Many visual effects-heavy blockbusters these days use more shots with visual effects than not. A film like “Avengers: Endgame” boasts 2,500 VFX shots out of roughly 2,700 shots across the film.
Filmmaker Christopher Nolan is known for wanting to shoot practical wherever possible, trying to avoid use of green screen and CG. As a result, his blockbuster films often boast a visual effects count in the hundreds rather than thousands – “The Dark Knight” with 700, “Batman Begins” with 620, “Inception” around 500 and “The Dark Knight Rises” with 450.
“Tenet,” which Nolan has dubbed his ambitious movie to date, goes even lower. Editor Jennifer Lame spoke with ICG Magazine (via Indiewire) recently and revealed that there are less than 300 visual effects shots in the entire movie: “The visual side of the film is huge in scale, but our VFX shot count is probably lower than most romantic comedies.”
Nolan himself also spoke to the outlet and says that special effects were a ‘safety net’ instead of the primary choice for creating the world of “Tenet,” and they weren’t required as often as you might think:
“Visual effects supervisor Andrew Jackson was responsible for coming up with our safety net. We wanted it all in-camera, but if it couldn’t be done, what choices are there in post-production? I like to say Andrew kind of bid himself out of a job because he helped us achieve such an enormous amount practically. There were still very complicated visual effects for the team at Double Negative, but Andrew’s expertise and background in on-set effects benefitted us enormously.”
Nolan also says his relationship with cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema was just as key to making the film work. The film was almost all shot with IMAX cameras, and the film team worked with IMAX and Panavision and pushed for new lenses that would work in lower-light situations.
John David Washington, Robert Pattinson, Elizabeth Debicki, Kenneth Branaugh, Dimple Kapadia, Martin Donovan, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Himesh Patel, Clemence Poesy, Denzil Smith and Michael Caine star in the film opening in select U.S. cities September 3rd.
