What I mean by favorite here is
“what I often find myself greatly admiring when I notice it’s done really well”
gonna go with Director of Photography (cinematographer). with emphasis on the photography.
Some things I’ve watched recently that illustrate this role.
- Saltburn, great use of vertical space with the 4:3 aspect ratio, lots of color and natural light. Summer is captured well.
- Crash (1996), Lots of night scenes (always tough to get right), the setting looks appropriately dark, grimy, and mechanical.
- Fight Club, also a (literally) dark film and looks great.
All of my actual experience with Movie magic has been with tangentially through editing.
One of my college buddies edited student films and some freelance internet video (very early youtube) and I have always found the art of editing to be really fascinating. The editor takes a bunch of different shots and music and creates context and concessive vision which I think is pretty damn cool. The thing I liked was hearing him talk to the director or video creator and talking about how/what the vision for something is. It gave me a real appreciation for the behind-the-scenes of movie magic.