Beijing Wrap on Retrieval: Filming in China
And that’s a wrap on Retrieval in Beijing, China! Wow! It was more than a 6 month journey to complete the second part of Retrieval in China.
As I had mentioned in the previous Retrieval LA post, I had to shoot my film in China, but I had no idea when or how this would happen. (If you didn’t read my previous post, this is my first film as actor, director, writer, and producer.) As fate would have it, I ended up flying out to China to work on Jackie Chan’s Dragon Blade also starring John Cusack and Adrien Brody. After I finished the film I thought I would be able to go to Beijing and then start prep on Retrieval. But no! I ran into more obstacles. I had to take care of some visa matters so I ended up going to HK and Thailand for 2 months before FINALLY returning to China.
However when I returned to China I could only stay 14 days and because I didn’t want to make any mistakes I only gave myself 12 days just in case delays happened. Once again it was a mad rush to prep. I had one week! Of course I did some prep before I arrived in China, but still I was missing so many elements. Also I had some props and wardrobe from the LA shoot that I had brought over (and carried with me for 6 months while traveling!)
The first thing I needed was my core team – my camera and sound dept. Fortunately I had my good buddy Van who I work with at FlowCS. He’s a good friend and said he was on-board since Day 1. However he nearly gave me a heart attack with his scheduling because he was traveling and then his family was in town, etc.. so even when I arrived in Beijing he still wasn’t in town, and I only had a window of 2-3 days that were realistic for shooting. Luckily I could count on him and the dates narrowly worked.
Next was my cast. This was something unbelievable. I knew that I could get stunt guys through my stunt contacts in Asia, but casting the right lead characters was more of an issue. I needed a solid actor and actress who not only could act, but also had the look that I wanted. I called around and looked everywhere. Amazingly, Wei Ren, the actress I had originally cast for the role happened to be in Beijing on the EXACT same days I was. Our flight back to the US was even the same day. She is a Beijing actress that lives in LA. I had no intention of making her fly out to China just because the project was facing so many obstacles and I wasn’t sure I was even going to be able to find the location, team, props, etc.. but she happened to be in China at the exact time so I knew it was fate that we had to shoot this thing.
Another interesting occurrence was that my producer and buddy Steven Chien also happened to be in China. None of these things were planned. I was originally going to go to China by myself and prep and shoot it with my own team in China, but fortunately Steven was there to lend an extra hand. He was pivotal to getting the shoot completed. Day 1 of shooting (pictured above) was also our warm up day with a smaller team. Steven found us the interior location and it worked out great.
There were so many things that seemed impossible. Certain props in China were very difficult to attain. I couldn’t find certain very crucial props and it wasn’t until the day before the shoot day that I ended up getting all my props. Also I had NO rooftop location 2 days before my shoot. The night before my shoot a friend said that he was at a house party that had a nice rooftop. At 10pm I went to check it out, confirmed it, and finally had the location.
Pictured above is our Day 2 cast and crew. There were so many hurdles that were seemingly impossible and by some stroke of destiny I was given the tools I needed in the last second. It was pure will power that materialized my intention to make this shoot happen.
Again we shot in the cold and in the darkness until the wee hours of the night. Within 10 days we were able to round up everyone and everything to make this shoot happen. Huge thanks to my camera operators, stunt team, actors, actresses, producers, sound team, friends that provided equipment, referrals, props, locations, etc. Thank you guys so much! Because of everyone’s help we were able to finish principal photography on Retrieval.
It is now in the hands of an editor, who also works on The Walking Dead, and it is in the post-production process. There were also a lot of interesting differences between shooting in LA and shooting in China, but I will save those comments for when the film comes out. Stay tuned for more updates!