Fiction
Lauretta’s fiction filmmaking ranges from feature films to shorts, drama to comedy, TV pilots to the big screen. She is most interested in creating compelling, thoughtful work, whose style derives from story.
Lauretta has shot four full-length feature films and dozens of short films. Her narrative camerawork has screened at festivals including Sundance, Tribeca, and the Manhattan Film Festival, and received awards and grants from groups such as the Directors's Guild of America, NY Women in Film and Television, and Panavision.
Shorter work includes Lady Hunters, which brought home numerous Best Cinematography awards, as well as Best Picture and Best Socially Conscious Film. Lady Hunters is Lauretta’s fifth collaboration with director Angela Atwood, who is currently in fundraising for the feature, which follows three moms as they become a clumsy vigilante death squad.
116 is another highly laureled short film, claiming numerous awards for Best Picture and Best Director (and one Best Lighting!). The stylized story reinterprets a Shakespeare sonnet as a couple struggles around the power of love and the love of power.
CURRENTLY:
In early 2024 Lauretta filmed a nuanced short film all in one sixteen minute Steadicam shot: The Actress and the Photographer. Recent work includes Across, a 1940s post-war piece, and Anatevka, a black-and-white/color hybrid dark comedy premiering at the Lincoln Center in 2023. Fujifilm recently sponsored Lauretta’s trip to Camerimage, the cinematography festival in Poland.
Lauretta is attached to three narrative features in various stages of funding: Lady Hunters; Gabriel’s Horn, a black-and-white noir following a fallen archangel’s battle against a Heaven that wants him back from the Brooklyn jazz scene; and A Demon On My Life, chronicling two dancers’ relationship as one struggles with the little understood ME/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.
Operating on Fiction
Kindly head over to this website’s Operating page to check out the famous faces Lauretta has had the pleasure of working with.
Writing for Film Magazines
Lauretta writes for film publications such as
American Cinematographer,
ICG: International Cinematographer’s Guild,
Filmmaker Magazine,
& No Film School.
"Art is not a mirror held up to reality but a hammer with which to shape it."
--Bertolt Brecht
For seventeen years Lauretta has brought a cinematic style to her documentary work, and a deeply empathetic sensibility to her narrative films. Her first documentary feature received a grant to film in Cuba in 2004. Her first narrative feature filmed in 2008.
Lauretta grew up in Germany and Virginia, and studied film history and visual culture at the College of William and Mary. She took filmmaking courses in London with the BBC through New York University.
Non-Fiction
Lauretta’s documentary interests are strongly rooted in social justice, as well as environmental, arts, and community work.
An Inciting Incident for her social justice work was filming at Standing Rock, North Dakota for four months, contributing footage to Democracy Now!, the BBC, Al Jazeera, The Real News Network, and two feature documentaries screened and awarded at the Sundance Film Festival.
MOST RECENTLY:
In post-production is a shot-for-shot remake of News From Home, the 1977 avant-garde feature by Chantal Akerman. Wrapping production is a feature based on the star-studded criminal case against Fugees’ member Pras Michal. Documentary feature Thirst for Justice was nominated for Best Documentary at the Raindance Film Festival and had its US premiere on Bloomberg TV.
Lauretta served as an Additional Cinematographer on Battleground, which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in 2022, and as a camera operator on a film premiering at Sundance 2023: the Indigo Girls documentary It’s Only Life After All.
In 2022 Lauretta was selected for a documentary cinematography residency at NewportFILM in Newport, Rhode Island.
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Whether filming South American presidents or US presidential hopefuls; whether taking a turn driving the camper van on a family’s personal journey or bouncing around in the back of a pick up truck with clowns performing in El Salvador; whether filming endangered parrots in Puerto Rico or documenting climate change on Peruvian glaciers, it is a joy and an honor to be trusted and let into folks’ worlds, and to tell their stories.
Select Subjects
Hillary Clinton, Pete Buttigeig
The Presidents of Argentina, Chile, and Venezuela
Al Sharpton
Pharrell, Dr. Dre, The Indigo Girls
Roger Waters, Russell Simmons, Lady Gaga
Ethan Hawke, Lakeith Stanfield
Dan Rather
Mariano Rivera
Diane von Furstenberg
CEOs of Lyft, Airbnb, Blackstone, Barnes & Noble
endangered Puerto Rican parrots
…and people like you :)
Select Partners and Clients
NPR, BBC, PBS, WNYC, Al Jazeera, Now This News
AMC, iFC, MTV, VH1, The Onion, MarieClaire
VOX, DemocracyNOW!
United Nations, Planned Parenthood, Color of Change, Shambhala Mountain Center
McKinsey, PWC (PriceWaterHouseCooopers), LinkedIn,
Google, theMoth, NYU in UAE, CVS, Bustelo
Select Filming Locations
Argentina, Uruguay, Peru, El Salvador, Mexico, France, Japan, The United Arab Emirates, Cuba, & Croatia
The United States (NYC, San Francisco, LA, New Orleans, Asheville, Mississippi, Maine, Black Rock City, etc)
Organizations
Lauretta is honored to be part of
Cinematography Salon [occasional instagram host]
International Collective of Female+ Cinematographers
Reinas de la Luz
Empowering Women Documentary Filmmakers [founder]
Gear
Lauretta is super comfortable on most cameras,
and owns a variety of camera gear (Canon C300—4K, Canon C100—HD),
lighting gear,
and audio gear.
Outside of Work
Lauretta’s pastimes include hosting needlessly complex pun competitions, creating intimate participatory art projects designed to build connection among strangers, and co-leading the New York arm of Burners Without Borders, a grassroots community-support non-profit.