10,000 BC meets Sky Capitan in Sci Fi channel premiere of Warbirds
By Robin Rowe
HOLLYWOOD, CA (Hollywood Today) 4/19/08 – “The movie really holds up, with or without the pterodactyls,” says Jamie Mann of ‘Warbirds’, premiering on the SCI FI channel tonight. Mann plays a WWII WASP (Women’s Air Service Corps) pilot ferrying “the bomb” and forced down by a storm on a deserted Pacific island. Well, deserted except for the Japanese soldiers and ravenous flying monsters. It’s a WWII fantasy in the style of ‘Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow’, but with dinosaurs instead of robots.
Although not pterodactyls, Mann says real flying monsters attacked the cast and crew while shooting in the bayous of St. Francisville, Louisiana, near Baton Rouge. “When the sun goes down the bugs come out. You’ve never seen bugs like these. It’s 100 degrees and 100% humidity, and the cameraman is wearing gloves and a hat, and has a back scratcher. The horseflies are so large they can bite you through your clothes. People were jumping, shrieking, bleeding from bugs, 24 hours a day. There’s one scene in the movie where if you look closely you can see [co-star] Brian Krause getting bitten by a mosquito. I couldn’t believe he didn’t flinch. And, there were snakes. I’ve never spent any time in the woods before. I did not like walking back to base camp at night. I was terrified.”
“We’re very happy we went there, but in the beginning Louisiana was a financial decision,” says executive producer Bill Greenblatt. “This was a very expensive movie for the SCI FI channel, more expensive than most SCI FI movies. It was difficult to find a way to make the movie on the budget [under $2M]. We checked out many locations. We went to Puerto Rico because they have rebates, but it would be more expensive to make it there. Louisiana had the most easily accessible rebates and locations that would look like a south sea island. We had a very good time in Louisiana. I would go back again.”
“We did casting out here [Hollywood] and local casting in Louisiana,” says Greenblatt. “We did casting ourselves. Jamie was the first person who came in to read the part. I knew she was it right away, that there wouldn’t be anyone better. Brian was cast up here. We also cast Tohoru Masamune who played the Japanese captain. And, he was really wonderful. He came and read and we thought maybe he had too strong a Japanese accent. But, then we found he was born in New England to Japanese parents and had no Japanese accent. His father was head of the math department at MIT, and Tohoru is a graduate of MIT himself. Kevin’s wife Susan also graduated from MIT and was a student of his father’s. We also cast Gizza Elizondo here who plays Vicky, who’s someone I’ve worked with before. The rest of the people were cast in Lousianna.”
‘Warbirds’ is Kevin Gendreau’s first film as writer-director. A reason that ‘Warbirds’ is so heavy on visual effects is that first-time director Gendreau has supervised visual effects on many films for the SCI FI channel. “It’s huge,” says Greenblatt. “There are over 250 visual effects shots. We only had 15 days to shoot [in June 2007]. We not only had to do what you usually do in an action movie, but block and shoot plates that are necessary later. It was shot on 35mm film, and the dailies were transferred to Hi-Def. The editing was all done in Hi-Def in Final Cut Pro by Margaret Guinee, who did an excellent job. I think working in Hi-Def is how most of these movies are made today. We needed to be working on individual scenes in visual effects almost before the picture was locked.”
Greenblatt produced the movie ‘Target Earth’, that was popular on the SCI FI channel and the movie ‘Tail Hook’ for ABC. He also produced TNT’s first movie, called ‘Nightbreaker’, with Martin Sheen. A true story about the army marching soldiers toward mushroom clouds during atomic testing in the 50s, that won a Writers Guild Award for writer for T. S. Cook who also wrote ‘The China Syndrome’.
‘Warbirds’ is a ‘Jurassic Park’ meets ‘Sky Captain’ scenario. In the final days of World War II, a group of WASPs fight the Japanese and pterodactyls.
Distributor: SCI FI channel
Air date: April 19, 2008
9pm/8pm central
Robin Rowe is a co-founder of ScreenPlayLab (www.screenplaylab.com).
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16 responses so far ↓
1 Sheila West // Apr 19, 2008 at 7:14 pm
I just watched this movie on Sci-Fi. I’m impressed it was only shot in 15 days. The writer/director, Kevin Gendreau, went for (and achieved) a very retro style in his execution, capturing the feel of the old comic books of that era. The makeup and hair styles of the women seemed very authentic to me, especially the lead character (but the hair styles of the men just seemed like regular current day cuts). The way the director framed a lot of the close-ups of the various characters felt like actual comic book panels from that era, inclduing the rarely-used-today technique of a dead-on shot where the character is lonking directly at the camera. Gendreau really knows his stuff and did a fantastic job at world building.
I also never knew about the WASPs until I saw this film. Fascinating aspect of history.
The lead actress was just perfect for the role. She was a believable 1940′s woman, and didn’t just look like a 2000′s woman fumbling around in 1940′s clothing. Again, hair and makeup really helped, but she also captured the era just splendidly.
Getting back to how astonished I am that it was only shot it in 15 days, I have to say I have seen other Sci-Fi Channel projects also shot at such break-neck pace, and the results have rarely been as good as this one. I suspect a lot can be said about allowing the writer to ALSO be the director. He had a very specific vision in his head for what he wanted the end result to be, and when faced with a ticking clock and with cutting corners, he knew what he could abbreviate during the live shooting and what he could hold off for the SFX and the the editing room. Fantastic job by Kevin Gendreau. (I just wish I knew how to pronounce his name.) I expect more from him in the future.
2 Larry Reavis // Apr 20, 2008 at 5:58 pm
An entertaining flick, if you can suspend logic and belief. Oh, not the dinosaurs, I could accept that…….it was the women rebuilding two Wright R-3500 engines after they had burned for 15 minutes, it was the women lifting 400 pound 55 gallon gas drums, and it was having “little boy” fused and detonation ready while transporting it………..
3 Tom Townsend // Apr 21, 2008 at 10:11 am
I throughly enjoyed WARBIRDS. I supplied the WW II truck “Ghost” (CCKW 353)used in the movie and worked on about twelve days of the fifteen day shoot. One of my jobs was to teach Jamie Mann to handle truck’s 5 speed, unchronized manual transmission, an art which she mastered quickly. Of the 15 or so films I’ve supplied military vehicles for, this was probably the most enjoyable despite the bugs, heat and humidity. We had a great cast and crew, all working very well together under the worst of conditions. Best wishes to all of them.
4 Rey // Apr 21, 2008 at 10:10 pm
My mom was absolutely hooked on this movie, and normally she doesn’t care for stuff on the Sci-Fi Channel. WARBIRDS has a nice combination going for it: a bit of history, women in roles of leadership, and thrills upon thrills.
5 Longhofer // Apr 22, 2009 at 8:14 pm
Idk if I’ve ever seen anything like that. Quite happy I did, it just made my day!
6 Myrie // Apr 26, 2009 at 10:08 am
I can’t remember the last time I saw something like that…bookmark ftw =)
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