"The Meg"
Although sounding like a shitty soccer movie "The Meg" was really a pretty good overall film. It didn't try to stick to consistency or anything but I thought that overall it was a very brave new take on the classic "Jaws" that used a lot of new industry techniques and effects. I really just saw this as an updated version of "Jaws" and I think that it filled that role surprisingly well.
It's not made to be overly realistic or anything but strays close enough to keep you interested in the modern era of movies. Looking at the behind the scenes of this movie was really cool because when I first watched it I really wondered how they got the character interactions and then the massive shark to all work together. I learned that they shot everything that they could legitly in real life like the people and the boats, floaties, submarine kind of crafts all of that stuff in and basically 3d rendered their images from different camera angles and then added in the animations of the sharks and some other touch up details that ended up making it look surprisingly realistic. I learned that they did not film any of the scenes out in the middle of the ocean but instead had large basically pools that they would either submerge whatever they were filming if it was underwater or have the actors float out there either on their own or on a boat. And the first scene you see in that video where the people are jumping off of the boat really happened, minus the shark hitting the boat of course but they shook the boat as it would if the shark was on it and had the actors jump off of the boat and into the water and filmed the entire thing and then rendered it and added the animation of the shark and all the larger splashes in afterwards.
Frontier:
Jason Momoa opens by talking a little bit about him getting into the character that he play in "Frontier" and then moves on to how when he was out directing commercials for Carhartt in Newfoundland he stumbled upon a plateu of burned trees and knew that he wanted to film part of Frontier there. He explains that the problem with this was that he was hiking up when site scouting and he had to worry about transportation for the crew to be able to film there. They eventually work around this after going through the land owner and getting permission to build a road up to that spot just so that they could get the entire crew there to be able to shoot and build a set. The scene with the man on fire was really interesting, they show a short clip of it and I wish they explained how it was done but unfortunately they didn't. Cool shots of them working the camera as he's running through the woods in the snow. Not any different that what we have done here in the past with someone holding onto his belt and pulling him in the right direction so that he doesn't hit anything and him running backwards holding the camera and trying to keep focus on his actor in front of him. Talks again about the importance of site scouting and you get to see the awesome sink hold up in Newfoundland that one of his friends came across, interesting to see that they have a safety team with them helping them to get down into the sinkhole safely and with the cameras that they need. He also brought a local chef with him to teach him how to hunt, skin, and cook an arctic hare. Also interesting to note how often stunt doubles are used even though they are just out filming in a small group of friends even over the course of just one day. "Push the limits of whats possible", they were out filming in such a could and windy environment that their biggest concern was if the cameras would continue working. And even when it was -36 out they kept working and got the shots that they needed to get. (Attached hand warmers around the cameras to keep them warm).
Part 2:
The first part that surprised me about this was how much work went into practicing the fighting scenes over and over again before they got all dressed up and into makeup so that once they were they could focus on getting in and getting the shots that they needed. Theres a scene where in a bar Jason Momoa's character throws up and it shows how they did it and kind of how it looks in this, they just filmed one side of his body and used his body to hide a tube from the camera that was filled with liquid made to look like vomit and then shot out when it was time. It seems fairly simple but theres a lot that goes into that and it is just one small piece of that whole fight scene. I love how they show I dry run take of the actors in normal cloths just running through the motions while the camera practices the path it will take when they are in costume. Love how he explains the vision that he was going for, also cool to note is that once they started filming they only took 4 takes and then linked it together. Clean and simple out fast once they started filming, it's the pre production work that allows them to do that so professionally in the first place. Interesting to see the differences in the camera rigs that they use throughout the season, smaller ones when they are in the cold compared to these big over the back ones when they are shooting in the dunes outside of the castle. He hints towards the fact the he is used to the DP's on films not actually touching a camera themselves and more just leading other people while they use the cameras. You get a lot of insight into his style of acting as well as directing. This was a great piece to watch and I enjoyed doing it much more than I thought I would.