Barry Lyndon, the 1975 film directed by the great Stanley Kubrick, is considered by many as one of the most impressive pieces of work completed throughout his career.

Based on the 1844 novel The Luck of Barry Lyndon by William Makepeace Thackeray, Barry Lyndon is the period drama film starring the likes of Ryan O’Neal, Marisa Berenson, Patrick Magee and more. Created directly after Kubrick’s iconic feature film A Clockwork Orange, Barry Lyndon displayed the filmmaker’s innate ability to put his own unique spin on a film in any genre.

The success of the film, of course, comes with Kubrick’s remarkable attention to detail and the production team that he surrounded himself around. John Alcott, the pioneering cinematographer, produced some of his best work on Barry Lyndon with many describing his craft as groundbreaking.

Filmed in London, Ireland, England and Germany, the film tells the story of a “likeable young Irishman changes into a conniving, manipulative rogue” and went on to win four Oscars in production categories at the 1975 Academy Awards.

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“I’m not sure if I can say that I have a favourite Kubrick picture, but somehow I keep coming back to Barry Lyndon,” Martin Scorsese once said of the film. “I think that’s because it’s such a profoundly emotional experience. The emotion is conveyed through the movement of the camera, the slowness of the pace, the way the characters move in relation to their surroundings. People didn’t get it when it came out. Many still don’t.”

Scorsese continued in his praise: “Basically, in one exquisitely beautiful image after another, you’re watching the progress of a man as he moves from the purest innocence to the coldest sophistication, ending in absolute bitterness—and it’s all a matter of simple, elemental survival. It’s a terrifying film because all the candlelit beauty is nothing but a veil over the worst cruelty. But it’s real cruelty, the kind you see every day in polite society.”

Featuring shots of Kubrick on set and editing the film in the converted garage of his home in Abbots Mead, December 1974, enjoy some of the best photographs of Barry Lyndon below:

Photo credit to the excellent Cinephilia & Beyond who were passed on the images by Vivian Kubrick, the daughter of Stanley Kubrick.

(Via: Cinephilia & Beyond)