So there we were. Finally at the gate. Leaning on it, straining with all our undead weight...
The gate broke open. The gate's supposed to break open, but not that easily. As far as I know the script didn't call for us to think "that was a bit easy. Can't really be bothered now", and shuffle huffily off into the dawn. So we did it again.
Another reality of the movie biz. The underlying profession is the creation of illusion. They're paid liars, if you want to be blunt. Space contracts and expands, ordinary people become ubermenschen, and sturdy-looking metal gates turn out to be secured by something you wouldn't trust to keep a packet of frozen veg secure.
The sheer scale, even of a movie this small, is pretty amazing. Watching them work out solutions to these kinds of problems (because there's sod all else to do while you wait) is fascinating. The solution in this case was some poor guy with his feet on the gate below the level of the shot, holding up 15 people with more piling in. Who needs the gym?
Hours 2-4 basically ran like hours 0-2. Act like a zombie, rinse, repeat until everyone gets it right. That is, everyone gets it right at the same time, on camera. It's like herding kittens but with less mewing.
This time there was more blood, squirted into mouths just before every take. We were encouraged to drool; not hard because after the 4th application this stuff tastes like toothpaste.
We spent hours at that (literally) bloody gate. Spilling through, starting again, spilling through, ad nauseum. By lunch (jerk chicken, since you ask, and quite nice too) everyone was sick of the thing.
We brightened up during lunch. A few brave souls stole out to the local corner shop, while I developed my soon to be patented method for meeting members of the opposite (or same) sex (for, well, sex):
After lunch, we were back on the gate, spilling through again from a different angle, then for a steadicam shot, then for a dolly shot, slouching up and down on the spot to create the illusion of movement where there was none. I see that gate in my dreams. Terrible dreams...
It's hard to describe the fatigue that set in about this point. I'm pretty sure we were all having a blast, but walking like a zombie does nothing for the knees. No wonder the bloody shamblers break down so quickly. At one point I actually lay down on the gravel and nearly drifted off while the tech guys set up the last tracking shot. At which point my destiny breifly flashed before me.
"Excuse me."
My eyes snapped open, like the hero in a movie when he's having a rough dream. Fortunately I didn't slam bolt upright, because looming above me was Ted.
Now, I couldn't recall what Ted does. I could probably find him on IMDB, but I can't be bothered. If you're that bothered, you do it. All you need to know about Ted is that he was everywhere. He was important in a below the line way. One of those guys who has a hand in most on-set stuff but doesn't get the red carpet treatment when it's time to traipse down to Leicester Square. Ted was Antipodeian. He probably still is.
I'm in trouble. That was my first thought. I'd fallen asleep and tripped the 2nd unit Director up. Or called out something ridiculous in the throes of a nightmare. Or snored.
He wanted to know if I'd been featured.
That's right. Featured. A close up, or gesture, something to define me from the massed horde. I'd done one earlier take where I spun towards the camera in profile, drooling. One take. That meant either:
A) I'd got it spot on first time.
B) I had buggered it so spectacularly they believed there was no hope for me.
My mind wasn't leaning towards A. So in essence, I hadn't been featured. And yes, I WAS ready for my close-up, Mr. DeMille... (It's amazing what being on a movie set can do to the ego. Even when you're so low on the totem they couldn't give your Zombie a number to distinguish him from the next.)
But I'm getting off the point. Ted wanted to know if I'd like to be the dead body lying in the road 20 feet beyond the gate. Clearly, trying to catch 40 winks I'd inadvertantly auditioned for the role. But this was progress! This was a role... beyond the gate. Zombie nirvana, baby.
Of course I said yes.
He took me over to some prop/make-up people. They conferred intensely for a few minutes and decided they would use a dummy mock-up instead. This mock-up seemed to consist of plastic bags stuffed inside empty clothes. That's right. I was being upstaged by a mass of plastic bags.
"So you won't be needing me then?"
They would not be needing me. Back to bed it was until the last shot was set up. After jam baguette sandwiches (strangest mid-afternoon nibbles ever), we did the tracking shot from the side, lumbering towards the dolly rig. Then we changed clothes so that we all looked like different zombies. Then we did it again with yet more clothes, so that in the final shots we would look like 300+ flesh-hungry super fiends, and not 30-odd cold, bored plebs with nothing better to do than hang out playing undead all day in clothes we only wear around the house.
The last job for day one was a quick half hour in twos in front of green screens practicing our zombie walks for a high-angle shot. More composite stuff, basically, for the CGI guys to construct a heaving mass of flesh-eaters.
"Remember the walk!" Our Zombie-trainer descended into his trademark shuffle. I did remember the walk, but my left knee was now physically incapable of performing it. I had a feeling I was shuffling in circles. Our two minutes in front of the screen was briefer than everyone else's, and I wondered if this was the cause. Had my left knee sabotaged a potentially glorious career in cinematic shuffling?
The last pair spun and veered in front of the green screen. A saturday night closing-time vignette...
"Zombies are wrapped."
That was it. An involuntary cheer went up. I've never been so knackered by a day's work in my life. It was by turns boring, cold, and repetitious. But I loved it. It sounds like proper work but it's much, much more fun, and much, much less paid. Nevertheless I was really looking forward to day two...
Poor fool.
*Unless of course, they're driving, and sometimes even then.
