The 31st EnergaCamerimage international festival of cinematography, which travels to Turun, Poland, in November, will honour cinematographer Peter Biziou with the lifetime achievement award. Biziou won an Oscar and a BAFTA for his work on the 1988 film Mississippi Burning, directed by Alan Parker.
Among Biziou’s credits are several films with Parker, including Bugsy Malone (co-starring DP Michael Seresin) and Pink Floyd: The Wall, for which he received a second BAFTA nomination. Biziou also worked on Peter Weir’s The Truman Show.
Other notable projects he has worked on include Terry Jones’ Monty Python’s Life of Brian, Terry Gilliam’s Time Bandits, Merek Kanievska’s Another Country, and Jim Sheridan’s In the Name of the Father.
Biziou was evacuated with his family during World War II and was born in Wales. His father, Leon Bijou, collaborated with Richard Thorpe on the 1952 film Ivanhoe as a cinematographer, expert in special effects and animation, and assistant director.
After returning to post-war London, Biziou attended the Quintin Kynaston School, which was renamed in 1969. There, he gained expertise in engineering, machining, and technical drawing before breaking into the film industry through animation. He created a wide range of animation rigs and scaled models, and by helping the company’s cameramen with the lighting, lenses, and cameras, he picked up the skills necessary for working in the animation film industry. He used this method to ascend and shoot his own animation scenes.
Midway through the 1960s, Biziou made the decision to begin his career as a self-employed artist, specialising in lighting film sets for commissioned shorts and commercials. That gave him the chance to collaborate with well-known photographers who were making their debuts in the film industry and allowed nascent cinematographers to assist them in transforming their still-image visions into moving pictures.
Biziou was asked to be in charge of the visuals in Robert Freeman’s debut fiction film, Secret World, starring Jacqueline Bisset, as a result of their growing collaboration. After a successful debut as a cinematographer, Biziou received jobs shooting commercials, short films, and documentaries. He was able to develop his contemporary method of lighting movie sets as a result, which led to more difficult job offers.