By Randi Altman

Want something scary to watch on Halloween? Look no further. Hulu’s Monsterland is an eight-episode anthology series created by Mary Laws. It’s based on a collection of short horror stories by Nathan Ballingrud.

Episode 3, New Orleans

With a title like Monsterland, viewers shouldn’t be surprised that this series is designed to scare the holy hell out of you. Each episode takes place in a different city and features evil mermaids (yup), fallen angels and other beasts that drive troubled people to desperate acts. The series premiered in early October.

Cinematographer Anka Malatynska shot half of the episodes, while DP Anette Haellmigk shot the rest. We reached out to Malatynska, who describes the show’s look as magical realism, to talk workflow, look and inspiration.

You shot four different episodes of this anthology series. Did each one have its own look, or was there a look book for the entire series?
Yes, it was an anthology, but there were specific colors of lighting and lighting approaches that tied the series together to create a semblance of a specific look while giving each director an opportunity to put their own mark on the show. It was exciting to work with such unique and different voices and walk that line as the DP, incorporating their [voices] into the already brilliant vision laid out in the script.

Episode 3, New Orleans

It’s also a thriller, so there are dark moments… lots of greys and blues. But there are also brighter moments. Can you talk about that?
There are brighter moments yes. Early on, Mary Laws and I had a conversation about using the idea of light, an overwhelming amount of light, kind of like the aliens in Close Encounters of the Third Kind, as the indicator of an extraterrestrial presence.

Episode 103 was probably my darkest, but our main character begins her final demise in the brightest part of the day. In the finale, we took the Close Encounters motif to another level. Our angels in the episode are almost luminescent, and when humans ingest their blood everything gets brighter and more vibrant. I don’t want to spoil the plot though because these are wonderful incredibly unique stories.

How early did you get involved in planning for your episodes? What direction did the showrunner give you about the look they wanted for your episodes?
I was hired very early on, months before production. Mary Laws, our showrunner, was very clear with her visual references to photographers Gregory Crewdson and Todd Hido. It was great to have a concrete visual starting point. Mary also liked a lot of the ideas I brought to my interview. In the end, all of us — Mary, DP Anette Haellmigk and I — were really aligned to the show that we were making.

Episode 8, Newark

Anette and I discussed the lighting and she established a lot key elements with our gaffer Rich Ulivella … like the orange street light that makes it into the episodes. Then some things evolved in production, like the heavy backlights for supernatural moments that director Babak Anvari and I came up with for Episode 108, which EP Eagle Egilsson and Anette then used on 107.

There was the ARRI 8R lens that was inspired by director Logan Kibens in her longing for a wide lens that would introduce a creepy and surreal element. The 8R has an enormous field of view but it is rectilinear, so it doesn’t bend any lines. It’s a lens that Bill Bennett, ASC, introduced me to years ago. It is a difficult lens to use because it literally sees everything, so if it’s an interior you have to light from the outside. We used that and it worked really well in her episode. Then director Babak Anvari and I used it in 108 again for emotional effect. It’s great to have visual rules but to also be able to refine and redefine through the process.

The ask in this anthology series was for a more filmic visual language, meaning holding longer on shots, allowing the wide shot to develop and evolve outside establishing a scene and not being afraid of withholding coverage. I would watch all the movies each one of our directors directed prior to working with them. I would actively invite their preferred language into the coverage while maintaining similar lighting patterns throughout the series.

Episode 6, Iron River, MI

How did you work with the directors and colorist to achieve the intended look?
I would create a shot list with the directors and this is where they really left their mark. We’d ask, “What kind of shots are we choosing? Where are we putting the camera?” Directors on our show had a lot of input there, and it’s been fun to watch the episodes and see the brilliance of their choices, and it’s amazing to witness the acting as a whole.

Did you have much input in the color grading?
Most of the post took place during the pandemic. I only had a chance to give notes in person on one episode. For the rest of the episodes, we used Streambox and calibrated Mac Book Pros to review the color and give notes. It’s interesting watching it on my Roku TV — some of it is spot-on how I remember from sitting with Sim New York colorist Rob Sciarratta in our remote color sessions, while some bits and pieces fell off. It was not completely scientific, but it was pretty effective. Of course, sitting in the same room looking at the same monitor is preferable, but we made it work, and I think we did a really great job in the end.

Where was it shot, and how long was the shoot?
We shot all the episodes in and around New York City September 2019 through February 2020.

Episode 104, Plainfield, IL

How did you go about choosing the right camera and lenses for this project?
Anette had just worked on the Sony Venice and brought it to the table. It’s a great camera for low-light situations. We shot our nights at 2500 ISO. We could literally fake day in a room that felt like it was lit for night. Kind of incredible. The camera has beautiful shadow detail but is not that kind to the nightlights.

