Point Reyes Light - November 4, 1999
Inverness Park cameraman an expert at filming the NFL
On a bright October Sunday, high above the crowd at Candlestick Park, cameraman Mark Allan of Inverness Park watched the San Francisco 49er offense finish a touchdown drive against the Tennessee Titans to gain a comfortable 11-point lead midway through the fourth quarter.
Allan got a close-up on quarterback Jeff Garcia lined up behind center Chris Dalman, then zoomed out just a bit as Garcia dropped back to pass. He opened up the lens a bit more to reveal wide receiver Terrell Owens streaking down the near sideline, then zoomed in on Owens as he made the catch and dived across the goal line.
As the 16-millimeter film silently rolled on, Owens was joined in the end zone by three teammates, who congratulated him by slapping his helmet. Then Owens began a herky-jerky dance, and when the extra point kick sailed through the uprights, Allan panned to the seats behind the end zone, and the ecstatic crowd.
Some of Allan's footage would appear later that week on HBO's weekly program, Inside the NFL, complete with graphics, a symphonic score, and the signature baritone voice-over of an NFL Films production. But all the drama of a sometimes tedious, early season game was distilled in that sequence of frames.
"Mark is a documentary filmmaker," explained NFL Films president Steve Sabol. "When you have Mark Allan shoot for you, he comes back with a complete story."
Last year, Allan was credited with taking NFL Films' best shot of the entire season - a 96-yard touchdown romp by Niner runningback Garrison Hearst against the New York Jets in overtime. It was just the latest honor Allan has received in his nearly quarter-century career filming Bay Area sports teams, rainforest and wildlife documentaries, and incomparable footage of Tomales Bay and the Point Reyes National Seashore.
Filming and motion pictures run in his family. His father Kenneth Allan, a San Francisco bureau chief for Movie Tone news, started out as a child actor in the studios of New Jersey before following the industry to California, where the sixth-grade graduate worked as a cable puller, carpenter, scene painter, cameraman, and assistant director.
Among his father's many credits were helping to build the gorilla hand that grabbed Fay Wray from a New York skyscraper in King Kong, an appearance in the DW Griffith classic Intolerance, and a cameo as a news reel photographer in The Manchurian Candidate.
When news reels went out of fashion, the former bureau chief teamed up with a fellow Movie Tone cameraman in 1967 to start Essanay Film & Television, which they named after a defunct studio that produced some of Charlie Chaplain's early work. An apprentice cameraman for Movie Tone news, Mark Allan started working professionally for his father's production company in the mid-1970s.
Allan met his wife, Susan Giacomini Allen, when she was producing a news segment on Halleck Creek Riding Club in Nicasio for KGO-TV, the local ABC affiliate. Susan, also a volunteer at the riding club for disabled children, still recalls the day of the shoot, her anxiety about Mark's reputation as a perfectionist, and her delight at the footage he captured for her. She said he understood exactly what she was after for the story.
"He got it, and not only that, he got pictures of it. He captured for me all the love that happened there between the kids and the horses," he said. "It was amazing to me. I'd worked with other cameramen, and I'd never seen anything like it."
Nearly 20 years later, the couple collaborates regularly on Essanay productions for clients that range from ESPN to Marin Agricultural Land Trust. They moved to West Marin 12 years ago but split their time between Inverness Park and San Francisco, where their son is a senior at St. Ignatius High School and has already shown an almost innate skill with a movie camera that seems to pass from father to son. Another son attends Manhattanville College in New York State and is a promising actor.
Because Mark Allan is considered one of the best cameramen working for NFL Films, he regularly gets assigned one of the difficult jobs in professional football.
Countless millions have seen it. Just seconds after winning the Superbowl, the game's most valuable player makes his way off the crowded field. Somewhere in the frenzy he will encounter Mark Allan. The player always smiles into his camera and tells the world he is heading to Disneyland.
Last week Allan was scheduled to tape a Charlie Rose interview with Jodie Foster for CBS. Last year, he had to decline an offer to shoot the World Series. Some mornings he simply drives around West Marin looking for new footage of Tomales Bay. Freelance camera work has taken him to Europe, Australia, India, and Asia.
The Allans insist their work is not that glamorous. It involves lugging film equipment to the roof of Candlestick Park in the wind and fog, and long hours setting up shots. It involves sports agents counting down the minutes available to shoot a pampered client. It involves miles upon miles of travel, and time away from home.
But the couple clearly loves what they do, and it shows throughout their work, whether they are shooting an interview with an NFL quarterback or a Tomales Bay oyster farmer, a music video for the X-Games, or a lone shaft of sunlight sneaking through the clouds atop the Inverness Ridge.