cameron diaz movies
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 Chapter 4 - A Ceaseless Journey Around the World
From the minute June and Roy encounter each other in Kansas, the pace of Knight and Day begins to accelerate, until they are on a ceaseless, death-defying journey around the world, making stops in Boston, New York, the Alps, Austria, Spain and the tropical Caribbean. For the filmmakers, this meant an ambitious production on every level. Shooting in five different countries while forging a wide variety of original stunts and intricately choreographed set pieces, the production of Knight and Day, much like its characters, had to hit the ground running.
"In the beginning it was like sitting in front of a giant chess board and puzzling over all these different scenarios," admits Cathy Konrad. "The exhilarating part was having the chance to create as you go."
As they dove in, Mangold put the film's visual emphasis on the real - favoring in-camera action over CGI, the latter being employed primarily to enhance the live feeling of the scenes. "What we wanted to do was to create a seamless look that feels like you're always in the middle of the action," Mangold explains. "We wanted the audience to always feel like they are with June, because she is the one who is like us, has led an ordinary existence and is suddenly on the wild ride of a lifetime. The film is about a fantasy made real, if you will, and that was the tone."
In order to move with maximum speed and creativity, Mangold and Konrad surrounded themselves with the devoted team of cinematic craftsmen with whom they shot the hit Western, 3:10 to Yuma. The team includes cinematographer Phedon Papamichael, who collaborated closely with Mangold on Knight and Day, choosing a hands-on, immediate camera style to draw the audience deeper and deeper into the film's labyrinth of humor, heat and peril.
"Phedon and I wanted the film to have a classic simplicity," comments Mangold. "We wanted it to be beautiful and glamorous and feel like a whirlwind trip around the world - to bring out the rich tones of Jamaica, the baked, warm sun of Spain, the icy landscapes of the Alps and Austria and the hometown feel of Boston. It gives the film a feeling of wish-fulfillment for the audience, of going to places you've never seen, and feeling like you're really there. That was a very important component of the film."
"I've never really done a picture like this before," admits Papamichael. "It's not a pure action movie and it's not entirely a romantic comedy, and I think if you could call it any genre, you'd call it cool, inventive fun. For me, it was irresistible because there's so much potential for combining beauty with visual excitement, especially the way it constantly transitions from one country to another - one minute someone passes out in Jamaica, the next they're in jeopardy on a train in the Alps. As a cinematographer it was a tremendous challenge to pull this off, but it was equally tremendous fun to play with so many different looks and styles that all had to fit together."
He continues: "There's sustained visual energy, because the characters never stop moving, never stop running. They're on the maximum ride of their lives and that's the feeling on screen."
Flying in the face of many dark, grainy recent thrillers, Mangold and Papamichael chose grace over grit as an overall visual concept. "We wanted everything to be almost sparkling and color-saturated - it's a look that showcases Tom, Cameron and our beautiful locations," says Papamichael.
The rapport between Cruise and Diaz also gave Papamichael a lot to work with visually. "Their chemistry is simply magical," he says. "It's not something you can create - it's already there and we just tried to capture it to the max."
Tasked with shooting dozens of intricately plotted stunts that unfold in real and often crowded locations, Papamichael devoted months and months to planning every shot - but then let all of his best laid plans fall prey to spontaneity as Mangold and the actors changed it up.
"Everything was pre-conceived but we didn't want to lock ourselves in," he explains. "We always wanted to have the space to take advantage of those amazing things that happen in the moment, to react to Tom and Cameron's subtle changes on the fly. Jim is very flexible in that way. He has a great ability to focus on the actors while managing all the technical aspects of such a complex picture."
Although he has many favorite scenes, Papamichael says that his favorite took place on the notoriously tangled roads of Boston, as June finds herself in a hair-raising, high-speed car chase, which culminates in a foot-chase through four lanes of roaring freeway. "Boston is a high-traffic city and we were shooting in major tunnels and on popular highways dealing with a real urban environment where you don't have full control," he recalls. "The key was to shoot it in pieces and then carefully orchestrate all of these elements into one seamless whole. It was very exciting."
For production designer Andrew Menzies, the global whirlwind of Knight and Day was also the stuff design dreams are made of. "When I read the script, I was thrilled by the idea of melding together all these spectacular locations as the story builds to a crescendo," he says.
Menzies started out with the idea of a perpetually intensifying color palette. "We begin in gray, monochromatic, working-class Boston, which is June's reality and then as the suspense and romance start to build so do the colors, until we're in all these vibrant, glamorous European countries. Then, suddenly, you're going from an Old World alpine train to a modern hotel in Salzburg to a Spanish villa to a primitive island. Those were wonderful challenges," he says.
Menzies and Mangold decided from the beginning that, unlike on 3:10 to Yuma, they would use largely practical locations in order to give Knight and Day even more immediacy and texture. "This meant doing a lot scouting to look for beautiful places that could give us different options for shooting," notes Menzies. "Luckily, in places like Salzburg and Seville; wherever you point the camera, there's endless texture, tone and character."
The production designer worked closely with Konrad, who often focuses on design elements. "Jim is really honed in on the characters, and Cathy helps serve as his creative eye when it comes to the photography and design, so we collaborated a lot," he explains.
Costume designer Arianne Phillips, in her fifth collaboration with Mangold, was equally exhilarated with the task that faced her: designing for two of Hollywood's most charismatic stars. "I was so excited to work with Tom and Cameron in a story with a lot of costumes," she says. "Their personalities were inspiring to me in terms of thinking about the overall look."
She continues: "Tom Cruise is such an American movie icon, and that American quality really set the tone, inspiring us to embrace a lot of American designers and design ideas in the film. I also looked back at cool American stars like Steve McQueen and Paul Newman. We didn't want to repeat a look that Tom has done before, but to create something fresh and new."
Her first meeting with Cruise was a creative free-for-all. "He came in with tons of ideas about how Roy should be warm and welcoming, not the cold and off-putting traditional secret agent type," she recalls. "We talked about using great American designers." For Cameron Diaz's June, Phillips had her hands full of constant costume changes. "The inspiration for June was that she is always on the run, and constantly wearing clothes that were given to her or found in the moment, including the maid-of-honor dress that she's wearing when things take a dramatic turn," says the designer. "Her clothes became part of the comedy and fun of the story."
Phillips' work was also influenced by the film's ever-changing geography. "Each different city in the film helps to inform the color and silhouette of the main character's clothes," she notes. "It was a great chance to play with all kinds of international fashion."
Says Konrad of Phillips: "Arianne tells stories through clothes. She's got such a keen eye and a great way with fit and movement and her work further accentuates our characters."
As the production moved from one change of costume and location to the next, it not only kept the artistic crew on their toes, it also kept the actors moving as quickly as their characters. "I've been making movies for 15 years and I've never jumped from location to location like this," muses Diaz. "The chance to put these amazing places on screen, and to give the story that kind of scope, is a thrill."
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