Bradford Young

Phil Lord and Chris Miller assembled a dream team to create their Han Solo spinoff Star Wars anthology film. The cast is incredible: Donald Glover, Woody Harrelson, Emilia Clarke, and Alden Ehrenreich as the young Solo. The screenplay was by longtime Star Wars creative force Lawrence Kasdan and his son Jon. The cinematographer was Bradford Young, whose quickly proven himself as one of the most talented young D.P.s in the business with films like Ain’t Them Bodies Saints, Selma, and Arrival. If you’re gonna make a Han Solo movie, these sure seem like the men and women you want to do it with.

Lucasfilm is building a great roster of talent for its untitled Han Solo project, with Phil Lord and Chris Miller directing, Alden Ehrenreich and Donald Glover starring (as Han and Lando, respectively) and cinematographer Bradford Young — whose resumé includes stunning work on another recent sci-fi film: Denis Villeneuve’s Arrival. Those are some very bold names involved with the upcoming Star Wars spinoff, but just how subversive can we expect this movie to be when it’s tied to such a prominent franchise? According to Young, he’s been “pleasantly surprised” by the amount of creative freedom they have at Lucasfilm.

If nothing else, Phil Lord and Chris Miller’s upcoming Han Solo prequel / spinoff is going to look fantastic, as the duo have hired Bradford Young to serve as cinematographer. Okay, let’s be honest: With Lord and Miller on board and the incredibly charming Alden Ehrenreich in the lead role, it’s almost guaranteed that the next Star Wars anthology film will be pretty entertaining — but now we know it’s also going to look really, really, really good.

After the November 17 New York City premiere of ‘Selma’—the new Martin Luther King, Jr. biopic that details his time during the Selma, Alabama civil rights marches—the film’s cinematographer, Bradford Young, speaking to the audience after, made a reference to this film being about today as much as it’s about 1964. While doing so, Bradford, who is an extremely passionate man, evoked images from what we all saw out of Ferguson, Missouri this past August. He then spoke emotionally about his job and his life and his family: