One Scene In The Creator Recruited Actual Nuclear Physicists To Play Screaming Extras
Soon, the never-ending barrage of films based on existing IP will be briefly interrupted when "The Creator" debuts. "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story" director Gareth Edwards is at the helm for this futuristic adventure, which explores the highly relevant issue of AI and its relationship to humans. But as well as touching on real-world issues and attempting to inject some humanity into its fantastical narrative, "The Creator" is also an all-out action spectacle.
In a behind-the-scenes video from Industrial Light and Magic, one of the VFX houses that worked on "The Creator," Edwards says, "My favorite cinema is very visually driven. It's not like a play. It's like a dream," adding that he'd aimed to create "a really insane, rich, visual journey." John David Washington, who stars as ex-special forces agent Joshua, certainly seemed impressed by the results, adding that he admired the "magical realism that [Edwards] was able to execute."
Edwards has spoken on numerous occasions about the films that inspired "The Creator," citing such epics as "Blade Runner" — another sci-fi project with a limited budget — and "Apocalypse Now," among others. Indeed, the director described his movie in the ILM clip as "a Vietnam movie mixed with robotic sci-fi." But this grand sci-fi adventure, which was reportedly made on a budget of $86 million, didn't have quite the budget of the last futuristic blockbuster John David Washington starred in — the $205 million "Tenet." As a result, Edwards had to find an economical way to bring his elaborate vision to fruition.
The perfect location
One way Gareth Edwards kept costs down was to shoot at least some of "The Creator" on a Sony FX3 — a prosumer digital camera currently going for around $4,000. But, as much as possible, he also wanted to use real-world locations rather than building elaborate sets, telling GamesRadar that "the cost of a flight is way less than the cost of building a set. We were going to hopscotch around the world and shoot this film, then layer in the science-fiction on top afterwards." On his travels, Edwards came across an ideal location for a particularly explosive set piece. But in order to actually shoot there, he'd have to negotiate, and found that the owners had an interesting request.
Following a screening of some footage from "The Creator," Edwards participated in a Q&A where he revealed that, in Thailand, he came across a facility that housed "a particle accelerator." On the hunt for a location that could be used as "a really technologically advanced kind of factory," Edwards had found the ideal spot. The problem was, he needed to use it to stage a huge shoot-out. As the director explained:
"We were like, 'Please, please, please, can you let us film?' It looked amazing. It had that whole circular hub thing going on. We went to visit, and they were like, 'There's no way you're going to be allowed to film here.' And they sort of asked, 'What do you want to do?' and we were like, 'Well, there's people with guns shooting, and explosions, and it's a multi-, multi-million dollar facility with all these, leading it, cutting edge scientists.' And they're like, 'It's not going to happen, not going to happen, let it go, Gareth, let it go.'"
Fortunately, Edwards caught a break at the last minute.
'Can we be in it?'
In the Q&A, Gareth Edwards recounted how he was all but ready to give up on his ideal Thailand location, when things suddenly changed:
"Someone was like, 'What filmmaker is doing this?' and they were like, 'Oh, it's this guy from the States.' And they go, 'What films has he done?' and they go, 'Oh, he did this Star Wars film called Rogue One' ... and they were like, 'Can we be in it?' And we were like, 'Sure! Whatever!' So everybody in those scenes, everyone running around, are nuclear physicists. They really, really are. And they're amazing."
Edwards took an interesting approach to extras in general, with some extras not knowing if they were playing humans or robots. And while the inclusion of actual nuclear physicists is an amusing bit of trivia, what's more important here is that Edwards was able to land the location.
In the spirit of "Blade Runner," the director looks to have done an admirable job of melding real-world locations with sci-fi elements, in a way that recalls Ridley Scott's film and its immersive, tangible production design. If the trailers for "The Creator" are anything to go by, this isn't the sleek lines and sterilized interiors of certain sci-fi outings. The world of "The Creator" is a much more believable mish-mash of aging human infrastructure and futuristic technology, and using real-world locations was obviously a hugely important element in achieving that.
"The Creator" hits theaters on September 29, 2023.