Denys Coop

Denys N. Coop, or Denys Coop, was an English cinematographer. He was born on July 20, 1920, in Reading, Berkshire, and died on August 16, 1981, in London. Denys N. Coop was first or second assistant cameraman on some fifteen films released between 1936 and 1948, including Sam Wood's Goodbye Mr. C... More

Denys N. Coop, or Denys Coop, was an English cinematographer. He was born on July 20, 1920, in Reading, Berkshire, and died on August 16, 1981, in London. Denys N. Coop was first or second assistant cameraman on some fifteen films released between 1936 and 1948, including Sam Wood's Goodbye Mr. Chips (1939) and Ludwig Berger and Michael Powell's The Thief of Bagdad (1940). His early career was interrupted by World War II, during which he served in the Royal Air Force. He then worked as a cameraman on some thirty films (working notably with cinematographers Oswald Morris and Georges Périnal) released between 1945 and 1970, including Carol Reed's The Third Man (1949), Laurence Olivier's Richard III (1955), Otto Preminger's Bonjour tristesse (1958), and Stanley Kubrick's Lolita (1962). As a cinematographer, he contributed to twenty-six films (mostly British, released from 1961 onward), including John Schlesinger's Billy the Liar (1963, starring Tom Courtenay and Wilfred Pickles), Franklin J. Schaffner's The Claw (1967, starring Yul Brynner and Britt Ekland), and Roy Ward Baker's Asylum (1972, starring Peter Cushing and Britt Ekland). The last was Otto Preminger's Rosebud (starring Peter O'Toole and Richard Attenborough), released in 1975. Apart from one film released in 1981 (the year of his death) for additional shots, he ended his career as a visual effects technician, with Richard Donner's Superman (1978), then Richard Lester's Superman 2 (1980). Superman earned Denys N. Coop an Oscar for Best Visual Effects in 1979. and, in the same year, a British Academy Film Award. Previously, during the 1960s, he had received three nominations for the British Academy Film Award for Best Cinematography, without winning the award.