Biography
Stephen H. Burum, also credited as Stephen Henry Burum, is an American cinematographer. Born on 25 November 1939 in Visalia, California, he graduated from the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television and began his career working on Disney television productions and army training films before shooting commercials, television and low-budget features.
He gained early feature experience as second-unit director of photography on Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now (1979). Burum's first major credit as director of photography was The Escape Artist (1982). He is best known for his long collaboration with Brian De Palma, for whom he shot eight films including Body Double (1984), The Untouchables (1987), Casualties of War (1989), Raising Cain (1992), Carlito's Way (1993), Mission: Impossible (1996), Snake Eyes (1998) and Mission to Mars (2000). Other notable credits include The Outsiders (1983), Rumble Fish (1983), The War of the Roses (1989) and Hoffa (1992).
Burum received an Academy Award nomination for Best Cinematography for Hoffa and won an ASC Award for the same film; he also earned ASC nominations for The Untouchables and The War of the Roses. He was awarded the ASC Lifetime Achievement Award in 2008 and a Camerimage Lifetime Achievement Award in 2022. He returned to UCLA as Kodak Cinematographer in Residence in 2007 and retired from feature work after Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen (2004).
