American Cinematographer - July 1999 - 80

General's

Daughter, West recalls,
getting the team
together, I looked at a lot of cine¬
matographers' work. I was watching
many films and I came across [the
1994 remake of] The Getaway, which
"When I started

A£ew;Bad

Peter had shot. I remembered work¬

ing with him on a commercial a few
back, and I began looking at

years

other films he had done since then.
Each

one had a
very particular
consistent look, which I liked."

but

Menzies and West had formed

their initial bond

during an extraor¬
dinary turn of events that occurred
immediately after the
1994
Northridge earthquake, which
devastated large portions of Los
Angeles. As the tremors began to
rock the city, West was just starting
work

on

Ford commercial. The

a

director recalls, "The

earthquake
happened a Monday morning, and
we all thought that the job would be
canceled, but when the phones were
working again on Tuesday morning,
we

Director Simon West and cinematographer
Peter Menzies Jr., ACS team up to uncover
dark military secrets in
The General's Daughter.
by Jay Holben
Photography by Richard Foreman
Brenner is

directorial debut, the actionadventure yarn Con Air (see

Afterthe suc es of his feature
AC June

cial

turned
his

to

'97), veteran commer¬

director

Simon

West

mystery and intrigue

second

for

project. Adapted by

that it wasn't! Ford

hired

to

shoot the commercial had

his house totaled

by the earthquake.
Through a mutual friend, Simon and
I were introduced, and I got the job."
One could say that cinematog¬
raphy runs in Menzies' very genes.
Fie virtually grew up in a camera
department Down Under, and was
pretty much born into an appren¬
ticeship program. "My father was a
cinematographer, and I started out as
an

assistant for him

I had

Chris Bertolini, Nelson DeMille's

(Madeleine Stowe), Brenner

types

novel,

The

General's

discovers

a

scandal

of immense

proportions.
Asked

time

Australian director of

he

After

photography

commercial

shoot The

a

a

couple

on

assistant."

selected

Peter Menzies Jr., ACS to

hooked

those
of experiences, and for a long
I thought that I would be a

career

how

school holi¬

stayed in London for

with fellow CID veteran Sara Sunhill
soon

on

days," he recalls. "Working on
commercials, I got to travel a lot. By
the age of 18,1 had been to Paris and

screenwriters William Goldman and

Daughter, centers on warrant officer
Paul Brenner (John Travolta). A top
investigator from the Army's
Criminal Investigation Division,
July 1999

out

of months. I got

seventh

78

assigned to look into the
Captain Elizabeth
Campbell (Leslie Stefanson), the
daughter of General Joseph
Campbell (James Cromwell), after
her body is found in the middle of an
Army training field. Working closely
brutal murder of

found

urgently needed the spot, so we went
right to work."
Explains Menzies, "I happened
to be in Los Angeles at the same time.
The gentleman who was originally

camera

securing a job with a
production company as

assistant/assistant editor,

Parocmouufnrtt.esy
Phot s
American Cinematographer - July 1999

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