Dean Cundey

Years active1973–presentOrganizationAmerican Society of CinematographersAwardsNominated for:
Academy Award for Best Cinematography
BAFTA Award for Best Cinematography

Dean Raymond Cundey, A.S.C.^[1] (born March 12, 1946) is an American cinematographer and film director. He is known for his collaborations with John Carpenter, Steven Spielberg, and Robert Zemeckis, as well as his extensive work in the horror genre, in addition to numerous family and comedy films. His filmography as a cinematographer includes Halloween (1978), The Fog (1980), Escape from New York (1981), The Thing (1982), the Back to the Future trilogy (1985–1990), Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988), Jurassic Park (1993), Apollo 13 (1995), and Garfield: The Movie (2004).

Cundey was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Cinematography for his work on Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and has been nominated for numerous BAFTAs and BSC Awards.

Life and career

Cundey was born in Alhambra, California, United States. As a child, he used to build model sets, suggesting an interest in films from an early age. Cundey already had several low-budget films when he met Debra Hill, who in 1978 recruited him to work on Halloween, a film she co-wrote with director John Carpenter.

Having Cundey work on a film brought considerable advantages. In addition to his considerable skill as a cinematographer and director of photography, he also had the advantage of owning most of his own equipment packed in a large van, referred to by Debra Hill as the "movie van".^[2]

Cundey's work on Halloween is cited by many fans as being among his best as director of photography. In addition to his lighting skills, particularly in the famous hallway scene where the hidden face of Michael Myers is slowly revealed by way of a blue light next to the mask, he was among the first cinematographers to make use of a recent invention called the steadicam, or panaglide.

The panaglide allowed the camera operator to "wear" the camera and obtain shots that were previously deemed too difficult or even impossible. In Halloween, the panaglide was used as a point of view reference for Michael Myers, allowing the audience to see what he saw.^[3]

Other noteworthy films

Cundey would go on to work with Carpenter and Hill again on the films The Fog (1980), Escape from New York, Halloween II (both 1981), The Thing (1982), and Halloween III: Season of the Witch (1983).^[4] He would also return to work with Carpenter for the last time on the 1986 big budget science fiction/comedy adventure Big Trouble in Little China. Cundey also served as director of photography on the 4D film Honey, I Shrunk the Audience!, which ran in five Walt Disney theme parks around the world.

Later work

In addition to his work with Carpenter, Cundey would lend his talents to the films Psycho II (1983), Romancing the Stone (1984), the Back to the Future trilogy (1985–1990), Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988), Road House (1989), Jurassic Park (1993), Apollo 13 (1995), What Women Want (2000), and Garfield: The Movie (2004), among others. In 1997, he made his directorial debut with the direct-to-video sequel Honey, We Shrunk Ourselves. He recently worked in Canada on Camp Rock, one of several movies that he has filmed outside the United States, including Who Framed Roger Rabbit which was filmed primarily in England. In 2011, Cundey shot the comedy film Jack and Jill, which involved extensive split-screen and motion control effects to create the illusion of actor Adam Sandler interacting with multiple on-screen personas.

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Director	Notes
1973	The No Mercy Man	Daniel Vance
	Brother on the Run	Edward J. Lakso Herbert L. Strock
1974	Where the Red Fern Grows	Norman Tokar
	So Evil, My Sister	Reginald Le Borg
1975	That Girl from Boston	Matt Cimber
1976	The Witch Who Came From the Sea		Uncredited
	Black Shampoo	Greydon Clark	With Michael Mileham
	Creature from Black Lake	Joy N. Houck Jr.
	The Human Tornado	Cliff Roquemore	With Bob Wilson; Credited as "Gene Condie"
1977	Satan's Cheerleaders	Greydon Clark
	Bare Knuckles	Don Edmonds
	Charge of the Model T's	Jim McCullough Sr.
1978	Hi-Riders	Greydon Clark
	Goodbye, Franklin High	Mike MacFarland
	Hanging on a Star
	Halloween	John Carpenter
	The Kid from Not-So-Big	Bill Crain
1979	Angels' Brigade	Greydon Clark
	Rock 'n' Roll High School	Allan Arkush
	Roller Boogie	Mark L. Lester
1980	The Fog	John Carpenter
	Galaxina	William Sachs
	Without Warning	Greydon Clark
1981	Escape from New York	John Carpenter
	Separate Ways	Howard Avedis
	Jaws of Satan	Bob Claver
	Halloween II	Rick Rosenthal
1982	The Thing	John Carpenter
	Halloween III: Season of the Witch	Tommy Lee Wallace
1983	Psycho II	Richard Franklin
	D.C. Cab	Joel Schumacher
1984	Romancing the Stone	Robert Zemeckis
1985	Back to the Future
	Warning Sign	Hal Barwood
1986	Big Trouble in Little China	John Carpenter
1987	Project X	Jonathan Kaplan
1988	Big Business	Jim Abrahams
	Who Framed Roger Rabbit	Robert Zemeckis
1989	Road House	Rowdy Herrington
	Back to the Future Part II	Robert Zemeckis	Shot back-to-back
1990	Back to the Future Part III
1991	Nothing but Trouble	Dan Aykroyd
	Hook	Steven Spielberg
1992	Death Becomes Her	Robert Zemeckis
1993	Jurassic Park	Steven Spielberg
1994	The Flintstones	Brian Levant
1995	Casper	Brad Silberling
	Apollo 13	Ron Howard
1997	Flubber	Les Mayfield
1998	Krippendorf's Tribe	Todd Holland
	The Parent Trap	Nancy Meyers
2000	What Women Want
2003	Looney Tunes: Back in Action	Joe Dante
2004	Garfield: The Movie	Peter Hewitt
2006	The Holiday	Nancy Meyers
2007	Whisper	Stewart Hendler
2009	Shannon's Rainbow	Frank E. Johnson
2010	The Spy Next Door	Brian Levant
2011	Jack and Jill	Dennis Dugan
2013	Crazy Kind of Love	Sarah Siegel-Magness
2014	Walking with the Enemy	Mark Schmidt
	Freedom	Peter Cousens
2015	The Girl in the Photographs	Nick Simon
	Diablo	Lawrence Roeck
2017	Slamma Jamma	Timothy A. Chey
	Home Again	Hallie Meyers-Shyer
2020	Anastasia: Once Upon a Time	Blake Harris

