Rudolph Maté (born Rudolf Mayer; 21 January 1898 – 27 October 1964) was a Polish-Hungarian cinematographer who worked in Hungary, Austria, Germany, and France.
In 1935, he relocated to the United States serving as a cinematographer on notable Hollywood films, including Dodsworth (1936), Foreign Correspondent (1940), and Gilda (1946).
[3] Wheeler Winston Dixon also noted Maté photographed "each shot with a radiant clarity, often using a halo 'iris' effect during Joan's close-ups, to accentuate her isolation and persecution during the trial.
Often, Maté frames Joan slightly from above, looking down at her with a mixture of reverence and sadness, which also serves to suggest her powerlessness during her interrogation by the judges".
During filming, Maté had shot some scenes that appeared blurry and fuzzy, after natural light had accidentally shone into the camera lens.
A few years later, Goldwyn selected Maté as his in-house cinematographer, replacing Gregg Toland who decided to become a wartime film director.
His first solo directorial debut was the 1948 film noir thriller The Dark Past, a remake of Blind Alley (1939).
(1950), a film noir in which Frank Bigelow (portrayed by Edmond O'Brien) is slowly dying of poison and races against the clock to find out the real culprits.
[12] A review in The New York Times deemed the film "a fairly obvious and plodding recital, involving crime, passion, stolen iridium, gangland beatings and one man's innocent bewilderment upon being caught up in a web of circumstance that marks him for death".
[13] William Brogdon of Variety felt Maté's direction "lingers too long over [the first portion of the story], spreading expectancy very thin, but when he does launch his suspense-building it comes over with a solid wallop.