Originally published November 9, 2016. Updated April 15, 2018.
With Rogue One: A Star Wars Story mere weeks away fans are already looking forward to news of the next spin-off in the Star Wars franchise, the young Han Solo film with Hail, Caesar! star Alden Ehrenreich as the famed smuggler and directed by Phil Lord and Chris Miller.
Cinematographer Bradford Young, whose recent film Arrival will hit theaters this Friday, was hired back in September for Han Solo and spoke to Collider about his the project and working with Lord and Miller, saying he’s “both excited and real nervous, yeah it’s going to be an interesting film the collaboration is going to be very interesting.”
“It’s funny, here’s the thing about Phil Lord and Chris Miller,” Young continued. “Don’t let their track record fool you. Don’t put those guys in a box because they have a vision, they know exactly what they want. They have no hidden agenda, but they do have an agenda; they have a way of seeing that’s very special, and their collaboration is genuinely unique. So I have to say I had to get converted into that. I respect their work, I respect them as filmmakers, but I wasn’t quite sure if there would be a good marriage between what I’m trying to pursue and the work that I’m doing and what they’re doing, but they helped make that real clear to me early on by expressing some real interesting story [and] photographic ideas that really resonated with me. So once they started really pulling me into that world, I realized how much these cats have come from the same pedagogy of filmmaking—in the visual sense for sure, and definitely from an approach in terms of how we want to make movies, they come from the same school. These cats are subversive, don’t let it fool you. They are prepared, they are prepared to say exactly what they want to say and it’s complex and it’s layered, it’s smart, it’s visual, it’s dramatic, it’s funny, it’s uneasy, it’s unexpected. I’m honored to have them in the list of directors that I’ve worked with, that’s for sure.”
Asked if he was going to make the film look aesthetically similar to A New Hope, Young said: “We’re doing our own thing, that’s why we’re there. Phil and Chris are there to bring what they bring to their films, their very unique vision, their perspective on story and they asked me to come bring what I bring, and so just for that it won’t feel like any of the other films. And nobody at Lucasfilm is asking us to betray that, they’re saying ‘We’re in full support of what you do and we wanna make sure that we’re able to help you do it in the best way.’ It’s gonna feel like a Star Wars film, but we’re definitely gonna break some rules, and we’re encouraged to do that. Visually, narratively that’s a good mandate. They really are about, from what I’ve seen so far, supporting up and coming artists, artists who have a strong vision and voice and perspective, and they really wanna permeate the films with those kinds of voices. So it’s interesting, very interesting. Not what I thought it would be, that’s for sure. I’m pleasantly encouraged and pleasantly surprised.”
Head over to Collider to see what else Young had to say on Arrival. Han Solo will also star Donald Glover as Lando Calrissian and actresses Zoe Kravitz, Tessa Thompson and Naomi Scott are rumoured for the female lead. Han Solo is currently scheduled for a May 25, 2018 release.
