Fellow cinematographer William A. Fraker called Willis's work a "milestone in visual storytelling",[1] while one critic suggested that Willis "defined the cinematic look of the 1970s: sophisticated compositions in which bolts of light and black put the decade's moral ambiguities into stark relief".
[6] During the Korean War, Willis served in the Air Force, managing to join the Photographic and Charting Service in a motion picture unit.
[6] He worked in advertising, shooting numerous commercials, and made a number of documentaries, a discipline that strongly influenced his later style.
He captured America's urban paranoia in three films he shot with Alan J. Pakula: Klute (1971), The Parallax View (1974) and All The President's Men (1976).
[10] He collaborated with Hal Ashby on The Landlord (1970), James Bridges on The Paper Chase (1973), and Herbert Ross on Pennies From Heaven (1981); as well as shooting all three of Coppola's Godfather films and working with Woody Allen on a succession of films that included Annie Hall (1977) and Manhattan (1979).
[10] At a seminar on film-making he gave in 2003, Willis said, "It's hard to believe, but a lot of directors have no visual sense.
When asked by the interviewer how he applied his style to different genres and to working with different directors, Willis answered: "You're looking for a formula; there is none.
Willis went back to using Mitchells on The Godfather Part II (1974), in order to retain the visual coherence of the two films.
"The interpretive levels suffer", adding: "Digital is another form of recording an image, but it won't replace thinking.
[1] His work turned out to be groundbreaking in its use of low-light photography and underexposed film, as well as in his control of lighting and exposure to create the sepia tones that denoted period scenes in The Godfather Part II.
[7] The visual structure of the films was, he said, his, but he gave Coppola credit for hiring him, saying: "I'm not that easy to deal with".
He praised the director for the "management hell" of his struggles with Paramount,[7] adding that he was "grateful he could separate the visual structure of these movies from the mess that went on to fashion them".
[13] On Annie Hall he contrasted the warmth of Annie and Alvy Singer's romance in New York with the overexposure of the film's California scenes, while in Allen's Manhattan he was responsible for what has been called a "richly textured black-and-white paean to the beauty and diversity of the city itself".
His frequent absence from this period's nominees has been ascribed both to his unhidden "antipathy for Hollywood" and his work being ahead of its time.
[17] Willis was later nominated twice, once for his recreation of 1920s photography in Woody Allen's Zelig (1983),[18] and then for The Godfather Part III (1990).
[10][22] ASC president Richard Crudo said: "He was one of the giants who absolutely changed the way movies looked.
Willis's work became celebrated for his ability to use shadow and underexposed film with a "subtlety and expressivity previously unknown on color film stock", with one critic citing as examples Don Corleone's study in The Godfather and a parking garage in All the President's Men.
[1] Speaking of contemporary film-making in 2004, Willis said:"I'm delighted that people can fly, dogs can talk, and anything destructive can be fashioned on the screen, but much of what's being done lacks structure or taste.