Checco Varese, ASC (Director of Photography) shot the soon to be released feature, THE 33, directed by Patricia Riggen and starring Antonio Banderas, Oscar® winner Juliette Binoche and Rodrigo Santoro. Shot entirely on location in Chile's stunning Atacama desert and deep within the mines of Colombia, THE 33 follows the extraordinary real-life survival story that captivated the world's attention in 2010 -- the catastrophic collapse of the Copiapó gold and copper mine and miraculous rescue of all 33 miners after 69 days trapped 800 meters below the surface of the earth, under a megaton boulder twice the size of the Empire State Building.
Checco's works include: Their Eyes Were Watching God, starring Halle Barry and produced by Oprah Winfrey; El Aura, the follow-up film from Nine Queens director Fabian Bielinsky; Under the Same Moon (Director: Patricia Riggen); HBO's vampire series True Blood (Director: Alan Ball) ; Kevin Costner's film The New Daughter (Director: Luis Berdejo); 5 Days of War (Director: Renny Harlin); writer Carlton Cuse's The Colony (Director: Juan Campanella), The Returned (Director: Keith Gordon), and Point of Honor (Director: Randall Wallace). Checco's relationship with Guillermo Del Toro, which began with second unit on Pacific Rim, continued on The Strain, also written and directed by Del Toro.
In the mid 1990s, Checco established himself as a leading director of photography, shooting hundreds of music videos, including Dave Matthew's Band's "Crash" and Prince's "Black Sweat," for which he was nominated for Best Cinematography at the 2006 MTV Video Music Awards. TV commercial clients continually seek Varese's visual talent and expertise.
Born in Peru, Checco began his career in the mid-1980's, spending nearly a decade shooting news coverage and documentaries within the major global hot zones of conflict: Latin America (Chiapas Uprising, Salvador and Nicaragua Wars, Panama Invasion, Colombia Drug War, Shining Path, Chile's Military Junta); The Caribbean (Haiti Crisis); Europe (Bosnia Crisis, Chechnya Crisis); the Middle East (Gulf War, West Bank and Gaza Strip Crisis) and Africa (South African Riots and the Rwanda Crisis).
Checco currently lives in Los Angeles.
