Operation Avalanche (film)

Conception

Director Matt Johnson (left) and producer Matthew Miller

On a flight home from the premiere of their film The Dirties (2013), director Matt Johnson and producer Matthew Miller conceived of a "fake documentary" focused on faking the Apollo 11 moon landing.^[2][3] Although Johnson did not believe that the Apollo 11 moon landing was faked, he found the "lies and duplicity" surrounding Moon landing conspiracy theories "very appealing".^[4] Miller and Johnson reunited with various cast and crew of The Dirties, including co-writer Josh Boles, co-star Owen Williams^[5][6] and composer Jay McCarrol.^[7] Influences on the film included the Maysles Brothers film Gimme Shelter (1970), the documentary series An American Family (1973), Orson Welles's docudrama film F for Fake (1973)^[6][8] and the political thriller films The Manchurian Candidate (1962)^[9] and JFK (1991).^[10]

Principal photography

Operation Avalanche was Johnson's thesis film for his Master of Fine Arts degree at York University, completed in 2015.^[11][9][12] Via the masters program, the production were able to access 1960s film gear for use in the film.^[9][13] Principal photography, which shot for 42 days,^[14] began on June 30, 2014, and took place mainly in Toronto, Houston, and Washington, D.C.^[15] Johnson and Boles created a roughly ten page outline for the film rather than a formal script,^[6][16][13] and began shooting in an improvisatory manner. The crew continually refined the film's structure based on the footage captured.^[17][6][3] Similarly to The Dirties, scenes were often shot in public spaces without permits; however, the period nature of Operation Avalanche made this highly difficult.^[6][17] Anachronistic visuals such as smartphones were digitally removed from footage.^[18] Johnson has stated he dislikes the description "found footage" applied to the film, preferring "fake documentary".^[9][19] Johnson used his own name for his character to uncomplicate interactions with on-screen individuals not involved in the production.^[13]

Whilst Johnson and cinematographer Jared Raab were in England for The Dirties's release in 2014,^[9][14] they attended but bailed on a Shepperton Studios tour to capture shots of the lot where 2001: A Space Odyssey had been filmed.^[20][14] They were later thrown out of the studios by production staff working on Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015) who assumed Johnson and Raab were paparazzi.^[12][14]

The production sought to film at NASA as recreating their facilities as sets was prohibitively expensive.^[13] To get permission to shoot on location, Johnson claimed he was making a student documentary on the Apollo program.^[18][4][6] Johnson noted the irony that both himself and his character were shooting at NASA under false pretenses.^[3][6] The production benefited from the fact that NASA's campus had remained largely unchanged since the 1960s.^[21] The NASA personnel shown in the film were real, and the film's storyline was then "built around" these filmed conversations.^[9][21][22] NASA later released a statement that "the film project was misrepresented" and "We are disappointed the filmmakers would exploit the openness and transparency of those involved."^[2]

The film's car chase was originally envisaged as taking place in a city street, but was moved to an empty field due to the difficulty of dressing a period-accurate street.^[17] The vintage cars often broke down during filming.^[23] The sequence was performed about seven times and captured in one take.^[9] The moon landing sequences were the most challenging to produce.^[22] Johnson remarked: "I had zero faith that the moon landing was faked before we started [production on Operation Avalanche] and I have even less now."^[17] For scenes depicting the construction of the fake lunar module, the production filmed the real construction team hired to build the set.^[18]

Use of archival footage

NASA's public domain archives were used heavily in the film to source 1960s imagery.^[8][12] Johnson was recorded against green screen and composited into 1960s footage of NASA's mission control room^[17] and the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968).^[20] The 2001 sequence was recreated from still images, as little behind the scenes footage could be found.^[20][14] Certain exterior shots were taken from the National Film Board of Canada film Christopher's Movie Matinée (1968).^[8]

Anticipating legal issues related to filming without permits and using copyrighted archival material, Johnson hired lawyer Chris Perez, who had recently worked on the film Escape from Tomorrow (2013) which was shot on location at Disneyland without permits.^[2][14] Stanley Kubrick's estate declined a request to use his likeness in the film,^[14] though archival footage of Kubrick appears via liberal application of newly-permissive fair use laws.^[24][14]

Camera and post-production process

The production began shooting on 16 mm film but soon realized it was unsustainable considering the amount of footage shot.^[12] Ultimately Operation Avalanche was shot "about 70/30" on digital video cameras^[9] using authentic 1960s lenses.^[17][14][8]

After editing in Adobe Premiere Pro,^[25] the digital footage was transferred onto old 16 mm film stock,^{[18][6][25][8]} chosen as Operation Avalanche incorporates various 16 mm film clips from the 1960s.^[26][25] To give the printed film an authentic worn appearance, sections were hung from a bicycle and ridden around.^[12] In another case, sections of film were stored in a bucket of dirt. Operation Avalanche was colour graded twice; before and after the film printing process.^[8]

Accolades