Mulan: Warrior Princess Arises
Trevor Hogg is privy to the cinematic and logistical battlefield tactics deployed by Niki Caro, Mandy Walker and the visual effects team of Mulan…
The team behind Disney’s upcoming live-action remake take us behind the scenes
An ancient Chinese poem about a daughter pretending to be a son in order to take the place of her conscripted father in the Imperial Army was made into a Disney animated classic. Rather than have singing and a sidekick dragon in the live-action remake, New Zealand filmmaker Niki Caro (The Zookeeper’s Wife) focused more on the source material. “Our intention with Mulan was to honour the original ‘Ballad of Mulan’ which was written over 1,500 years ago. This drove all of us involved with the film into real China. We drew great inspiration from being down on the ground there. While this movie is a real visceral, raw, high-octane epic action adventure, it still honours some of the iconic elements from the animation that I love.” Chinese cinema influenced the visual language. “Zhang Yimou [House Of Flying Daggers] was such a huge inspiration for me
because of the otherworldliness of his films, the incredible action sequences and the design, in particular, the costume design.”
A 14-minute previs cut by editor David Coulson (Broken English) of the midpoint battle which concludes with an avalanche was presented to Disney executives. “The big thing when we started was doing the pitchvis,” states Day for Nite previs supervisor Rpin Suwannath. “The sequence that we did showed the scope of the action and movie. We needed to make sure that it delivered.” As well as having to choreograph massive fight sequences for the first time, Caro needed the creation of 2,046 visual effects shots by Weta Digital, Framestore, Image Engine, Sony Pictures Imageworks, Crafty Apes and an in-house team. “Niki was open to us holding her hand through the experience,” remarks Mulan VFX producer Diana Giorgiutti (Australia). “It always makes a huge difference when a filmmaker is willing to admit to themselves that they are dealing with an element that they are not familiar with.” Certain guidelines were set by the studio which required some creative solutions. “Under the Disney label you can’t show violence and bloodshed so I wrestled with the idea of how can I build this epic battle sequence without it being Game Of Thrones,”
notes Caro. “What I decided to do was to set it in a geothermal valley so there is steam drifting throughout all of the fighting that tends to obscure violence and adds another layer of beauty.”
For two and a half years Mulan
VFX supervisor Sean Faden (Power Rangers) worked on the adaptation with a year spent in post-production. “We had a sizable prep period and I spent a lot of time looking at videos on Vimeo and cutting reels together to show Niki. An effect that we did a lot
of research on was the Witch transformation, although in the end we went with something that was more simplified. We looked at bird murmurations and aerial reference of hawks. My favourite is when the young soldier transforms into the Witch and then turns into the hawk. For that we timed it with the rhythm of his walk. Stunts had a spin rig so as the Witch twists we were able to take that motion and feather it into the hawk’s motion as well.” Caro loves the ‘cloth fu’ moments where the long sleeves of the Witch (Gong Li) become lethal weapons. “We had built a whole stunt/fight sequence where she kills people with her sleeves which is just glorious!” It was important to avoid conveying the impression of rubber. “The sleeves are not characters in themselves as they’re being driven by the Witch,” notes Image Engine VFX supervisor Christian Irles. “It was hard to art direct the action of what sleeves needed to do while retaining the properties of cloth.”
Resurrecting Mushu, the wisecracking dragon voiced by Eddie Murphy, was never considered. “The Phoenix was a part of this movie from day one,” remarks Faden. “I worked with Aaron Sims Creative to develop a Phoenix concept which we ended up presenting to Disney.
The Phoenix was never going to be a sidekick character; it was like a spiritual guide for Mulan [Liu Yifei]. We did a lot of research into hummingbirds, iridescence and actual Chinese phoenixes. It was a combination of peacocks, a phoenix rooster that has long tail feathers, and the secretary bird which is one of the birds that the phoenix mythology is based on.” The role of the Phoenix was further developed in post-production. “We would sit down and try to develop the Phoenix and see what the character was,” states Day for Nite postvis supervisor Cody Hernandez. “Was it something that only Mulan saw, or it was something that everyone could see? The character doesn’t talk so we had to figure out how to show that in the animation.”
Black Wind is a faithful companion to Mulan. “Yifei did most of her horse riding,” states Giorgiutti. “But in some of the faster moments she was on a buck alongside a camera car and we put Black Wind in later on.” The digital version of the steed was handled by Sony Pictures Imageworks VFX supervisor Seth Maury. “We roto Yifei off of the buck, put her on a card, block her move in our battlefield geometry in layout and with some low-resolution effects elements block the speed and depth of the avalanche. We would make a new plate of her on top of the CG horse and gave it to effects so they had a full 3D scene to work with.” The flowing black hair of Yifei was a great reference. “We were able to get a realistic bouncing horse mane and tail by basing them on how her hair was blowing and bouncing,” reveals Faden. “It ended up being a guide for us on each shot.”
