GOING REMOTE
Director utilizes New Mexico’s changing landscape to capture the story of ‘12 Strong’
The state’s landscapes are transformed into Afghanistan for the film “12 Strong.”
New Mexico often gets repeat customers when it comes to film projects.
One of the biggest — and most anticipated — to come to the state was “12 Strong.”
Attached to it is Chris Hemsworth and Michael Shannon. And it was being produced by Jerry Bruckheimer.
The film is set in the harrowing days following 9/11 when an elite U.S. Special Forces unit, led by their captain, Mitch Nelson, played by Hemsworth, is selected to be the first U.S. soldiers to provide an offensive response to the unprecedented attacks on U.S. soil.
Leaving their families behind, the team drops into the remote, rugged landscape of northern Afghanistan, where they must convince Gen. Abdul Rashid Dostum, played by Navid Negahban, to join forces with them to fight their common adversary: the Taliban and their Al Qaida allies.
In addition to overcoming mutual distrust and a vast cultural divide, the Americans — accustomed to state-of-the-art warfare — must adopt the unfamiliar tactics of the Afghan horse soldiers.
The film was shot entirely on location in New Mexico.
It offered filmmakers a blend of natural environments that closely resemble those of Afghanistan.
The production would ultimately take the cast and crew to some of the most remote and arduous sites in the state, where they would all be tested by the vagaries of nature, as well as the toughness of the terrain.
Director Nicolai Fuglsig collaborated with cinematographer Rasmus Videbaek on the film.
“One of the things Ras and I looked to convey is that when the team first gets off that Chinook helicopter, they feel like they’re entering an entirely new world, so the photography of the landscapes became hugely important,” Fuglsig says. “We wanted to capture a desolate, barren and bone-snapping cold visual palette.”
Fuglsig was also intent on taking advantage of New Mexico’s natural backdrops, instead of relying on soundstages or green screens.
It was incumbent upon his location scouts and design teams to find locations that worked, however remote they may have been. In some cases, the grip department built special rigs just to cable equipment up mountainsides and hillsides.
One of the most remarkable shooting sites was the historic Iron Duke Mine, located more than 200 miles south of Albuquerque.
It served as the ideal stand-in for the Cobaki and Shulgareh cave command posts of Gen. Dostum, with magnificent vistas from the steep cliffsides, of which Fuglsig and Videbaek took full advantage.
“The Cobaki Cave scenes were beautiful,” says Hemsworth. “But it was freezing cold and as visceral as it could be. If we had shot in a season other than winter, I don’t think it would have been nearly as effective. Our performances were built around the environment.”