Writer/Director James Gray on We Own the Night

Keeping Stuntmen Safe With Digital Rain

When writer/director James Gray started showing his new film, We Own the Night, to friends, they wanted to know how he got stuntpeople to agree to shoot a complex car-chase sequence in the pouring rain — an insanely dangerous proposition. "Mark Romanek said, 'Don't tell anybody how that's done. You're going to ruin it,'" Gray recalls. "But it was already in the press notes. The cat was out of the bag."

The chase scene, a centerpiece at the conclusion of the film's second act that serves as a turning point for Joaquin Phoenix's character, was shot on a sunny day. The downpour you see in the film was created by Digital Domain in a painstaking, months-long process that involved layer upon layer of water effects. Gray says the rain was important because the story needed an elemental component — he wanted it to have a supernatural force, suggesting Greek gods having their way with the mortals below. The result is very nearly seamless — it would take a very good eye indeed to peg the scene as a largely digital creation. Film & Video sat down with Gray in mid-August to talk about pulling off that trick, as well as his thoughts on sound mixing, and how he feels about the pros and cons of digital filmmaking tools. (Hint: if he has his way, you may have to pry his 35mm camera out of his cold, dead hands.)

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