Stephen H. Burum

Stephen Henry Burum, A.S.C. (born November 25, 1939) is an American cinematographer.

Burum was born in Dinuba, California, a small Central Valley town near Visalia. He graduated from the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television in the 1960s, and became an instructor at the same school. He began his professional filmmaking career working on the Walt Disney anthology television series, and then was drafted into the U.S. Army and assigned to the Army Pictorial Center, for whom he shot army training films. Returning to California after his service was complete, he worked on commercials, television shows, and low-budget films; he won a technical Emmy for his special-effects work on the popular public television astronomy series Cosmos: A Personal Voyage. He began working on major feature films for Francis Ford Coppola in 1976, shooting the second unit of Apocalypse Now and then The Black Stallion. His first credit as the cinematographer of a major motion picture was for The Escape Artist (1982).^[1][2][3][4]

In 2007, Burum returned to UCLA as the Kodak Cinematographer in Residence.^[5]

Awards and honors

Burum was nominated for the American Society of Cinematographers Award for Outstanding Achievement in Cinematography in Theatrical Releases in 1988^[6] and 1990 for his work on the films The Untouchables and The War of the Roses, finally winning in 1993 for his work on Hoffa.^[2][7] He was also nominated for an Academy Award for Hoffa but did not win.^[2][4]

Burum was the 2008 recipient of the American Society of Cinematographers' Lifetime Achievement Award.^[2]

Filmography

Burum is credited as cinematographer or director of photography for 40 movies and TV movies, including:^[4]

• Scream Bloody Murder (1973)
• The Entity (1981)
• Death Valley (1982)
• The Escape Artist (1982)
• The Outsiders (1983)
• Rumble Fish (1983)
• Something Wicked This Way Comes (1983)
• Uncommon Valor (1983)
• Body Double (1984)
• The Bride (1985)
• St. Elmo's Fire (1985)
• 8 Million Ways to Die (1986)
• Pacific Northwest Ballet's Nutcracker (1986)
• The Untouchables (1987)
• The War of the Roses (1989)
• Hoffa (1992)
• Raising Cain (1992)
• Carlito's Way (1993)
• The Shadow (1994)
• Snake Eyes (1998)
• Mystery Men (1999)
• Mission to Mars (2000)
• Life or Something Like It (2002)
• Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen (2004)

References