Laszlo Kovacs; shot 'Easy Rider,' 'Paper Moon'

LOS ANGELES -- Laszlo Kovacs, the Hungarian-born cinematographer who found international fame after treating the American landscape as a character in the landmark 1969 movie "Easy Rider," has died. He was 74.

Mr. Kovacs, a former Budapest film student who arrived in the United States as a political refugee in 1957, died in his sleep Sunday at his Beverly Hills home, said his wife of 23 years, Audrey.

His work on "Paper Moon" was considered a masterpiece of black-and-white photography. He also put his stamp on such notable movies as "Five Easy Pieces" and "Shampoo."

"I worked with him more than any other photographer, which speaks for itself," said director Peter Bogdanovich, who worked with Kovacs on six films, including "Targets" (Bogdanovich's first feature film), "What's Up, Doc?," "Paper Moon," "At Long Last Love," "Nickelodeon," and "Mask."

"He was just reliable. He could make things look gritty, as we did on 'Paper Moon,' or very glamorous, like we did with [Barbra] Streisand in 'Doc.' "

Most recently, Mr. Kovacs shot "Torn From the Flag," a documentary about the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 that incorporates footage that he and cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond shot before fleeing the country.

"Laszlo Kovacs was in the vanguard of American cinematography in the late '60s and early '70s, and he helped change the look of American cinema," said James Chressanthis, who is making a documentary about Mr. Kovacs and Zsigmond called "Laszlo & Vilmos." Chressanthis, who interviewed Mr. Kovacs on camera as recently as two weeks ago for his documentary, said the cinematographer was known for his "inventiveness, the ability to improvise on location, his portraiture of actors in terms of lighting, and his compositional ability."

Mr. Kovacs had been in America for a decade and had shot a number of low-budget biker movies such as "Hells Angels on Wheels" and "The Savage Seven" when Dennis Hopper asked him to shoot "Easy Rider," a portrait of America that starred Hopper, Peter Fonda, and Jack Nicholson.

"I didn't want to do it," Mr. Kovacs told the Albuquerque Journal in 2006. "We did so many motorcycle movies; they're all the same. They come into town, they destroy the town, and at sunset they ride away." But this time, with Hopper, things looked different.

"I was fascinated by the aspect of two young men, and I had a chance to put in this third person -- this landscape, this character," Mr. Kovacs said.

Director Bob Rafelson, who used Mr. Kovacs as cinematographer on "Five Easy Pieces" and "The King of Marvin Gardens," said he "could film air like nobody I had ever seen. There's something palpable about the air that somehow or other he could make visible on film: You could sense the density of the air, the small particles of color in the air, that were invisible to the eye."

In a career spanning five decades and more than 70 films, Mr. Kovacs's credits also include "Ghostbusters," "My Best Friend's Wedding," and "Miss Congeniality."

He was born May 14, 1933, on a farm about 60 miles from Budapest. In 1952, he was accepted into the Academy of Drama and Film in Budapest. He was in his final year in 1956 when a revolt against the communist regime broke out. He and Zsigmond documented the historic event with a 35mm camera and film from the school, hiding the camera in a shopping bag with a hole for the lens.

"We saw the Russian tanks driving back and forth and shooting indiscriminately," he said in the 2006 interview. "People were jumping into doorways. We just looked at each other and said, 'Let's go.' Wherever we heard gunfire, that's where we went."

In addition to his wife, Mr. Kovacs leaves his daughters Julianna and Nadia and a granddaughter.