Michael Ballhaus on a set filming “Martha” with director Rainer Fassbinder

I just read 19 issue of Mono.Kultur magazine which presents a lengthy interview with German cinematographer Michael Ballhaus. Topics range from technical aspects of the craft to experience working with two legendary directors: Rainer Maria Fassbinder and Martin Scorsese. There are some interesting stories and some good insight:

“To be honest, I preferred working with the complicated directors to the easy-going ones, simply because they were better. If someone has very high demans and visions that other people don’t have. then it’s naturally a bit complicated. But of course the results are better in the end. In this respect, working with Fassbinder was always interesting, always. Provided you overlooked the fact that he wasn’t very nice sometimes.”