BATTLEFIELD AVALANCHE
An epic battle between the Chinese Imperial Army and Rouran Army is interrupted by an avalanche. “The avalanche mountain was built from helicopter photogrammetry passes of the ‘Double Cone’ peak which is part of the Remarkables range in the South Island of New Zealand,” explains Sean Faden. “Sony Pictures Imageworks adjusted the falloff of the mountain to blend into the Ahuriri Valley to look and feel like part of the natural landscape.” Each avalanche has a unique
“WE HAD A WHOLE SECTION THAT WAS SOUNDSTAGE” SHOT ON A Hubert Maston, VFX supervisor, Framestore
signature. “When you look at highresolution imagery of an avalanche there is light and shadows in places that you would never expect,” notes Seth Maury. “Sometimes where the avalanche meets the leading edge of the ground there is a bright edge that looks like a matte line on a still, but with motion it sits in well.”
All of the cracks form down a mountain in a matter of one or two seconds. “For the purpose of the storytelling we had to slow it down to make sure that the audience could read and understand what is going on, and then stretch it out over a few shots to build the beat like the previs had,” states Maury. “We went for a snow quality that was soft and fluffy. There were some parts that had melted, thawed and refrozen but for the most part it was meant to look like a big snowball.” Practical elements were created by the special effects team led by Steve Ingram (The Last Samurai) for when Honghui (Yoson An) gets swept away. “We had Honghui on a large blue conveyor belt that was eight feet wide by 25 feet long, and special effects had enough artificial snow so while he’s flailing real snow could be kicked up,” remarks Faden. “Imageworks roto animated him and replaced 95 per cent of that snow, but we still had enough real snow sticking to and flying off of his costume and hair that helped to ground the work that they did of surrounding him with deeper layers of snow.”
RECREATING CHINA’S LANDSCAPES
Mulan was primarily shot in New Zealand with the home base being Kumeu Film Studios. “The only shots that were done in China were establishing shots of the Imperial City [at Xiangyang Tangcheng Film and Television Base], Rainbow Mountains and Kumtag Desert,” explains cinematographer Mandy Walker (Tracks). “Most of that was done with drones by the scenic unit. We had a lot of backlot sets in Auckland. New Zealand has varied landscapes so we could easily make it look like China. We had this amazing system called Moxion that allowed us to have live full-resolution images of what they were doing in China or New Zealand.” The multicoloured layers of sedimentary rocks in the Rainbow Mountains posed an aesthetic challenge. “It is easy to make this unique place look like a normal mountain with a weird stripy look to it,” observes Framestore VFX supervisor
Hubert Maston. “There was a lot of plate work and we had a whole section that was shot on a soundstage. We had some CG replacing and completing the set plus projections and matte paintings for the background and a completely different sky.”
“During some of the more serious stunts we choreograph them so it was all about her face during that moment,” explains Walker. “We had to watch the performance. I would stand there with my gripping crew, dolly grip, camera operator and work out how we move with her; that choreography was the trickiest.” She was able to guide the eye of the viewer by utilising some traditional techniques. “I would get more depth of field when we wanted to include the other characters in what was going on in a scene, and a lower depth when we wanted the audience to focus on Mulan.”
Böri Khan (Jason Scott Lee) has a climatic fight with Mulan at the Bamboo Palace inspired by the Daming Palace. “The lower section was a backlot set and the top portion was on a soundstage,” states Weta Digital VFX supervisor Anders Langlands. “Because it was all on greenscreen we could separate Mulan’s element quite easily and could do a little bit of post animation to help the parabolic arcs.”
In many ways, the career of Niki Caro has gone full circle. “The thing about it is that Paikea’s journey in Whale Rider is the story of what happens when leadership presents in the form of a young girl and how confronting that is,” states Caro. “Mulan in many ways is the same story. But in this incarnation Mulan learns that she is going to be truly powerful when she is truly herself. Mulan cannot be disguised as a young man any more; she must become a woman in order to become the most powerful and in fact, can save China. This all runs in parallel to my journey as a filmmaker. There is a line in Mulan where the Witch says to her, ‘It’s impossible, a woman leading a man’s army.’ That resonates with me because that’s what I’m doing as a filmmaker. I lead a man’s army. But my army is as female as I can make it.”
“MULAN LEARNS THAT SHE IS GOING TO BE TRULY POWERFUL WHEN SHE IS TRULY HERSELF” Niki Caro, director, Mulan