Direct-to-video

Year	Title	Director	Notes
1982	Citizen Soldier	Michael Elsey	With Baird Bryant
2001	The Face: Jesus in Art	Craig MacGowan	Documentary film
2014	Sophia Grace & Rosie's Royal Adventure	Brian Levant
2015	Back to the Future: Doc Brown Saves the World	Robert Zemeckis Glenn Sanders

Short film

Year	Title	Director	Notes
1989	Michael & Mickey	Jerry Rees	Part of the Studio Backlot Tour attraction at Disney-MGM Studios
1999	Battlestar Galactica: The Second Coming	Richard Hatch Jay Woelfel	With Scott Spears
2011	Back for the Future	Frank Marshall
	To Beauty	Jess Zakira Wise
2012	Ten Men on the Field	Scott Essman	Interior shots
2015	Control Your State	Nate Hochstetler
2016	Bad Timing	Taylor Hatch
	Stripped	India Dupré
2017	Weddings Inc.	Kalee StClair
2019	It's Not for You (Film B)	Clark Barclay
	It's Not for You (Film A)	Jiasi Emily Lai
2020	At Last	Lorena Gordon
2024	The Magic Shop	Nick Simon

Television

Year	Title	Director	Notes
1981-84	Tales of the Unexpected	Ray Danton John Peyser	4 episodes
1989	Tales from the Crypt	Robert Zemeckis	Episode "And All Throgh The House"
2001	Religion & Ethics Newsweekly		1 episode
2005	The West Wing	Christopher Misiano	2 episodes
2014-2015	Clinton Anderson's Outback Adventure	Grant Slawson
2022	The Book of Boba Fett	Steph Green Kevin Tancharoen	2 episodes
2023	The Mandalorian	Rick Famuyiwa Lee Isaac Chung Carl Weathers	3 episodes

TV movies

Year	Title	Director
1983	The Invisible Woman	Alan J. Levi
	M.A.D.D.: Mothers Against Drunk Drivers	William A. Graham
1984	Amazons	Paul Michael Glaser
	Invitation to Hell	Wes Craven
	It Came Upon the Midnight Clear	Peter H. Hunt
1999	Partners	Brett Ratner
2008	Camp Rock	Matthew Diamond
2010	Scooby-Doo! Curse of the Lake Monster	Brian Levant

Other credits

Director

• Honey, We Shrunk Ourselves (1997)

2nd unit director

• Deep Rising (1998)
• Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties (2006)

Additional photography

• Leave it to Beaver (1997)

2nd unit director of photography

• Beware! The Blob (1972)
• Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties (2006)
• Playing for Keeps (2012)

Cameos

Year	Title	Role
1990	Back to the Future Part III	Photographer
1993	Jurassic Park	Mate
1994	The Flintstones	Technician

Awards and recognition

Academy Awards

Year	Award	Title	Result
1988	Best Cinematography	Who Framed Roger Rabbit	Nominated

American Society of Cinematographers

Year	Award	Title	Result
1991	Outstanding Achievement in Cinematography	Hook	Nominated
1995		Apollo 13	Nominated
2014	Lifetime Achievement Award[5]		Won

BAFTA Awards

Year	Award	Title	Result
1988	Best Cinematography	Who Framed Roger Rabbit	Nominated
1995		Apollo 13	Nominated

British Society of Cinematographers

Year	Award	Title	Result
1988	Best Cinematography	Who Framed Roger Rabbit	Nominated
1995		Apollo 13	Nominated

Chicago Film Critics Association

Year	Award	Title	Result
1995	Best Cinematography	Apollo 13	Nominated

Society of Camera Operators

Year	Award	Result
1999	President's Award	Won

Daytime Emmy Awards

Year	Award	Title	Result
2001	Outstanding Cinematography	Religion & Ethics Newsweekly: The Face: Jesus in Art	Won

Primetime Emmy Awards

Year	Award	Title	Result
2023	Outstanding Cinematography for a Series (Half-Hour)	The Mandalorian (For episode "Chapter 20: The Foundling")	Nominated

References

External links

• Dean Cundey at IMDb