Chapter 325

Before film production begins, the production team needs to carry out sufficient preliminary preparation work.

This includes the modification and perfection of the script, the setting of roles and casting of actors, the design and set construction of scenes, the preparation of costumes and makeup, and so on.

For the film "Pirates of the Caribbean," the preliminary preparation stage was particularly important because the film was full of various fantasy elements and special effects scenes, requiring careful planning and preparation.

Compared to the more than half a year of preparation for "Inception," the preparation for "New Pirates of the Caribbean" was simply effortless, extremely simple and easy.

The reason was also very simple: although the previous "Pirates of the Caribbean" failed at the box office, it was after all a masterpiece that cost 140 million US dollars, with complete props and studios, having everything that should be there.

After the film failed at the box office back then, Disney sealed this adapted live-action film, but the "Pirates of the Caribbean" adventure ride still existed, so the props and studios were all preserved.

For example, the most important set, the cave where Barbossa hid his treasure, was built in Disney Film Company's largest Studio 2, and the production team hired 100 craftsmen who spent 5 months building this set.

Then it took three or four days to fill it with 300,000 gallons of water, and the final decoration took another three weeks.

This set, which would have taken half a year to complete, could be put into use just by repairing it slightly because Disney had preserved it.

For example, the "Interceptor" needed for the film was built based on the "Victory," a victorious warship in the British fleet at that time, and was built on a floating barge in the Long Island wharf.

At that time, 150 craftsmen were hired, and it took three and a half months; the ship was 170 feet long and 34 feet wide, using nearly 40,000 pounds of steel and 1,000 square feet of canvas.

Disney also preserved this, saving the time to build this ship again.

There was also the important "Black Pearl"; the filming of this "pirate ship" actually used two ships, one of which was a rented schooner that had been in service for more than sixty years.

This "pirate ship" was built in Finland in 1948, and in the 1970s, its main role was to transport goods in the Caribbean Sea and serve as a cruise ship for tourists to visit.

There was also a replica that the crew completely copied from the front half of the "Black Pearl," while the back half was replaced by a trailer, specifically for filming parts that were inconvenient to shoot in the water at night.

The "Black Pearl" schooner had already been contacted and rented for three months, and the replica ship was also preserved at Disney.

In this way, the preparation work was truly simple and easy, and didn't waste time.

Actually, not only props and studios, but for convenience, Cao Yang also hired many staff members from the original "Pirates of the Caribbean" crew.

These staff members were mainly concentrated in art design, costume design, and set construction.

For example, the art design used the original Derek R. Hill and James Tochi.

The costume design also used the original Penny Rose.

The set decorator was the original Larry Dias.

It was mainly because Cao Yang analyzed the reasons for the failure of the original "Pirates of the Caribbean."

Simply put, the plot was too cliché, following a love line, and they didn't dare to innovate to make the film a fantasy film, and it lacked a "weird" soul character like Captain Jack played by Depp.

According to Disney's current CEO Robert Iger, the Disney CEO at the time of filming "Pirates of the Caribbean" was Michael Eisner, who was a bit of an extreme individualist and was called a "tyrant."

"Pirates of the Caribbean" producer Jerry Bruckheimer had considered making this film into a different kind of pirate movie, wanting to add supernatural elements to let the film break away from traditional pirate movies.

Michael Eisner supported it at first, but later, for some reason, he changed his mind, thinking it was too risky, and rejected Jerry Bruckheimer's idea.

He insisted on filming a traditional adventure movie, more faithful to history, with love as the main line, adding plots like adventure, treasure hunting, and naval battles with pirates, without adding fantasy elements.

Precisely because of this, although this film flopped, the art design, costumes, and sets were all very attentive, so Cao Yang decided to continue these, which was also more worry-free.

For other staff, the director of photography was still Gu Changwei, and there were also two other Hollywood photographers.

The assistant directors included Liu Shan and Li Mingyi, who had always followed Cao Yang, and there was also a Steven Bader hired by Disney, mainly responsible for location shooting.

For the score, he still hired Hollywood master composer Hans Zimmer, who had also collaborated with Cao Yang on two films and was quite familiar.

In order not to be deceived by these people in Hollywood's art, costume, and set departments, Cao Yang also set up an art director position, which had to be given to someone he could trust.

So, he called Ye Jintian.

Ye Jintian could be considered one of the best in this field in the country, having collaborated with many great directors and also having collaborated with Cao Yang on two films.

Upon receiving Cao Yang's call, Ye Jintian was very happy.

He was the premier art director in the country and had also won the 73rd Academy Award for Best Art Direction.

