New York City, Brooklyn. An apartment on Fulton Street and an area outside it had been marked off early on. Vehicles were not allowed to pass through. The residents living nearby didn't know what was going on at first, but as the various vehicles arrived and the tools were moved down from the vehicles and set up, they quickly understood.
No one was surprised. There weren't even many onlookers. This kind of situation was too common in New York. As the most famous city in the United States, many movies and TV series were shot here every day. It wasn't until a team of fully armed police officers got out of the cars and quickly spread out into tactical formations that some residents became interested.
Would they launch a rescue or arrest operation in the name of filming? Someone thought in a mocking tone. Of course, this was impossible. These "police officers" began to slack off in less than two minutes. Even so, many people still thought it was interesting and stopped to watch for a while when they passed by.
However, for Adriaan, who was directing and tidying up the set, it wasn't so interesting.
"Charley, tell Raymond to hurry up and get the extras ready for the first test shoot. Also, tell Trevor to come to me immediately, "Adriaan ordered Charlize while he was flipping through the things.
"Got it." Although the beautiful female secretary was more beautiful than before, she seemed very unhappy. She didn't wait for Adriaan to speak again and turned to walk away.
Adriaan shrugged noncommittally. A smile appeared on his face as he thought of something. He then began to discuss with the others. The first scene was the only big scene in the whole movie. Well, it wasn't a big scene. The special police officers blocked outside Leon's apartment, wanting to go in and arrest him. The important and intense scenes were all inside the building, and the people outside just surrounded the place and maintained order.
If that was all, Adriaan wouldn't have arranged for this part of the scene to be shot. The key was that in addition to these, the explosion scene was very important, so he had to negotiate with the community organizations and some government departments to allocate half of the street for filming.
Back when he was filming the racing scene of "Knowing a Woman by Scent", he knew how annoying these agencies were. Sometimes, something didn't work, and sometimes, something didn't work. If he didn't follow their instructions, he wouldn't be able to start filming. Therefore, before this, he had already asked someone to contact the other party. Anyway, it was just a scene, so the earlier it was done, the better.
"Very good. That's it. Have the explosives experts get ready." After Adriaan gave his instructions, he walked towards the RV. The two main actors had already changed into their costumes and were rehearsing their lines.
"How is it, Jean? Do you feel okay?" Adriaan greeted them loudly and hugged Jean Renault. Then, he looked at the guy with messy hair, who was dressed in a suit and leather shoes and looked a little evil.
"It's an honor to meet you, Count Dracula. Do you need me to kiss your hand?" Adriaan said in an exaggerated tone.
"I think I have to remind you, Mr. Adriaan, that firstly, I am a man; secondly, I am currently single." Gary Oldman raised his eyebrows as he spoke. The stubble on his chin, which he had deliberately grown for the movie, quivered.
Renault, who was next to him, immediately burst into laughter. Oldman seemed to feel that it was not enough, so he added, "It seems that the rumor that you are very knowledgeable about British culture is not credible."
"I never said that I was knowledgeable about British culture." Adriaan did not care about his teasing. He smiled and stretched out his hand. "I'm very happy that you can join this movie, Gary. You are just as the rumor says. Although all the roles you play are dark, you are a lovely and interesting person in private."
"Thank you for the compliment. I'm also very happy to work with the famous Miracle Director." Oldman, who was shaking hands with Adriaan, suddenly smiled. Obviously, he was very happy with the compliment.
"Well, I'm going to shoot the explosion scene now. I look forward to your performance after it's over." After a few words of greeting, the stage manager ran over to say that everything was ready. Adriaan then said goodbye and went behind the camera.
"Attention, all departments. Scene 79, Scene 16, ready to shoot." After everyone returned to their positions, the script supervisor raised the board in his hand and shouted. Two seconds later, he slammed it down.
The scene suddenly quieted down, and the camera began to roll. Adriaan folded his arms and stared at the exit of the apartment. One second, two seconds, and with a loud bang, smoke and fire spewed out. Several professional stuntmen in explosion-proof police uniforms immediately rolled away as if they had been hit by the blast.
The explosion scene in the shooting was completely different from what they saw on the big screen. There were not as many flames, and most of it was smoke. It was neither gorgeous nor impactful. This required adjustments in post-production, such as increasing the contrast, speeding up the shot transition, or slowing down the playback speed, etc.
