Elephant White

A wealthy businessman contracts an assassin, Curtie Church (played by Djimon Hounsou) to avenge the murder of his daughter by slave traffickers in Thailand. With the help of his paranoid, but hilarious weapons supplier Jimmy (played by Kevin Bacon), a merciless Church exterminates gangsters by the dozens.

Rewarded by-the-head Church moves in hard and fast through the shady corners of Bangkok, using all manners of destructive heavy artillery and bone crushing Thai fighting to rack up a mountain of body count. Not according to plan, he frees a young prostitute in distress but eerie situations arise. The good thing is, she’s on his side and extremely bent for revenge.

Director of Ong Bak, Prachya Pinkaew is one of the most respected martial arts film directors in Asia. Making his first English directorial debut on Elephant White with Australian DP Wade Muller, the film is ambitiously shot within two months entirely in Bangkok.

The 48-day shoot sees very little daylight, in fact over 90% of the film features night scenes so the new MX–Sensored RED cameras with an ISO setting of 800 brilliantly captures the Bangkok skyline. Comparing to the limitations of the old sensor, the new MX sensor is completely noise free , we would often shoot parts of action scenes at 96FPS instead of adding a lot more light we would increase the ISO from 500 which was our base to 800 and slightly open up the lens.

During pre-production on this film, Muller maximises the time location scouting and shooting test shots on Djimon’s stand-in. The actress Guzjung, who plays Mae, has very light skin and Djimon is very dark. Therefore vigorous tests prove the new MX sensor lives up to its reputation. Not only for its sensitivity in low light conditions but also the way it handled the extreme contrast difference between the two actors side-by-side was amazing, the capabilities of the new MX sensor surprises Muller beyond expectations. Before the tests, he was expecting to back off the light on Guzjung every time they were together in the frame.

On set the team uses Ultra Primes and Optimo Zooms , often we would changed the camera to 3K mode with the 180mm or 24-290mm , to get extra focal length for scenes like the sniper’s point-of-view. A PL converted Tokina 11-16mm T2.8  zoom also complements the Ultra Primes perfectly. The only filtration used was ND’s and ND Grads. The focus pullers did a great job we were shooting between T2 – T2.8. we had four cameras on set  two MX REDs and two REDs. During action sequences, all four cameras are definitely in operation but occasionally they are used to provide extra coverage in dialog scenes with multiple actors. Kinoflos are frequently used for interior close ups, we also had some of them in shot after the art department disguises them with plastic wrapping to carry off a worn-out exterior look. To maximise the output and get the most out of the balloon lights we would bounce 18K’s off them. 

Wanting the film to possess a edgy look, Prachya jokingly comments about not requiring tripods on location. All-in-all a large portion up to 75% of the film is indeed shot handheld. Whenever it is feasible, we would try light 360° , flags and nets were always being constantly adjusted right up until we rolled. We had practical light sources in most of the shot they were all connected to a dimmer boards.

In one of the scenes, Church hastily flees Ratchadon’s whore house after a killing spree. Despite Church being a relentless assassin, Prachya crafts the atmosphere of that sequence to appear sorrowful so audiences will feel empathetic for the girls standing in the stinking alley soaked to the bone. This effect is achieved with the ten girls underneath multiple rain bars naturally spraying in all directions. The steadicam shot begins at 24FPS moving behind Church, and increases to 60FPS up towards the vulnerably exposed girls. The shot then slowly creeps forward and eventually focuses back round to Church walking forward as the camera tracks back.

The very large forest environment is another location in particular where the MX camera’s low light sensitivity comes in handy. To spread an even layer of hazy smoke on-site, a machine normally used for insecticides becomes an ingenious solution. A network of 25-meter long tubes with tiny holes injected at equal intervals, these adjoining tubes are laid in the background to create a gradual rise of very realistic mist.

There are numerous specialised weaponry used in the film from sniper rifles such as the Accuracy International and Barrett. Powerful shotguns like Cobray Street Sweeper has the whole team hidden behind Lexan sheets each time they are hot. Kudos to Kevin Chisnall and his team for keeping the entire crew safe from the applications of heavy artillery and firepower throughout the filming process.

Another feat to acknowledge is filming of the fight choreography where Prachya and his team really excels in. To get in the midst of all the action, the camera crew strips down the cameras to a bare minimum and only uses the lightweight 11-16mm Tokina. The after-effects are alarmingly bold where much of the action narrowly misses the edges of the camera lenses. Overall, the fight sequences are sensationally edited with wider profile shots.

Elephant White is the third feature length film Muller has been involved with in Thailand. Perhaps it is the undefeated professionalism and efficiency of the Thai crew that keeps him coming back for more. It is with no doubt the film industry in Thailand is a force to be reckoned with.