The gate broke open. The gate's supposed to break open, but not that easily. As far as I know the script didn't call for us to think "that was a bit easy. Can't really be bothered now", and shuffle huffily off into the dawn. So we did it again.
Another reality of the movie biz. The underlying profession is the creation of illusion. They're paid liars, if you want to be blunt. Space contracts and expands, ordinary people become ubermenschen, and sturdy-looking metal gates turn out to be secured by something you wouldn't trust to keep a packet of frozen veg secure.
The sheer scale, even of a movie this small, is pretty amazing. Watching them work out solutions to these kinds of problems (because there's sod all else to do while you wait) is fascinating. The solution in this case was some poor guy with his feet on the gate below the level of the shot, holding up 15 people with more piling in. Who needs the gym?
Hours 2-4 basically ran like hours 0-2. Act like a zombie, rinse, repeat until everyone gets it right. That is, everyone gets it right at the same time, on camera. It's like herding kittens but with less mewing.
This time there was more blood, squirted into mouths just before every take. We were encouraged to drool; not hard because after the 4th application this stuff tastes like toothpaste.
We spent hours at that (literally) bloody gate. Spilling through, starting again, spilling through, ad nauseum. By lunch (jerk chicken, since you ask, and quite nice too) everyone was sick of the thing.
We brightened up during lunch. A few brave souls stole out to the local corner shop, while I developed my soon to be patented method for meeting members of the opposite (or same) sex (for, well, sex):
- Stand at gate dressed as a Zombie.
- Wave.
After lunch, we were back on the gate, spilling through again from a different angle, then for a steadicam shot, then for a dolly shot, slouching up and down on the spot to create the illusion of movement where there was none. I see that gate in my dreams. Terrible dreams...
It's hard to describe the fatigue that set in about this point. I'm pretty sure we were all having a blast, but walking like a zombie does nothing for the knees. No wonder the bloody shamblers break down so quickly. At one point I actually lay down on the gravel and nearly drifted off while the tech guys set up the last tracking shot. At which point my destiny breifly flashed before me.
"Excuse me."
My eyes snapped open, like the hero in a movie when he's having a rough dream. Fortunately I didn't slam bolt upright, because looming above me was Ted.
Now, I couldn't recall what Ted does. I could probably find him on IMDB, but I can't be bothered. If you're that bothered, you do it. All you need to know about Ted is that he was everywhere. He was important in a below the line way. One of those guys who has a hand in most on-set stuff but doesn't get the red carpet treatment when it's time to traipse down to Leicester Square. Ted was Antipodeian. He probably still is.
I'm in trouble. That was my first thought. I'd fallen asleep and tripped the 2nd unit Director up. Or called out something ridiculous in the throes of a nightmare. Or snored.
He wanted to know if I'd been featured.
That's right. Featured. A close up, or gesture, something to define me from the massed horde. I'd done one earlier take where I spun towards the camera in profile, drooling. One take. That meant either:
A) I'd got it spot on first time.
B) I had buggered it so spectacularly they believed there was no hope for me.
My mind wasn't leaning towards A. So in essence, I hadn't been featured. And yes, I WAS ready for my close-up, Mr. DeMille... (It's amazing what being on a movie set can do to the ego. Even when you're so low on the totem they couldn't give your Zombie a number to distinguish him from the next.)
But I'm getting off the point. Ted wanted to know if I'd like to be the dead body lying in the road 20 feet beyond the gate. Clearly, trying to catch 40 winks I'd inadvertantly auditioned for the role. But this was progress! This was a role... beyond the gate. Zombie nirvana, baby.
Of course I said yes.
He took me over to some prop/make-up people. They conferred intensely for a few minutes and decided they would use a dummy mock-up instead. This mock-up seemed to consist of plastic bags stuffed inside empty clothes. That's right. I was being upstaged by a mass of plastic bags.
"So you won't be needing me then?"
They would not be needing me. Back to bed it was until the last shot was set up. After jam baguette sandwiches (strangest mid-afternoon nibbles ever), we did the tracking shot from the side, lumbering towards the dolly rig. Then we changed clothes so that we all looked like different zombies. Then we did it again with yet more clothes, so that in the final shots we would look like 300+ flesh-hungry super fiends, and not 30-odd cold, bored plebs with nothing better to do than hang out playing undead all day in clothes we only wear around the house.
The last job for day one was a quick half hour in twos in front of green screens practicing our zombie walks for a high-angle shot. More composite stuff, basically, for the CGI guys to construct a heaving mass of flesh-eaters.
"Remember the walk!" Our Zombie-trainer descended into his trademark shuffle. I did remember the walk, but my left knee was now physically incapable of performing it. I had a feeling I was shuffling in circles. Our two minutes in front of the screen was briefer than everyone else's, and I wondered if this was the cause. Had my left knee sabotaged a potentially glorious career in cinematic shuffling?
The last pair spun and veered in front of the green screen. A saturday night closing-time vignette...
"Zombies are wrapped."
That was it. An involuntary cheer went up. I've never been so knackered by a day's work in my life. It was by turns boring, cold, and repetitious. But I loved it. It sounds like proper work but it's much, much more fun, and much, much less paid. Nevertheless I was really looking forward to day two...
Poor fool.
*Unless of course, they're driving, and sometimes even then.