But the position of art director is different from that of a director; the fields are different, and he was mainly strong in the Chinese-language field, so it was very difficult to develop in Hollywood, and he had to rely on a director.

Obviously, nowadays, only Cao Yang was his best choice.

However, upon knowing that Cao Yang wanted him to be the art director for "New Pirates of the Caribbean," he still hesitated.

He also really wanted to follow Cao Yang, preferably becoming part of Cao Yang's permanent team, like Gu Changwei.

But, after all, he rarely involved himself in things on the European and American side, and he was afraid that if he messed it up, he would cut off the path of following Cao Yang.

He had a clear understanding of himself.

So, he smiled bitterly at Cao Yang on the phone and said: "Cao Dao, I want to collaborate with you very, very much, but you know that what I excel in is the Chinese-language field, and I'm afraid I won't be able to handle things in Europe and America."

Cao Yang smiled; he liked collaborating with people who knew their own limits.

"It doesn't matter; your role as art director is mainly to play a supervisory role. I've hired many staff members from the original crew; these people have worked together for almost a year after all, and they all know each other, but I'm not familiar with them.

You should understand what I mean; I'm mainly afraid of trouble and find it very annoying to deal with these petty matters that can't be brought to the table. You've been in this industry for twenty years, so you should be familiar with this aspect. How about it, are you willing to come over and help me?"

Cao Yang didn't hide anything; it was mainly unnecessary.

For an old hand like Ye Jintian, there was no trick he hadn't seen, and preventing and dealing with such things was still very simple.

Ye Jintian understood: Cao Dao didn't want to waste his energy on the petty squabbles of the crew, so he let himself be the art director, managing the people below to prevent unnecessary trouble.

Afterwards, Ye Jintian smiled; could Cao Yang's action be considered treating him as one of his own? It should be.

Ye Jintian was still very familiar with the little tricks played by the people below, and he could definitely do this job.

"No problem, Cao Dao; you can rest assured if you leave this matter to me; there will absolutely be no trivial matters that affect the filming."

Ye Jintian guaranteed.

He made up his mind that not only must he do this well, but he must also seriously study European and American dressing customs, so as not to be ignorant of these when Cao Dao needed to use him.

For the filming of this movie, although there were a large number of shots in the ocean, Ludong Island was obviously unsuitable; the environment here didn't match the film, so there was no way to shoot some shots on Ludong Island this time.

For this reason, the Ludong Island officials were very regretful; such a good promotional opportunity had been missed just like that.

Cao Yang took the actors and some domestic staff, as well as sixteen interns selected by the Beijing Film Academy as assistants, and boarded the flight to the US together.

After consultation with Robert Iger, Cao Yang decided to place the main filming locations in several island countries around the Caribbean Sea, which were also the main filming locations for the original film, and under Disney's arrangement, it could be considered familiar territory.

Cao Yang didn't know much about the island countries around the Caribbean Sea; it was only when he was about to shoot the film that he learned that the two most important filming location countries were called Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, and Dominica.

How big are these two Caribbean island countries?

The area of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines is less than 400 square kilometers, with a population of less than 100,000.

Dominica is an island country located in the northeast of the Windward Islands in the eastern Caribbean Sea, with a land area of 751 square kilometers and an even smaller population, only about 70,000.

Fine, many small counties in the country are larger than these two island countries in both area and population.

On December 4, "New Pirates of the Caribbean" started filming.

Cao Yang didn't choose to start filming in the island countries where the locations were, but chose Studio 2 in the Walt Disney Studios in Burbank, California, to shoot the scenes of Isla de Muerta first.

This place was built into a perfect pirate hideout, a cave surrounded by waterways, trenches, small rock caves, and dangerous rocky terrain, and it was extremely luxurious, filled with gold coins and various "antiques."

This cave on the island was based on the "Dead Man's Cave" in the Disney ride, and the original waterfall scene was also preserved.

Moreover, 30,000 gallons, which is about 114 tons of water, had been added to the cave in advance, forming a "natural" treasure cave.

Of course, this "Isla de Muerta" and all the props preserved before were not provided to the crew for free; although these were Disney's assets, business is business, and the crew had to pay rent to use them.

Completely according to market price, no discounts.

Renting was much cheaper than rebuilding, and it also saved a lot of time, saving a lot of production costs.

Cao Yang planned to use all the money saved from this on special effects, striving to make this film even more magnificent.

On the first day of filming, Cao Yang didn't add role-playing experience for the actors; it was still the old rule: adapt first on the first day, shoot a few simple shots, and then "increase the intensity" for the actors at night, adding role-playing experience.

(End of chapter)