How about that Man in Black shootout in the rain?

I wanted each action sequence to have a dance-like quality, so I tried to design a way we could get most of the footage in a couple of elegant one [shots] that would flow and feel naturalistic, while still capturing the grace of the Man in Black and his excellence as a fighter. I wanted to play with different textures and tempos of what an action sequence could be. If action scenes just happen decontextualized, they lose their weight and the viewer can feel they don’t make sense and that they wouldn’t have happened that way.

The intent of the rain sequence in Las Mudas was to communicate a change. The Man in Black has been to Las Mudas before, and in his previous visit, the park was working as it should. There weren’t any stakes for him, and you can feel it in the way he shoots people in this almost lackadaisical, going-through-the-motions way. This time, I felt like the action should reflect the changed circumstances. Now that the hosts are off their loops, he can’t necessarily predict their movements, and he’s no longer immune to injury or death.

All the choices I made in this scene were to underscore those changed stakes. Instead of looking at him from afar and seeing his movements as mechanized and apart from the viewer, I felt we should be over his shoulder, like a first-person shooter in a video game, that way we would feel the immediacy of the bullets going towards him and the fluidity of his motions. I worked with Chris Haarhoff the incredible Steadicam operator along with Ed and our wonderful stunt team to make sure everybody was moving together in tandem. It’s a dance not only with the performers but with the cameramen, too, as they track their movements. No one can be out of step or else it feels jarring and you lose the immediacy of what we’re trying to do.

The entire sequence was done in only two Steadicam shots, but it’s those kind of seemingly simple shots that actually take the most preparation. One false move, one lack of synchronization, and the entire shot is ruined. But in the end, thanks to the great work of the entire team, we got some really beautiful performances, really sweeping, lovely movements. All, by the way, done in the middle of the freezing rain…

Speaking of the rain, that was also really important. What I liked about it thematically was the notion that here is The Man always thinking he’s in control of his fate, but nature is stronger than us. There are forces, elemental and infinite that are far more powerful than we are. The rain seemed like a nice symbol of that, a storm blowing in, just as this moment reaches its crisis.

Also, can I just say one of my favorite shots of the episode is the push-in on Ed’s face. It’s so simple, but his performance is stellar and subdued, and it really allows us to see his character. The churning of his mind, the way the rain falls off the roof of the tavern recalling a tragic memory from his past. Getting those macro shots that link the rain and the storm blowing in with his own memories was really important to me in telling the visual story. And they culminate, finally, when he decides to make a change. To do something he’s never done before: To be the hero in this town instead of the villain. When he springs into action, we filmed it in a way we haven’t really seen his action before. It is immediate, spontaneous, visceral and dangerous. I wanted to feel at any moment he could actually be injured.