Tom Cruise did his first underwater scene for “Legend” (1985), adopted by executing much more demanding scenes in “Fringe of Tomorrow” (2014) and most famously “Mission: Not possible – Rogue Nation” (2015), the place he held his breath for six-and-a-half minutes. However when author/director Christopher McQuarrie, who has made eleven movies with Cruise, was on the Filmmaker Toolkit podcast, he made clear the duo walked away from “Rogue Nation” deeply dissatisfied with the underwater set piece.
“Taking pictures in water is extraordinarily difficult and really irritating,” mentioned McQuarrie, who at one level swore by no means to do one other underwater scene.
In accordance the McQuarrie, the most important drawback is how time-consuming these scenes might be to shoot, having been restricted to solely six setups a day working within the tank on “Rogue Nation.” He additionally mentioned there have been a lot of errors made in how the underwater scenes had been designed for the 2015 “M:I” film, together with its over-reliance on visible results.
These had been the errors he and Cruise had been decided to be taught from after they got here up with “The Last Reckoning” storyline of Ethan (Cruise) needing to get to the highest secret Russian submarine, The Sevastopol, buried deep underneath the ice caps of the Bering Sea, so he can retrieve the “Podkova” and cease the AI villain The Entity from destroying the world.
“We’re all the time desirous to take the teachings we had realized and do one thing that was extra sensible,” mentioned McQuarrie. “Much less digital, rely much less on CGI, much less on inexperienced display. All these issues had been very, very irritating on ‘Rogue Nation.’ They had been all dictated by the design of the set and the idea of the scene itself. So we utilized the information of ‘Fringe of Tomorrow’ to ‘Rogue Nation,’ after which utilized the information of ‘Rogue Nation’ to [‘Final Reckoning’].”
Beneath, McQuarrie and stunt coordinator Wade Eastwood, who has labored carefully with Cruise and the director since “Fringe of Tomorrow,” break down how they designed and constructed from the bottom up what’s arguably their most tough, harmful, and spectacular set piece but.
Time Saver: McQuarrie Will get within the Water
“The large breakthrough on this film was I obtained within the water,” mentioned McQuarrie. “What occurs usually once you’re directing an underwater sequence is you’re above water, and also you’re speaking to an assistant director, who’s on a microphone, speaking to everyone underwater, so that you’re directing by mediaries.”
Not solely did the “M:I” crew improve the variety of underwater shoot days from ten on “Rogue” to 22 on “Last Reckoning,” however McQuarrie’s studying to scuba-dive so he may direct underwater meant going from six to 22 setups a day.
“You haven’t any spatial consciousness of the set that’s underwater [when you are directing from above-water],” mentioned McQuarrie, explaining the elevated effectivity. “You’re solely seeing what the digital camera sees. I described the method: It’s akin to making an attempt to repair a pocket watch whilst you’re carrying boxing gloves.”
Two Years to Construct the Set
Cruise has lengthy been a Buster Keaton fan, and one of many key classes of conceiving “The Last Reckoning” sub scene is how the actor’s interplay with the set, or the machine, creates the following motion and hazard. As Cruise navigates his technique to the sonar room to retrieve the “Podkova,” he faces the impediment that some compartments have been sealed shut and left bone dry, whereas others are flooded.
Because of this when Ethan opens the door to the non-flooded compartment, it creates an amazing vacuum-like impact of water dashing by to fill the room. Compounding the issue, the sunken sub is close to the sting of a sea flooring cliff, and rolls underneath the shifting weight of the washing by its hull. Oh, yeah, and there are monumental torpedoes that Cruise should navigate as they’re jostled with every sub rotation.
It was an motion scene rooted within the geography and physics of the precariously flooded sub, and capturing it virtually would require one of many largest and sophisticated movie units builds ever.
“There was no facility on earth that would accommodate the ambitions of this sequence. So every thing needed to be scratch-built,” mentioned McQuarrie.
Along with the 2 monumental submarine units, there had by no means been a have to construct a gimbal massive and powerful sufficient to assist, rotate, and transfer a set of this dimension, nor a water tank giant sufficient to accommodate the gimbal and set. The ultimate tank constructed for “The Last Reckoning” was so massive it took 15 days to fill with water, and, together with the set and gimbal, would take over two years to assemble.
