Known for Camera
Robert Krasker, BSC was a cinematographer and feature film Director of Photography who worked on more than sixty films in his career. He was born in Alexandria, Egypt during a business trip by his parents Mathilde and Leon Krasker from Western Australia to Europe and back and his birth was registered in Perth, Western Australia after their return. The Krasker family lived and operated their pearl trading business out of Denham in Shark Bay and Subiaco in Perth. After Leon died in an accident in Shark Bay, Mathilde had to consider the children's educational needs so moved the family back to Paris where she and Leon had been educated as refugees from eastern Europe. Krasker completed his secondary schooling in Paris then studied art there in 1929 before enrolling in Professor Robert Luther's celebrated photograph course at the Photohändler Schule of the Technische Hochschule, later Technische Universität, in Dresden. He credited his education there for his fast start in the film industry at Les Studios Paramount in Joinville-le-Pont in the south-east of Paris and rapid ascension as the youngest Director of Photography of his era. Krasker moved to England from Paris in 1931 and worked there in that year on his last film as camera assistant to Philip Tannura, Service for Ladies, produced and directed by Alexander Korda. Korda invited him to work at Korda's London Films, where he was apprenticed to French Director of Photography Georges Périnal , becoming a senior camera operator then a Director of Photography in his own right. To say that Krasker's work was "strongly influenced by film noir and German Expressionism" is an oversimplification. It elides his art and photography education in Paris and his apprenticeship to Georges Périnal working as his camera operator on a range of very different films including The Rise of Catherine the Great (1933), Things to Come (1935), Rembrandt (1936), I, Claudius (1937 but unreleased), The Drum (1937), The Four Feathers (1938), The Thief of Bagdad (1939) and more. Robert Krasker's most notable films as Director of Photography included Henry V (1944) for Laurence Olivier, Uncle Silas (1947), directed by Charles Frank and The Third Man (1949), for which he won an Oscar, and Odd Man Out (1947), both for director Carol Reed, as well as Brief Encounter (1945) for David Lean and Another Man's Poison (1951) for Irving Rapper, and more. Despite Krasker's brilliant and atmospheric work on Brief Encounter (1945), Lean sacked him from his next film, Great Expectations (1945), because he and producer Ronald Neame were unhappy with the handling of Krasker's much-celebrated marsh scenes at the beginning of the film. Robert Krasker's later films included Romeo and Juliet (1953) for Renato Castellani, Senso (1953) for Luchino Visconti and The Quiet American (1957) for Joseph L. Mankiewicz and The Criminal (1960) for Joseph Losey as well as the widescreen black and white drama Billy Budd (1961) for Peter Ustinov and the widescreen Technicolor epics Alexander the Great (1955) for Robert Rossen, Trapeze (1955) for Carol Reed, El Cid (1961) for Anthony Mann, The Fall of the Roman Empire (1963) for Anthony Mann and The Heroes of Telemark (1965) also for Anthony Mann.
Born
August 21, 1913
Died
August 16, 1981 (age 67)
Birthplace
Alexandria, Egypt
Filmography
45 films


The Trap
1966 · 1h 46m
country: Canada
A French-Canadian fur trapper takes a mute girl as his unwilling wife to live with him in his remote cabin in the woods.


The Heroes of Telemark
1965 · 2h 11m
country: United Kingdom
Set in German-occupied Norway, resistance fighter Knut Straud enlists the reluctant physicist Rolf Pedersen in an effort to destroy the German heavy water production plant in rural Telemark.


The Collector
1965 · 1h 59m
country: United Kingdom
A man kidnaps a woman and holds her hostage just for the pleasure of having her there.


The Fall of the Roman Empire
1964 · 3h 8m
country: United States
In the year 180 A.D. Germanic tribes are about to invade the Roman empire from the north. In the midst of this crisis ailing emperor Marcus Aurelius has to make a decision about his successor between his son Commodus, who is obsessed by power, and the loyal general Gaius Livius.


The Running Man
1963 · 1h 43m
country: United Kingdom
An Englishman with a grudge against an insurance company for a disallowed claim fakes his own death and escapes to Spain, but is soon pursued by an insurance investigator.


