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Arthur Miller (cinematographer)

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Arthur Charles Miller, A.S.C. (July 8, 1895 – July 13, 1970) was an American cinematographer. He was nominated for the Oscar for Best Cinematography six times, winning three times: for How Green Was My Valley in 1941, The Song of Bernadette in 1944, and Anna and the King of Siam in 1947.[1]

Arthur Charles Miller
Miller with 1912 Pathé 35mm movie camera
Born
Arthur Charles Miller

(1895-07-08)July 8, 1895
Roslyn, New York, US
DiedJuly 13, 1970(1970-07-13) (aged 75)
Hollywood, California, US
NationalityAmerican
OccupationCinematographer
Years active1914–1951
EmployerFox Film Corporation
Board member ofAmerican Society of Cinematographers (A.S.C.) co-founder (1919) and president (1954-1956)
AwardsAcademy Award for Best Cinematography
How Green Was My Valley (1941)
The Song of Bernadette (1944)
Anna and the King of Siam (1947)

Career

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"The basic principle I have had in making pictures was to make them look like real life, and then emphasize the visuals slightly ... I was never a soft-focus man. I like the focus [to be] very hard. I liked crisp, hard, solid images." — Arthur Miller.[2]

Born in Roslyn, New York, he began his movie career at the age of 13. According to a 1970 interview with Leonard Maltin, he once worked for a horse dealer. One day, he was returning home from delivering some horses and was sitting on a horse when a man offered him a job in motion pictures because he could ride bareback. Miller recalled, "The first day we went out to a golf course in Brooklyn, and I rode this horse all over, got chased, and all."[3] He found himself working as an assistant to filmmaker Fred J. Balshofer.[3] The two remained lifelong friends and in 1967 co-wrote a book about the early days of film titled One Reel a Week.

 
The House of Hate (1918) - Actors Pearl White and Antonio Moreno, director George B. Seitz, and Miller at Cliffhanger Point on the Hudson River Palisades

Miller eventually joined Pathé and, although only 19 years old, became the cinematographer for the 1914 adventure serial The Perils of Pauline. He worked for Astra Film Co. and then Solax Studios in New Jersey.

In 1918, he and his brother Bill founded the Motion Picture Industry Union.[citation needed] He moved to Hollywood and had a lengthy tenure at Paramount from the late teens throughout the 1920s. In 1932, Miller signed a long-term contract with Fox Film Corporation to be the cinematographer for every Shirley Temple film. He retired in 1951 for health reasons but remained active in the industry as president of the American Society of Cinematographers.

He died in Los Angeles, California, in 1970 and was interred in the Hollywood Forever Cemetery.[4]

In August 1973, his widow Mae Miller and Donald Crisp attended the dedication of the Arthur Miller Memorial Fountain and Arbor at the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital in Woodland Hills.[4]

Partial filmography

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* - according to silentera.com

Notes

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  1. ^ "The Official Academy Awards® Database". Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Archived from the original on 2012-02-25. Retrieved 2019-02-21.
  2. ^ Higham, 1970 p. 134: Italics in original. Composite from two consecutive paragraphs on same subject, for brevity, clarity.
  3. ^ a b Maltin, Leonard (July 25, 2012). The Art of the Cinematographer. Courier Corporation. pp. 117–137. ISBN 9780486154749. Retrieved May 10, 2015.
  4. ^ a b "Arthur Miller Memorial Fountain and Arbor". Van Nuys News. August 7, 1973 – via Newspapers.com.  

References

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