Variable Takes Us To The Brink Of 'Rocket Wars'

Where did the concept for the short come from?

As I was going down a rabbit trail on YouTube, I stumbled upon a video of the event. I saw what looked like war in the Middle East, but saw the terms 'tradition' and 'thousands of rockets' in the title and was intrigued. I thought about how we could tell that story with a cinematic sensibility, and started roping in Variable to see whether we could make it a reality.

Was the celebration something you were aware of beforehand?

The whole event was completely foreign to me, and I think that was part of its intrigue: something so bizarre and so seemingly violent for the sake of celebrating 'peace' was an interesting juxtaposition. It was a great subject matter to explore.



How much research/prep did you have to do before the shoot itself?

I think we probably spent a month, on and off, preparing for the shoot. The piece has a documentary feel, which required us to research and track down people who could give us insight into the event. Some of their stories were really interesting, but we had to pull back on some of the details in order to focus on the event itself, as opposed to the people taking part in it ? strange as that might sound.

Was it hard to explain to the locals what you were trying to capture?

There was obviously a language barrier, but our local producer and translator was very helpful in communicating with the locals. We also developed a short hand with the people we were shooting, so pretty quickly we were able to understand each other without having to speak.

I think it was hard at times even for me to explain to Alex Friedman, our producer, what I was trying to capture. Take the hallway shot for instance ? I was really insistent on that shot being a transitional device in the film, taking us from a pretty standard doc-type segment into something that elevated the piece in a somewhat 'cerebral' sense. I think it was hard for people to see, during production, how a shot like that could work or make sense editorially.



The film marries the more documentary aspects with incredible cinematic visuals. Were there any discussions about whether to go one way or the other?

Definitely, but I think we knew that in order to be true to the story we had to keep it feeling like a documentary that was shot with intentionality. I think if we pushed too hard into the cinematic spectrum, then things might have felt forced, especially since we weren't working with actors and we weren't working with 'ideal' locations. We also didn't have time to work on art direction and set design. All these limitations would have strong-armed us into a sub-par cinematic experience. We just wanted to do something more true to what was happening.

Was cutting it together tough?

We were always battling over whether to hinge the story on Marcos (the older gentleman) and explore his back story or make the film about the event itself. The more I explored what the (obvious) 3rd Act would be, the more I realized that we needed to characterize the event itself and try to build the narrative around what was central to the event ? the rockets. It took a while to make that work, since the individual stories were actually really good and hard to cut down.



The slow motion stuff you've captured is mesmeric. Was that using a Phantom cam?

Yes, a mix of Phantom Flex 4K, RED Dragon and Sony a7s, which is a small, relatively inexpensive DSLR.

Did you work closely with the DOP to capture the shots you were after?

Yes. Khalid Mohtaseb, our cinematographer, and our production team did extensive tests to make sure we could marry the different formats/codecs and exposures throughout the film.

We knew that the night stuff was going to be a challenge, so we spent a lot of time in Upstate New York testing a variety of fireworks to see what kind of exposures and frame rates we could get with the different cameras when shooting at night.



What was the tech you guys used to capture it all?

Aside from the cameras mentioned above, we also used a drone provided by Snaproll Media, a Ronin Stabilizer, a set of vintage anamorphic LOMO lenses for the majority of the piece and a couple of vintage spherical lenses for the night stuff. We also used an easy-rig for some of the hand held stuff.

The narrative from the film is provided through some great VO sound bites. Was it important to you to have many different voices, rather than a 'narrator' of sorts? What does this add to the film?

As soon as we decided to characterize the event, instead of building people's individual stories, it made most sense to use the three people we interviewed in a way that would help build the story of the event. The different perspectives also give the event a sense of mystery. The 3rd Act ? the actual firing of the rockets ? also feels more satisfying then, as we've been building the story around it.

If the story had been based on the characters, then we probably would have had to spend a bit more time setting things up, and the rockets would have served more as a side note. That could also be a great way to cut the story ? but maybe not for an online audience, more for a festival audience.



We guess that shooting the event itself was very much a 'no-repeat-takes' situation.

It definitely was. I mean, these guys just have to keep going; they don't stop to repeat things for our benefit, so we had to be on our game and be strategically positioned. It feels like war when you're out there ? the air is thick with tension ? in the best possible way. It's like the most intense football game, where the line between friend and enemy is so thin.

Were you tense on the day? Did you capture everything you were after?

Yeah, somewhat. We never really fully grasped what we could get in a 'no repeat take' four-hour window. I don't think any of us had really been forced to make do with the environment and time window that was so set in stone. So we literally could only react, we couldn't manipulate events. In that respect, I think it was a great challenge for us.

We captured almost everything we were after, but maybe not always how we wanted to shoot it. With documentary work you have to be a little bit less precious with aesthetics, because you have to be somewhat reactive: You have to get the moment, whether it's gorgeous or not. I think it just always looks different than what you expected ? not 'bad' different, just different. And to be honest, I think we got more than we bargained for.



Did you have to watch out for stray rockets?!

Most of the launching areas were covered with mesh for personal protection, but in between the barrages of rockets we'd run to different sections of the churches and launching areas that weren't protected. There were a couple of times that we got EXTREMELY close to getting hit. At first you're very careful, but then you loosen up and get braver ? to the point of stupidity, really. All part of the fun, though.

How long did the shoot take in total?

I guess it was about three days for all the interview/doc stuff that formed the setup for the film, and four hours for the actual event footage. We spent six days in Greece, and spent two to three of those days scouting locations and meeting potential people we could interview.



Greece is obviously in the news quite a lot at the moment due to its fiscal issues. Is it nice to produce a film that celebrates a different aspect of the culture?

Yeah, definitely. That was certainly not by design.

Did you have any thoughts to contextualise it in the current climate at all, or where you going for more of a timeless piece?

It came up in the interviews, actually. Many of the rocket makers couldn't hit their usual quota of rockets, as the recent financial climate has made producing this number a real difficulty. Strangely enough, however, this year there were more rockets than ever before. I think there were a number of rocket makers and additional teams who joined the two opposing sides. Each side has between 8 and 12 teams, comprising of anywhere from 4 to 10 members per team.



Adding to the epicness is the heady, imposing score. How did you go about producing that?

It's always an interesting process, but I think for this project I was just trying to keep a lot of the story/narrative elements feeling as though they were in the vein of a foreign film - which I think the charango sound gave us. For the warfare section, I was trying to keep the elements quite primal/tribal and loose/messy, which added to the frantic nature of the visuals.

I usually try to blur the lines between score and sound, and I think that was true with this film as well. There were definitely elements in the sound design that had score-like qualities, and elements of the score that had the randomness of sound design that tied closely to the picture. I worked with two friends of mine ? Ryan Taubert on the score and Defacto on the sound design ? to get things sitting just right.

The film has been picked up all over the internet. Are you happy with the response?

We're always grateful when people respond like that. I'm personally stoked with the fact that people are appreciating the shift in the work I'm trying to do. Sometimes when filmmakers, artists and creatives move into different territories, it's hard for audiences to follow.

What's up next for you?

I'm trying to learn how to tell people's stories better, whether it be documentary or narrative, and whether it be for our personal projects at Variable or for the work we're doing for clients. I think my head-space is in the doc world right now; for example, I'm trying to develop a short set in Mexico and a doc set in the Himalayas. We'll see how it goes.


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