Billy Budd
1962 · 1h 59m
country: United Kingdom
Billy is an innocent, naive seaman in the British Navy in 1797. When the ship's sadistic master-at-arms is murdered, Billy is accused and tried.


Guns of Darkness
1962 · 1h 42m
country: United Kingdom
Committed pacifist Tom Jordan's decision to help former President Rivera escape a military coup is a simple act of mercy that takes him and his wife to the edge of despair. It turns them into outlaws and fugitives, hunted by a vicious South American regime; yet it could also bring them together in a way they have never been before.


El Cid
1961 · 3h 7m
country: Italy
Epic film of the legendary Spanish hero, Rodrigo Diaz ("El Cid" to his followers), who, without compromising his strict sense of honour, still succeeds in taking the initiative and driving the Moors from Spain.


Romanoff and Juliet
1961 · 1h 43m
country: United States
Political satire has Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet story updated for the cold war era, with the children of the US and Russian ambassadors falling in love.


The Criminal
1960 · 1h 37m
country: United Kingdom
When a robbery at a racetrack goes wrong ex-con Johnny Bannion is caught and sent back to prison. He won't tell the rest of the gang where he has stashed the loot leading to violent consequences.


Libel
1959 · 1h 40m
country: United Kingdom
A California commercial pilot sees a telecast in London of an interview with Sir Mark Lodden at his home. The Canadian is convinced that the baronet is a fraud, and he is actually a look-alike actor named Frank Welney.


The Doctor's Dilemma
1959 · 1h 39m
country: United Kingdom
Four doctors face a serious dilemma when the beautiful wife of a TB-stricken artist begs one of them to cure her brilliant, but amoral, husband.


Behind the Mask
1958 · 1h 39m
country: United Kingdom
A newly qualified surgeon takes the blame for his drug addict colleague after the death their patient through neglect.


The Quiet American
1958 · 2h
country: United States
Cynical British journalist Fowler falls in love with a young Vietnamese woman but is dismayed when a naïve U.S. official also begins vying for her attention. In retaliation, Fowler informs the communists that the American is selling arms to their enemy.


The Rising of the Moon
1957 · 1h 21m
country: Ireland
Three vignettes of old Irish country life, based on a series of short stories. In "The Majesty of the Law," a police officer must arrest an old-fashioned, traditional fellow for assault. The man's principles have the policeman and the whole village, including the man he slugged, sympathizing with him. "One Minute's Wait" is about a little train station and glimpses into the lives of the passengers, with a series of comic setups. The third piece, "1921," is about a condemned Irish nationalist and his daring escape.


Trapeze
1956 · 1h 45m
country: United States
A pair of men try to perform the dangerous "triple" in their trapeze act. Problems arise when the duo is made into a trio following the addition of a sexy female performer.


Alexander the Great
1956 · 2h 16m
country: Spain
An engrossing spectacle set in the 4th-century BC, in which Alexander of Greece leads his troops forth, conquering all of the known world, in the belief that the Greek way of thinking will bring enlightenment to people. The son of the barbaric and ruthless King Philip of Macedonia, Alexander achieved glory in his short but remarkable life.


That Lady
1955 · 1h 40m
country: Spain
In 1570, widowed Princess Ana de Mendoza becomes the love object of a deadly rivalry between her cousin Don Inigo, King Philip II of Spain and his secretary of state Antonio Perez.


Romeo and Juliet
1954 · 2h 21m
country: Italy
In Shakespeare's classic play, the Montagues and Capulets, two families of Renaissance Italy, have hated each other for years, but the son of one family and the daughter of the other fall desperately in love and secretly marry.


Senso
1954 · 2h 3m
country: Italy
A troubled and neurotic Italian Countess betrays her entire country for a self-destructive love affair with an Austrian Lieutenant.


Malta Story
1953 · 1h 39m
country: United Kingdom
Malta, 1942, during World War II. While the German air force is relentlessly bombing the island, a British pilot falls in love with a young Maltese girl.


Never Let Me Go
1953 · 1h 34m
country: United Kingdom
An American reporter falls in love with a Russian ballet dancer.


