Cinematographer who won an Oscar for the 1964 film classic Zorba the Greek The title of the cinematographer Walter Lassally’s 1987 autobiography, Itinerant Cameraman, could not have been more apt. Lassally, who has died aged 90, was born in Germany (he had a German father and a Polish mother), lived and worked in the UK, and made films in, among many other countries, Czechoslovakia and Greece. It was the last of these, where he shot Zorba the Greek (1964), which won him best black-and-white cinematography Oscar, that meant the most to him. Known locally as “Walter the Greek”, Lassally lived for many years outside the city of Chania, on the island of Crete, near the beach that had served as location for the movie’s celebrated final scene, with Anthony Quinn and Alan Bates dancing to the music of Mikis Theodorakis. He shot six films with its Greek director Michael Cacoyannis, but he had earlier been associated closely with the Free Cinema movement in the UK and the directors that came out of it, and his other celebrated connection was with the American director James Ivory. Continue reading...
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