Nikon cameras in the movies

jmeyer | News | 02/07/2012 12:30pm

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7. Under Fire (1983)

This gripping movie, directed by Roger Spottiswoode, follows three journalists as they report on the last days of a civil war in Nicaragua – and fall in and out of love with each other. Photographer Russell Price (played by Nick Nolte) gets his lens dirty when he agrees to photograph a dead rebel leader to convince people that the man is still alive. He ends up producing an unforgettable image, in a similar vein to Alberto Korda’s famous shot of Che Guevara.

The photographer: Handling a Nikon F2 like a pro is tougher than it looks, but Nick Nolte gets it exactly right, even showing us a bit of manual rewinding at times. Maybe this is thanks to the influence of the film’s advisor Matthew Naythons, who’d worked as a photojournalist in wartorn Nicaragua. Just ignore the extra on the hotel roof – he’s not so handy with his video camera!

Most famous for: This is a Hollywood movie about a real-life civil war, and unambiguously takes the side of the Sandinistas, against Somoza’s dictatorship.

WORTH WATCHING? You could teach a course on old-school SLR photography using a DVD of Under Fire.

Posted on Monday, July 2nd, 2012 at 12:30 pm under News.