Another Man's Poison
1951 · 1h 30m
country: United Kingdom
Mystery novelist Janet Frobisher, lives in an isolated house, having been separated for years from her criminal husband. She has fallen in love with her secretary's fiancé and when her estranged husband unexpectedly returns, Janet poisons him, but just as she's about to dispose of the body, one of her husband's criminal cohorts also shows up.


The Wonder Kid
1951 · 1h 25m
country: Austria
Bobby Henrey, the amazing juvenile star of The Fallen Idol, is here cast as 7-year-old musical genius Sebastian Giro. Mistreated by his avaricious adult manager, Sebastian runs away to a remote Alpine village. He then falls into the hands of a gang of kidnappers, led by the basically sympathetic Jack.


Cry, the Beloved Country
1951 · 1h 43m
country: United Kingdom
In the back country of South Africa, black minister Stephen Kumalo journeys to the city to search for his missing son, only to find his people living in squalor and his son a criminal. Reverend Misimangu is a young South African clergyman who helps find his missing son-turned-thief and sister-turned-prostitute in the slums of Johannesburg.


State Secret
1950 · 1h 44m
country: United Kingdom
While working in England, an American surgeon Dr. John Marlowe is invited to Vosnia (a fictitious East-European country) to receive an award and demonstrate his life-saving surgery. Unwittingly caught in the middle of a dangerous and corrupt series of political events, Marlowe then becomes the object of a shoot-to-kill, vicious pursuit. Fleeing, he seeks help from an English-speaking actress, Lisa Robinson, and the two attempt to escape across the treacherous mountains of Vosnia.


The Angel with the Trumpet
1950 · 1h 38m
country: United Kingdom
Sad tale of a woman who marries the man her family wishes her to wed, not Wooland, the man she truly loves. Years after her lover's suicide, Herlie joins him before the Gestapo can get to her because of her Jewish ancestry.


The Third Man
1949 · 1h 45m
country: United Kingdom
In postwar Vienna, Austria, Holly Martins, a writer of pulp Westerns, arrives penniless as a guest of his childhood chum Harry Lime, only to learn he has died. Martins develops a conspiracy theory after learning of a "third man" present at the time of Harry's death, running into interference from British officer Major Calloway, and falling head-over-heels for Harry's grief-stricken lover, Anna.


Bonnie Prince Charlie
1948 · 1h 54m
country: United Kingdom
Scotland, 1745. After decades of exile, Prince Charles Edward Stuart secretly lands with the purpose of revolting the Highland chieftains against the German House of Hanover, ruler of Great Britain.


Uncle Silas
1947 · 1h 38m
country: United Kingdom
Following her father's death, a teenage heiress moves in with her guardian uncle who is broke and schemes to murder his niece for her vast inheritance.


Odd Man Out
1947 · 1h 56m
country: United Kingdom
Belfast police conduct a door-to-door manhunt for an IRA gunman wounded in a daring robbery.


Caesar and Cleopatra
1945 · 2h 18m
country: United Kingdom
At the height of the Roman Civil War, an aging Julius Caesar finds himself intrigued by the young Egyptian queen Cleopatra, whom he teaches how to rule Egypt.


Brief Encounter
1945 · 1h 26m
country: United Kingdom
Returning home from a shopping trip to a nearby town, bored suburban housewife Laura Jesson is thrown by happenstance into an acquaintance with virtuous doctor Alec Harvey. Their casual friendship soon develops during their weekly visits into something more emotionally fulfilling than either expected, and they must wrestle with the potential havoc their deepening relationship would have on their lives and the lives of those they love.


Henry V
1944 · 2h 17m
country: United Kingdom
In 1415, in the midst of the Hundred Years' War, the young King Henry V of England embarks on the conquest of France.


The Lamp Still Burns
1943 · 1h 30m
country: United Kingdom
A tribute to the important work of female nurses during World War II.


The Gentle Sex
1943 · 1h 32m
country: United Kingdom
During the War seven women from very different backgrounds find themselves together in the Auxiliary Territorial Services. They are soon drilling, driving lorries, and manning ack-ack batteries.