Soviet Emigre Builds Film Career Based on Artistic Freedom

Except for a few paintings and a Great Dane sleeping in the corner, Misha Suslov’s living room is empty, as are most of the rooms in his elegant, new four-bedroom home in Sherman Oaks.

Suslov designed and built the house himself. It took five years to finish. At one point, when jobs were scarce, the skeleton frame of the home stood untouched for almost two years. Suslov had run out of money for lumber and nails.

But lately, work has been picking up for the 46-year-old Soviet emigre. Finally, 11 years after he left a successful film career in Moscow, Suslov is beginning to establish himself as a cinematographer in Hollywood.

Major Production Credits

One of his recent projects--John Carpenter’s “Black Moon Rising”-- drew critical praise for its cinematography. Suslov has just returned from six weeks in the Arizona desert filming Evelyn Purcell’s romantic comedy, “Nobody’s Fool.” Next week, “Roanoke,” a three-hour historical drama that he shot for “American Playhouse,” will be broadcast on PBS.

“After my next film,” Suslov said, “then I can buy furniture.”

Sitting at the kitchen table, chain-smoking Marlboros, Suslov said that money and furniture do not concern him much. They are only trappings of success.

“If you are good at what you do, you get money, that’s all,” he said in heavily accented English.

The Soviet government allowed Suslov, his wife Irina, also 46, and their son, Vadim, 27, to emigrate to the United States in 1975 because they were Jewish. But it was not for political or religious reasons that Suslov wanted to leave his homeland. He came to America for his art.

Pursuit of Artistic Freedom

“Hollywood was something up in the sky,” Suslov said with a smile. “I came here for artistic freedom. You realize that it is not important just to shoot a movie, but to shoot a movie that says something, that will not be censored.”

Suslov, however, is proud of his Russian legacy. Educated at the All-Union State Institute of Cinematography in Moscow, Suslov believes that he was trained for his work in a manner different from his American counterparts.

“Here in the United States, cinematographers belong to a technical union,” he said. “In Russia, we consider cinematographers not as technicians; they are artists.”

The irony of this, Suslov said, was that in the Soviet Union he was not allowed to express such artistry. In Hollywood, he has the freedom to work on films that tell a wide variety of stories. He can now approach his work with concerns that reach beyond the technical aspects of filming.

“I want to know what is this picture about,” he said. “What is this picture for? What do we want to say?”

Bringing Intentions to Film

Once acquainted with the artistic viewpoint of the film, Suslov attempts to convert thematic intentions into lighting, camera angle and focus, he said.

“I think Misha’s technique is very different,” said director Matthew Chapman of Suslov’s work on his 1982 movie “Strangers Kiss.” “He’s much more than a technician. He has a real sense of story and drama, and I think he feels that the script is as much his domain as it is anybody else’s. He is the most inspired and the most artistic cinematographer I have ever worked with.”

It is Suslov’s use of light that has drawn attention from critics. The Times’ Michael Wilmington, in a review of “Black Moon Rising,” commented on “the stark, brilliantly metallic gleam cinematographer Misha Suslov puts on his images . . . . He gives the whole movie a virtuosic sheen; his lighting is so bleak and deep, the movie looks as if it would freeze your fingers.”

Suslov believes that he can also bring a fresh perspective to his work in America simply from having lived in a different culture.

“Cinematography is just like being a director or an actor--the more you know the richer you are in your art.”

Virtually Unknown in U.S.

As a teen-ager, Suslov was a movie and photography fanatic. By age 35 he had worked as director of photography on 30 films in the Soviet Union. Two of those films--Chekhov’s “The Seagull” and “The Sixth of July”--were distributed in the United States.

Yet when Suslov arrived in New York City in 1975, he was virtually unknown in the American film community. He brought with him only $125, and he could not speak English.

“I learned English from lying in bed and watching television,” he said.

Irina, a successful film editor in the Soviet Union, forsook ambitions of continuing her career and took a job as a bank teller. Friends who had already established themselves in the United States offered money to help Suslov open an auto body shop or a maybe a restaurant. He refused.

“I always believed I would shoot movies again. I learned that freedom not to be employed is also a freedom,” he said. “There were difficult times, but never doubts.”

During those first years in America, work came rarely and then only on minor films. “Low, low, low, low budget,” Suslov said. “Terrible movies.” After several years, he moved his family to the Valley to be close to Hollywood.

Adjusting to America

When talking about his acclamation to the United States, Suslov speaks mostly in terms of his work. He had to learn to use equipment that is more sophisticated than what was available in the Soviet Union. He had to learn English words for the technical terms of a cinematographer.

In his life beyond the movie set, Suslov and his family kept mainly to other Soviet emigres and a few American friends. Born and raised in Moscow, Suslov found New York and Los Angeles not much different from his home.

“The life of a big city I know already,” he said. “I knew about the United States before I came here. It is what I expected.”

Democratic Film Making

Suslov’s big break came with “Strangers Kiss.” The film, a romantic melodrama based on the relationship between the late actress Dorothy Stratten and director Peter Bogdanovich, drew attention as a grand experiment in democratic film making. The production crew, which included executive producer Michael White (who backed “Eating Raoul” and “My Dinner With Andre”) and director Matthew Chapman (“Hussy”), agreed to work free, deferring payments until after the movie was released.

The film was a critical success. Since its release, Suslov has worked regularly. He is now shooting almost as often as he was at the height of his career in the Soviet Union. And he has moved up to large-budget films with well-known directors and actors.

Suslov recalled an incident many years ago, when he was still living in Moscow. An American film director was touring the city’s film studio.

“He told me, ‘The biggest problem you face in (the United States) is having so much freedom that you have to find out how to use it,’ ” Suslov said. “Well, it’s true.

“I am glad to have that freedom,” he said. “I am doing what I’ve wanted to do all my life.”