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SHOOT: GODZILLA’s Japanese Nuclear Power Plant & its Quarantine Zone (in New Westminster)

Does the 3D Godzilla movie reboot reflect the real world event of Japan’s 2011 earthquake/tsunami and the resulting  nuclear crisis at some of the country’s older nuclear power plants? Is that the “contemporary issue” screenwriter Frank Darabont spoke of? It would seem so. “6.3 Earthquake Rocks Eastern Japan” said the news crawl on set screens at the Vancouver Convention Centre dressed as the Honolulu airport at the start of filming here in mid-March.

Janjira appears to be the fictional nuclear power plant in this modern-day re-imagining of the radioactive Japanese sea monster as a “terrifying force of nature”.

Godzilla used an abandoned Coquitlam paper recycling plant on the Fraser River to film a couple of weeks of scenes of the Janjira nuclear power station at risk of meltdown with radioactive leaks. Is this what wakes Godzilla (plural) from their slumber?

Related: Coquitlam paper recycling plant as Japanese nuclear power plant

Since Coquitlam, the Janjira plant has been played by an industrial building on Annacis Island and its offices by Nokia in Burnaby’s Glenlyon Business Park.  Godzilla also used  Steveston’s Japanese Cultural Centre to double as the Janjira International School Read More »SHOOT: GODZILLA’s Japanese Nuclear Power Plant & its Quarantine Zone (in New Westminster)

SET: GODZILLA Turns Watchmen’s Main Street Set in Burnaby into San Francisco’s Chinatown

Update: Godzilla filmed four or five massive SPFX explosions on this set overnight Saturday (June 22-23). See photo of one blast.

Godzilla blast

Godzilla lit up the south Burnaby night sky at Marine Way and Byrne Road on Tuesday to shoot scenes on the Main Street set (built for the 2009 movie Watchmen) dressed as San Francisco’s Chinatown — a ravaged Chinatown in the wake of a Japanese sea monster. Not much can be seen from outside the private back lot except for glimpses of Chinatown’s iconic hanging red-and-gold  lanterns, 1920s-era Dragon street lamps and a destroyed pagoda-topped building, so you’ll have to imagine it dark and filled with smoke for scenes of the movie’s hero Lieutenant Ford (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) and soldiers running through it.

Related: Godzilla turns New Westminster into Streets of San Francisco – Chinatown

Read More »SET: GODZILLA Turns Watchmen’s Main Street Set in Burnaby into San Francisco’s Chinatown

SHOOT: GODZILLA’s Golden Gate Bridge Set with Inflatable GreenScreens

For locals, Godzilla‘s Golden Gate Bridge set is Rise of the Planet of the Apes redux on the vast Kent Hangar gravel field at the Vancouver/Burnaby border. Rust-red street lights and railings. Giant greenscreens. Motorists and buses trapped on the bridge. Soldiers. Cop cars. Only this time the showdown is between the military/police and Godzilla not empowered apes. Plus the giant greenscreens are inflatable, something we haven’t seen before.

Related: Rise of the Planet of the Apes Reshoots on Golden Gate Bridge Set at Kent Hangar Field

Lieutenant Ford (Aaron Taylor-Johnson)’s son and schoolkid extras are on one of the Oakland, Alameda and Freemont school district buses evacuating San Francisco,  as tanks with soldiers rolled by yesterday.

Read More »SHOOT: GODZILLA’s Golden Gate Bridge Set with Inflatable GreenScreens

SHOOT: GODZILLA’s USS Alameda Rocks & Rolls Like Disney Ride in Steveston

Filming started this morning on Godzilla’s USS Alameda landing craft set on the edge of Garry Point Park in Steveston with soldiers, technocrane, fog machines, rain towers, giant scrims and green screens added to the ride.  Crew tested the mechanics last night, rocking and rolling the set while shooting sprays of water over the bow.

Related: Testing the USS Alameda Landing Craft Set in Steveston

Read More »SHOOT: GODZILLA’s USS Alameda Rocks & Rolls Like Disney Ride in Steveston

SHOOT: GODZILLA Crew Tests USS Alameda Landing Craft Set in Steveston

Godzilla crew tested their USS Alameda landing craft set last night on the edge of Steveston’s Garry Point Park. The craft was rocking and rolling as if battling a sea monster in San Francisco Bay with a stunt performer along for the ride. I’m guessing San Francisco because Alameda is the name of the old naval air station there. And the Steveston docks have been remade as San Francisco Fisherman’s Wharf for the past two weeks. Filming started on the USS Alameda set this morning with a technocrane, fog machines, rain towers and green screens.

Read More »SHOOT: GODZILLA Crew Tests USS Alameda Landing Craft Set in Steveston

SHOOT: Norma & Deputy Sheriff Shelby Hook Up at BATES MOTEL in Aldergrove for 1×04

Bates Motel has been renewed for a second season.

The one and only time I visited the 12-room motel and gothic house set in Aldergrove last year happened to be the day that Bates Motel filmed Norma’s estranged son Dylan catching her and Deputy Sheriff Zach Shelby coming out of a motel room after a steamy hookup. Since my visit was four months before the show’s premiere, I didn’t know what I was seeing. Now I realize that the motorcycle parked near the motel office belongs to Dylan (Max Thieriot) and the black jeep in the parking lot to Deputy Sheriff Zach Shelby (Mike Vogel). And if I’d got there earlier I might have seen Norma (Vera Farmiga) on set too. Or perhaps she was in the motel room when Mike Vogel came out during a break in filming, crossed the street and walked past me to grab something from the craft tent. Do you remember that scene of Norma and Zach coming out of the motel room from last week’s Trust Me?

Dylan: Hello there Norma. How are those new linens working out for you?

Norma turns to Zach and says: This is my son Dylan. And this is Zack Shelby.

Awkward silence.

Norma: Umm I’m gonna go get my car….

Shelby coolly walks to his black jeep, turns on the ignition and drives away as Dylan smokes and stares from a plastic green chair.

Promotional still from A&E of Dylan and Zach Shelby.

Copyright A&E

Read More »SHOOT: Norma & Deputy Sheriff Shelby Hook Up at BATES MOTEL in Aldergrove for 1×04

SHOOT: Double the Speedys at ARROW Night Shoot in New Westminster for 1×20

Are Arrow’s two Speedys in love? Crew messed up Lorne Mews in New Westminster yesterday to give it that ghetto The-Glades-of-Starling-City look, with graffiti, domestic violence posters, abandoned bikes, a barrel with a fire inside and other crap strewn from top to bottom. Oliver Queen (Stephen Amell)’s kid sister Thea (Willa Holland), nicknamed Speedy, walked down the steps to join Roy Harper (Colton Haynes from Teen Wolf), the thief who stole her purse and could evolve into Arrow’s trusted sidekick Speedy, as he is in the DC comics. In take after take, Speedy 1 rested her head on Speedy 2’s shoulders as he kissed her forehead. I look forward to seeing the scene as it is meant to be with Arrow’s night cameras.

Read More »SHOOT: Double the Speedys at ARROW Night Shoot in New Westminster for 1×20