Director worked on more than 80 pictures in prolific career.

Swiss-born cinematographer Carlo Varini, best known for The Chorus, The Big Blue and Subway, has died in a house fire.

The 67-year-old cinematographer, who shot more than 80 pictures throughout his career, started out as a calibrator at the Schwarz-Film laboratory in Berne.

After cinema studies at the Zurich University of Arts he became a news cameraman, moving into fiction as the assistant cameraman of celebrated Italian cinematographer Renato Berta.

He branched out on his own in the early 1980s to work with Luc Besson on his early features The Last Combat, Subway and The Big Blue. He was nominated for a Cesar for the latter two.

More recently, he gained recognition for his work on Christophe Barratier’s The Choir for which he was nominated for Camerimage’s Golden Frog alongside Dominique Gentil.

He was due to work on Canadian director Francesco Lucente’s upcoming feature Starbright.

According to French news reports, Varini died when he leapt from the upper floor of a house in Cathervielle on the French border with Spain, after a fire broke up. He is survived by his wife and two daughters.

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