Can you describe the lighting? Any “happy accidents” you captured?
The lighting was all about backlight and sidelight, and sometimes we let the backlight work as the key. It went from moments of realism to moments of hyper reality, fantasy and horror.

As for happy accidents, making a schedule like this is all about creating the room for happy accidents — like the cat crossing the street in Episode 108 before Brian discovers the Angel, or the beautiful noir light Shawn steps into in the bathroom. Part preparation, part happy accident. Sometimes it’s a tragedy that leads to the happy accident — like our freezing weather that didn’t allow for the original iteration of the final scene of the finale, which was written as an exterior night in the snow. Practically, we just could not put naked people outside at night in the winter. We found this gorgeous theater, and director Babak suggested it for the finale. I think it made for stronger images. Often the limitations are the genesis of the magic, the happy accident.

Episode 8, Newark

Any challenging scenes that you are particularly proud of, or that you found most challenging?
Every episode had some very challenging scenes. In the New Orleans episode (103), it was the big night exteriors on very hard, big page-count days. That script had 96 strips in its shooting draft, and we shot it in 10 days! We had 10-page days with eight scenes. Luckily, most were in one location — our big mansion. To keep up with this pace, director Craig Macneill and I walked through the shots several times and prepped very thoroughly to make it possible. That was the name of the game on all the episodes — thorough prep. Then my ninja G&E team preplanned every move, so the lighting was a fast and a furious ballet that happened one step ahead of the shooting unit.

In the finale, when the Angel slits its throat, that was an intense logistical feat of pouring 10 gallons of fake angel blood on someone’s hardwood floor, all coordinated with complex lighting cues that all had to work properly on a first take. We had cover shots, too, to make sure it worked in the edit.

Now more general questions….

How did you become interested in cinematography?
On the weekends when I was 13, my mom would let me sneak into her chemistry lab where they had a dark room. I grew up all over the world and started taking pictures when I was around 11 – this helped me to make sense of my world. I never stopped. I was into acting, into science and math, and that on top of the photography somehow translated into cinematography.

Anka Malatynska

Christopher Kieslowski’s expressive films and Tarkovsky’s haunting work led to discovering film director Wong Kar-wai, and through him, Christopher Doyle — he was the first cinematographer I was aware of. I wanted to be close to the camera but not in front of it. The idea of expressing emotion through composition and lighting became a deep fascination.

Do you think there are more opportunities for female cinematographers these days? Was there anyone in particular that helped you along your path to DP?
Yes. For sure there are many doors opening to women DPs that were much more limited before. The past five years, and especially the past two, there has been a significant improvement in the opportunities available to many more women, not just a few.

James Chressanthis, ASC, was an amazing mentor. He helped so many people. I learned a lot from working on his documentary about cinematographers Laszlo Kovacs and Vilmos Zsigmond. It gave me some good preparation for how tough the politics of the incredibly strong personalities in film can be.

What inspires you artistically?
Life inspires me. The work I do inspires me. I do incredible amounts of visual research for jobs. I learn so much from watching everything I can from everywhere. When working, my crews inspire me. The directors I work with inspire me, telling stories that are powerful and artful.

Can you name some other recent work?
Breaking Fast is an incredible independent film written and directed by Mike Mosallam about Mo, a practicing Muslim living in West Hollywood, who is learning to navigate life post heartbreak. It’s a romantic comedy of sorts with deep realness that transcends identity stereotypes. It was set in West Hollywood, and it was so fun to shoot at home with a group of incredible artists and human beings.

Breaking Fast

What new technology has changed the way you work (looking back over the past few years)? 
Shooting at 2500 ASA is incredibly liberating. The new problem was that we couldn’t dim our lights down enough sometimes! LED lighting and working off a dimmer board have also made the process of lighting much quicker and almost invisible – perhaps to a fault. But on Monsterland, I often felt like my gaffer’s team.

What’s your go-to gear?
It’s hard to be preferential. I love the ARRI Alexa or Mini. I loved the Sony Venice and would use it again, but not in all situations. For stories that dwell in the darkness, it’s a great tool. I’ve used the Red for a number of indies and commercials and also love a lot of that work. It’s all about the skin tone rendition and the optics. Optics – always primes, except in this post-/midst-COVID world. I am in prep on a show, and for the first time, I am going to use zooms because the less we need to do on set between setups, the better.

Explain your ideal collaboration with the director or showrunner when starting a new project.
I love a collaborator who knows what they want but can take suggestions and someone who leads through harmony, rather than berating someone for their own lack of communication.

What are some of your best practices or rules you try to follow on each job?
Be kind and respectful. Never talk shit. Always be grateful.

Randi Altman is the founder and editor-in-chief of postPerspective. She has been covering production and post production for more than 20 years.