This was Adriaan's first time directing an explosion scene, so not only did he use two cameras to shoot from different angles, but he also specially found an experienced assistant director to help him.
"It's basically up to standard, according to your requirements." Assistant director Masterson pointed to the picture on the monitor and explained to Adriaan, "In post-production, we can make the picture brighter and then slow it down. This way, it will give a sense of gravity and impact."
"Is there anything that needs to be improved?" Adriaan asked as he touched his chin.
"If it's according to your requirements, there's no need to make too many improvements." Masterson's answer was very clever. "It's already very good to be able to shoot this effect in one shot."
"Then shoot it again as a backup, and then shoot it again according to your feelings. I will ask the explosives technician to do it according to your requirements," Adriaan said immediately. In that case, he would shoot it a few more times. He had the time and the space. Otherwise, if he found that something was wrong and needed to reshoot it, it would be too troublesome and terrible.
After repeating this twice, the entire morning had almost passed. Before each shooting, the explosives technician and the prop master had to set up all kinds of props, and after each shooting, someone had to go up and clean up the scene. All of this took a lot of time. Especially after the cleaning up after shooting, don't think that you can just take advantage of the loophole and continue with the explosion. The people from the community organization were watching from the side, and all of this was written in the agreement.
Adriaan didn't care about this. As long as the movie's effect met his requirements, it didn't matter if he spent a little more money. As for the two main actors, they were still very dedicated to their preparations.
After a simple lunch, the crew rested for an hour before starting again. After spending about 40 minutes shooting the police-related scenes outside, Adriaan began to shoot the first scene between Renault and Oldman.
This scene was about Renault successfully sneaking out from the special forces and walking towards the exit, but he was shot from behind by Oldman, who had been waiting here for a long time. However, before he died, he pulled the grenade hidden on his body and killed Oldman.
This scene had a lot of meaning. As an assassin, Leon finally obtained a trace of warmth from Matilda and began to change his habits, hoping to become more like a normal person. He walked towards the door filled with light, and just as he was about to escape, a gun appeared from the darkness behind him and pointed at his back. In the end, he fell just one step away from the light.
Even so, he still used his last breath to kill the big villain, Stan. Stan's final reaction was also very interesting. When he saw the pile of grenades hanging on Leon's body, he only calmly cursed, "F * ck." It showed how crazy he was.
However, Adriaan didn't have too much time to analyze these meanings. That was a matter for the film fans and film critics. Besides, even if he really left a deep meaning here, the film fans and film critics could interpret it in completely different ways. So instead of thinking about these flashy things, it was better to use energy to tell the story.
From the perspective of the story, Leon also had to die, and dying together was the best ending. It was very simple. Even if he escaped, as long as Stan didn't die, he and Matilda would live in a tense atmosphere. The length of the movie didn't support another confrontation with Stan. What's more, an unsatisfactory ending would be more memorable, and it would also have a more meaningful feeling.
Of course, the most important reason was that the film critics and the mainstream society would not tolerate this kind of … "abnormal love" in movies. Although they themselves were dirty, if they wanted to express the plot of a little loli falling in love with a strange uncle and then living happily together, it would inevitably attract unprecedented criticism.
Of course, the film director could also insist on his own creation. After all, this was … um … free, but he would definitely be marginalized and rejected by mainstream society. Only water had gotten into Adriaan's head.
This was also one of the reasons why Luc Besson's version of "This Killer Is Not Too Cold" didn't do well in the United States. In addition to this being a French movie, some of the explicit lines in the movie — which were more explicit in the United States — also affected the perception of film critics, and these film critics influenced a large number of film fans.
So when Adriaan wrote the script, he deliberately dealt with these areas. For example, he made the feelings between the two more vague, mixing family, friendship, and love together. The lines had also been carefully modified. Some scenes were even abandoned or replaced. For example, when Matilda jumped out in a bra to play a certain role in the movie and asked Leon to guess where. Although the bra was hung outside, Adriaan still replaced it with another role. Simply put, he tried to reduce the possible tempting scenes and increase the warm parts.
Of course, the premise was that it didn't affect the main plot. Adriaan believed that after his modifications, this movie would only be more successful than the original.
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