Storyboarding

By modern standards, previz was not extensive, with the focus placed upon the Shelling Sequence, Deep Dive, Tank Battle and a deleted scene. “We previz’d the Deep Dive, where Major navigates the memories of one of the robot geishas because it was surreal,” remarks Guillaume. “The Tank Battle was previz as we needed to make sure it was a piece of storytelling. When we came back to Los Angeles, we had Halon Entertainment do some postviz on the Tank Battle to reassemble the whole thing based on our previz and what we had shot. We didn’t do previz for the Hotel Fight as it was precisely storyboarded. We used more traditional ways, and for a couple of scenes we did a lot of stuntviz with Guy Norris [supervising stunt coordinator and second unit director].”

Principal photography took place in New Zealand, with green screen sets being built on backlots. “We did shoot an action scene in downtown Wellington, but not a lot of exteriors.” The opening scene features Major diving off of a high-rise building and crashing into a banquet room being attacked by armed terrorists. “We shot most of the elements on green screen and had a small set section,” says Guillaume. Weta Workshop manufactured a practical version of the thermoptic suit that allows Major to go invisible out of modern silicone. “We replaced the thermoptic suit with a digital version to make it even thinner,