabesque (UK/US, 1966), Two for the Road (US, 1967), Staircase (US/France/UK,
1969) and The Little Prince (US, 1974). Challis retired from the business in
1985 after completing work on Joseph Losey's last film, Steaming (1984).
Duncan Petrie
This entry is taken from Duncan Petrie's The British Cinematographer (BFI, 1996). Used by permission.
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