Salvatore Totino

Director
Born in Sheepshead, Brooklyn, New York, N.Y., as son of Italian immigrants. Entered the New York film world in the 1980s as a production assistant, but quickly became fascinated with the role of the cinematographer. Moved up to first camera assistant, and received his first break when he was asked by director Peter Care to shoot second-unit footage on a music video for the British band New Order. He soon became a sought-after director of photography in his own right, shooting a wide array of innovative commercials and music videos. He has shot ad campaigns for Jack Daniels, Nike, Jaguar, The Gap and H.I.S. Jeans, winning a Clio Award for the latter. Among his most interesting music videos are U2’s ‘Staring At the Sun’ [1997, Jake Scott], R.E.M.’s ‘What’s the Frequency, Kenneth?’ [1994, Peter Care], Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Secret Garden’ [1995, Peter Care], Soundgarden’s ‘Spoonman’ [1994, Jeffrey Plansker], Live’s ‘Lightning Crashes’ [1994, Jake Scott] & Radiohead’s surreal ‘Fake Plastic Trees’ [1995, Jake Scott]. Both of the latter videos are part of the permanent archive collection at New York’s Museum of Modern Art.’ [From article on the ASC website.] Ph over 300 commercials dir by Bob Giraldi, Dominic Sena, Nick Lewin ['One on One', 2002, for Volvo; 'UFO They're Here', 'Flower', 'Dream' & 'Soul' for Volkswagen], Chris Palmer ['Ice Cream Truck', 2002, for American Express], Mehdi Norowzian, a.o. Appeared in the doc ‘New Frontiers: Making ‘The Missing” [2004].

Back to Reel

Back to Team