DEFINATE FILMSAn impossible image.
Shot for real.
Joji came over and we brainstormed the video. He wanted the cars underneath him to feel like sharks. That became the image we built around.
“He wanted to have
the cars under him
like sharks.”— James DeFina
We used a 90-foot crane to put Joji 30 feet in the air, with professional drift drivers underneath. It was all practical and real.
Separately, we used a specialized motorized jib that could work in the rough terrain. That’s the camera rig in these behind-the-scenes photographs.
I had Joji in a straitjacket. I wanted to keep the line he was hanging from in the shot. Making him look as though he was floating felt like the choice everyone would have made.
On the day, I put him in a hat with a spinning propeller. I liked the juxtaposition of that against him sitting in a rocking chair with a gun.
At the time, I felt I had to prove myself, so I wanted to direct and shoot the video. RAF was the second shooter on a long vintage lens, and Babak worked the jib.