“We constructed this big, enormously difficult set,” mentioned McQuarrie. “It was a 1,000-ton metal gimbal that would rotate 360 levels, it may pitch 45 levels in each instructions, you can elevate it and decrease it so you can fully submerge it in an eight-and-a-half million liter tank.”
Actual Hazard
In comparison with Cruise doing stunts on the wing of 140-mph of 100-year-old biplane, the comparatively and deliberately slower submarine scene on the floor could appear much less harmful, however that wasn’t the case. Whereas on the podcast, McQuarrie instructed IndieWire each “The Last Reckoning” submarine and airplane set items represented the 2 largest, most tough and harmful sequences within the “M:I” franchise historical past.
“The engineers instructed us how briskly it may rotate, and their predictions had been right, however you actually couldn’t anticipate what it was going to be wish to shoot in there till you probably did it,” mentioned McQuarrie of the rotating underwater set. “No person actually anticipated the physics of that rig rotating, with all the rip currents and the rain that was being generated. Nobody actually anticipated any of that, and the way may they?”
Stunt coordinator Wade Eastwood and his crew spent quite a lot of time earlier than the shoot getting used to the underwater rig, and made certain there was ample rehearsal time.
“After we first would go in, we’d rotate the set slowly and pitch it and sink it, and the bubbles and the present that was created by that set transferring with the tons of water — you’re getting sucked in the direction of the mechanics and the grinding gears and the chains, and also you’re getting pushed [by the current],” mentioned Eastwood.
Whereas the torpedoes weren’t actual, the load of the large prop weapons was stored life like — to have made it lighter (and therefore safer) can be noticeable to the viewers primarily based on the way it moved by the water.
“What we did is we went actual, however that every one needed to be examined for weeks of constructing certain that there was nothing that would snag after which all of the sudden drop the place it shouldn’t due to Tom’s path,” mentioned Eastwood. “If he’s underwater and a torpedo hits the highest after which sinks, as soon as it’s weightless within the water, it’s nice. He can transfer it round, he can hit towards it. But when he’s surfaced for some purpose or he obtained caught up and that torpedo falls off the shelf, a full-weight torpedo will crush him.”
McQuarrie, Cruise, Eastwood, the underwater digital camera and stunt groups communicated by a collection of hand indicators, and if vital, had a particular underwater dry erase board for extra difficult discussions. The issue is the transferring set’s present created bubbles. McQuarrie mentioned the issue that couldn’t all the time be pre-planned for was dropping sight of Cruise, “ Getting inside that gimbal, whereas it was rotating, crammed with water and particles, typically you’d lose sight of Tom — that was extraordinarily harmful.”
Eastwood added that the issue was compounded by not having the ability to all the time decipher when the actor was underneath actual misery versus what was performative misery for the digital camera. The stunt coordinator, who has been working hand-in-hand with Cruise and McQuarrie since “Fringe of Tomorrow,” admitted he discovered himself in unattainable conditions when capturing the sub-scenes.
“Tom has turn out to be a pal of mine through the years and if a pal’s in bother, you need to bounce in. It was very tough,” mentioned Eastwood. “We’re performing chaos [in one scene] the place a torpedo will hit him and push him to the underside and he’s going to get caught. [The plan was] he was going to get caught for 3 or 4 seconds, however now Tom’s down there for ten, 12 seconds and he’s nonetheless performing. We’ve obtained indicators if he’s in bother and it’s nerve-wracking watching. He’s ad-libbing, he’s going with it, he’s simply making it up, he’s performing it, nevertheless it appears to be like like he’s drowning and he’s pinned for actual and he’s in bother. It’s very laborious for me to not go in, and at occasions I’d go in after which I’d floor, [Tom] can be like, ‘What are you doing? I’m performing.’ It was simply an excessive amount of typically.”
To listen to Christopher McQuarrie’s full interview, subscribe to the Filmmaker Toolkit podcast on Apple, Spotify, or your favourite podcast platform.