Chatterton 9/12: THEY BUILT ME A BOOM CRANE.

A week and a half before this shoot, I told Carlos and Aljosa I wanted an overhead dolly shot.

They took it as a personal challenge.

They came back to me with a solution made of two c-stands, a pile of sandbags, and a mayfair clip, then taped it all together with a whole roll of AWESOME.

It was the Night of the Boom Crane. And it was more fun than you should probably be allowed to have on a film set.

"We begin here, and then WE TAKE POLAND!"

End of the dolly. George walks ahead with the light, Carlos pans the boom, Aljosa pushes, and I ride the dolly to watch the shot and hit record/pause.

Carlos and I have identical looks of concentration.

Easy does it.

Crossing the Delaware.

See that camera? It's pointing STRAIGHT DOWN.

The cast, crew and party extras gather around to watch the playback.

The rest of this post is dedicated to the crazy things we did.

Crazy thing #1: Devoting a weekend to 28 hours of backbreaking labor, to make something so good that the average viewer won't be able to tell just how much backbreaking labor went into it.

Making two people run into each other spontaneously on cue every time.

Making night at three in the afternoon.

Al and George took turns stapling newspapers to the ceiling...

...since they were the tallest people around...

So we could get this direct-upward shot.

And do it again in the other room, with a pan down this time.

The Film Department has six cans of smoke. We took three for the party scene.

I approve of the smoke.

Of course, there were some casualties.

Carlos executes a shot from Daniel's POV on the floor: staring at the ceiling, pan down to Brian and Donna, then back up again. I guide him using the display screen. Mike waits for his cue to enter frame and Emma, my spectacular all-purpose crew member, watches.

Aljosa uses a silk to soften the sunlight.

All Pictures: Charles Zhang