Paul Thomas Anderson not only revived VistaVision for One Battle After Another, he also directed the best car chase ever in the 8-perf/35mm horizontal format. That’s when Willa (Chase Infiniti) outsmarts and kills the hitman who’s chasing her up and down the rolling hills known as the Texas Dip, followed closely by Bob (Leonardo DiCaprio), her bumbling yet relentless ex-revolutionary dad. The thrilling car chase — shot at high speeds throughout Borrego Springs, San Diego — provided a technical challenge for the vintage Baumont VistaVision camera. The chase required quick reloads and tactical positioning. Anderson’s camera team, led by cinematographer Michael Bauman, pulled it off with the use of a camera Arm Car and an additional “elevator rig” for navigating the steep hills and dips.
VistaVision made it easy for editor Andy Jurgensen to cut the final three-car chase sequence, as there was a lot of verticality from the large format (shot in the 1.5:1 aspect ratio). “We did some tests on the hills with just normal cars to see if it was going to work,” Jurgensen explains. “We were using zoom lenses so you could really get the perspective of the hills. We shot Willa’s medium shots when she’s driving, where the camera was too locked off on the car. It was too smooth, it looked a little fake. So when we were doing dailies, Paul asked Mike if there was a way of loosening the screws on the camera so that it has that shakiness to make it feel authentic. So we shot some stuff of her looking at the road with this shaky camera, and it just makes it feel so much more tense.”
The thought of motion sickness did cross Jurgensen’s mind. “Paul and I sat really close to the [VistaVision] projector, watching dailies just to see how woozy it made us,” he says. “There were times when I would have to look away. We really went right to the line to find the sweet spot.”
This story first appeared in a November stand-alone issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To receive the magazine, click here to subscribe.
