CAPTURING A COLOSSAL CLOSE ENCOUNTER OF THE LUNAR KIND IN MOONFALL By TREVOR HOGG
Images courtesy of Lionsgate and Centropolis Entertainment. TOP: Director Roland Emmerich on the set of Moonfall. (Photo: Reiner Bajo/Lionsgate) OPPOSITE TOP: The Endeavour space shuttle encounters debris as it approaches the surface of the Moon. OPPOSITE BOTTOM: The Endeavour space shuttle docks at the International Space Station.
Whether it be an alien invasion in Independence Day, a raging Kaiju in Godzilla or the environmental catastrophe of The Day After Tomorrow, German filmmaker Roland Emmerich has gained a reputation of being able to destroy the world in creative ways. The cinematic tradition is carried over into Moonfall where a mysterious force knocks our lunar neighbor out of orbit and on a collision course with Earth. It is up to NASA executive Jo Fowler (Halle Berry), astronaut Brian Harper (Patrick Wilson) and conspiracy theorist K.C. Houseman (John Bradley) to save the day, and in the process of doing so they make a surprising cosmic discovery. Reuniting the team behind Midway, which includes Production Designer Kirk M. Petruccelli (The Space Between Us), Visual Effects Supervisor Peter G. Travers (Guardians of the Galaxy) and Special Effects Supervisor Guillaume Murray (Crisis), Emmerich has crafted a $140-million independently-funded action-adventure with a cerebral twist. A different global disaster occurred during pre-production in Montreal as the pandemic caused the project to temporarily shutdown. “When I prepared the movie, I had 74 days to shoot, but then I had to figure out what to cut out to be able to afford the COVID-19 costs of $6.5 million,” states Emmerich. “For an independent film, you can’t go to a bank and ask for more money. I ended up with 61 shooting days. There were no compromises. I just shot faster.” Re-igniting the public imagination and interest in outer space is the emergence of space tourism. “NASA read the script and supported us,” says Emmerich. “It took us three or four years to get the script right because it’s such an out-there story and we needed
34 • VFXVOICE.COM WINTER 2022
PG 34-40 MOONFALL.indd 34
12/5/21 4:36 PM
