Why a classic widescreen movie format from the 50s is making a comeback
- Last updated: March 7, 2026 | 10:53 ..
When Paul Thomas Anderson told his cinematographer Michael Bauman that he wanted to shoot “One Battle After Another” on VistaVision — a large-scale film format born in the 1950s — he had some questions. “Question one was: Is this even going to be reliable?” Bauman recalls. For much of the past 60 years, the few remaining VistaVision cameras have been mostly collecting dust on shelves.
Though the format was widely used in the 1950s, when Alfred Hitchcock shot “Vertigo” on it and Cecil B. DeMille used it for “The Ten Commandments,” VistaVision went dormant by the early 1960s. Yet at the March 15 Academy Awards, a movie made largely with decades-old antique cameras is poised to win best picture. Even in 2026, when most films are shot digitally and AI has begun filtering into moviemaking, “One Battle After Another” has — with film equipment borrowed from collectors and museums — showed that a vintage, analog film system can still astonish moviegoers.
“One Battle After Another” presented a major new test for an old format. A sprawling American epic filmed largely in dusty, rural locations, Bauman estimates it meant running 1.5 million feet of film through antique cameras. “VistaVision is great if you’re sitting on a tripod and filming a nice, beautiful waterfall or something,” says Bauman. “But when you’re putting it on a Steadicam, using it as a handheld strapping it to cars, or doing any of the myriad things we were doing — because ultimately Paul wanted it to feel like ‘The French Connection’ — it was a question if the camera could hold up to it.”
But it turns out that VistaVision isn’t just holding up, it’s enjoying a big-screen revival. At last year’s Oscars, Lol Crawley won best cinematography for Brady Corbet’s “The Brutalist,” much of which was shot on VistaVision. This year, Bauman is nominated for the same award after shooting an even greater amount of “One Battle After Another” (he estimates 80%) on VistaVision.
VistaVision is all about the size of the negative. First introduced by Paramount with 1954’s “White Christmas,” it has double the resolution of standard 35mm. Normal film stock is four perforations wide, but VistaVision is eight. To make a higher-resolution image, the film runs horizontally through the camera, instead of vertically. Before “One Battle After Another,” the last film shot and projected on VistaVision was 1961’s “One-Eyed Jacks,” Marlon Brando’s sole directorial effort. But, with some notable exceptions (George Lucas shot the visual effects to 1977’s “Star Wars” in VistaVision), Hollywood moved on.
But now, VistaVision is back in a big way. After being impressed with it for parts of 2023’s “Poor Things” Yorgos Lanthimos and his cinematographer Robbie Ryan shot the best picture-nominated “Bugonia” on VistaVision. Emerald Fennell’s just-released “Wuthering Heights” was also made with VistaVision. Greta Gerwig turned to Vista for her upcoming “Narnia” movie. And Alejandro Iñárritu, with his celebrated director of photography Emmanuel “Chivo” Lubezki, shot the upcoming “Digger” with it.
“It’s a revitalization of a level of the craft of cinematography,” Bauman says. “Photochemical has got a strong voice in the room, still.” The 1950s-set “The Brutalist” helped spark the revival. “We were excited by the colors and the feeling and the weight of the camera,” Mona Fastvold, cowriter and producer of “The Brutalist,” said in an interview last year. “It limits how you move it and dictates the shots, which I think is something that also helps to transport you back to the period.”
VistaVision has its drawbacks. The camera (which looks sideways) is awkward and noisy. You can film takes only for about five minutes. For her 2025 Shaker drama “The Testament of Ann Lee,” Fastvold considered VistaVision but ultimately decided its cameras were too loud for the quiet intimacy she wanted.
But for many filmmakers, the extra hassle is worth it for the beauty and clarity of the image it creates. Anderson has been pondering it for a while. He and Bauman first met when the director was experimenting with VistaVision for 2012’s “The Master.” Anderson decided not to use it then, but he tried it out in a short film for Thom Yorke’s “Anima.”
Just tracking down the equipment for “One Battle After Another” was a challenge, though. Much of “One Battle After Another” was shot on a camera owned by the actor Giovanni Ribisi. He’s long been enamored by the capabilities of the format and the tactile, vinyl-like nature of the camera. Years ago, Ribisi acquired a Beaumont VistaVision camera, a more mobile camera than traditional VistaVision cameras. “It’s not something that you can just press a button and you just let it roll for two hours It fights back a little bit, maybe too much,” Ribisi says, chuckling. “You kind of have to earn it, and I like that.”
For Ribisi, the VistaVision image speaks for itself: multidimensional, inviting, immersive. He thinks formats like VistaVision are more than analog novelty, but a rich future for increasingly image-savvy audiences. “I don’t think it’s just a flash in the pan,” says Ribisi. “I think a lot of people — especially with the phone calls I’m getting — are wanting to not just explore this but consider it their new sword in the battle for filmmaking.”
The “One Battle” filmmakers added two other VistaVision cameras, rented from Geo Film Group, and augmented the production with Super 35mm. They continued testing the Vista cameras even once shooting began. To lessen the noise for some scenes, they built a blimp, or a box, around it.
“It’s its own personality on the set using that camera,” Bauman says. “It would jam. It’s noisy. It kept the camera team on their toes. There’s a look of trepidation in their eyes in many of the photos I have.” Historically, VistaVision has been used for formally composed vistas. But Anderson wanted to approach “One Battle After Another” with a more 70s-style feel — essentially combining separate Hollywood eras, not unlike how the movie’s revolutionary saga blends generations in political resistance. So they leaned into the organic process, intentionally underexposing the film and then leaving it longer in development to add grain and texture.
Associated Press