Production Notes Chapter 4 Lucas Black and Nathalie Kelley in The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift. Post-Modern Western: Design of the Film Director Lin was precise when it came to setting the visual stage to film the landscape of Tokyo Drift. He knew it would be difficult to capture the complex street-racing subculture that surrounds drifting and the modern, global city that envelops it.  “The Tokyo you see in the film is definitely my take on the city. It hits you on different levels. I wanted to created a wild, wild west where people express themselves to the extreme…whether it's how they dress or what they drive.” The filmmakers' vision required exacting attention to detail from their production team of Windon, production designer Ida Random and costume designer Sanja Milkovic Hays. For Random, that challenge initially lay in creating a seamless look that could transition from the waterfront docks of San Pedro, California, and the Los Angeles suburbs to the stark, rustic, winding roads that snake through the hills of the city's Griffith and Elysian Parks. These hills would provide the backdrops for several breathtaking cliffside races set on the outskirts of Tokyo. Random and her team recreated Tokyo's Shibuya district in the midst of the urban sprawl of downtown Los Angeles. The filmmakers accomplished an extraordinary effort by closing six full city blocks to film a chase scene-taking two film units almost two weeks of filming to complete.  Street signs, buildings, newsstands, restaurants and bus stops replete with Japanese kanji to identify them were splayed over three city blocks.  Ironically, this would create a bit of confusion among a group of Japanese tourists who stumbled upon the filming set. While Los Angeles provided the team the versatility to recreate Japan's largest city in the Southland of California, they knew they couldn't completely duplicate the vitality that makes it one of the most unique cities in the world. Lin and Moritz agreed early on that filming in Tokyo would be essential to further establish the authenticity of the urban landscape. From the neon-saturated districts of Shibuya and Shinjuku to the gritty working-class neighborhoods and winding mountainside roads of Chiba (located several hours outside Tokyo), the filmmakers wanted to take a multifaceted snapshot of one of the world's oldest-yet most modern-cities. Producer Moritz notes, “It was important for us to feel like we could go shoot anywhere we wanted in Tokyo.  By bringing in a smaller crew, getting in there and making it happen, no one who looks at this movie will think we weren't there for the entire shoot.” The opening sequence of the film, the only one set in the States, had the cast and crew spending close to a week on the dusty flatlands of Victorville, located 86 miles east of Los Angeles. The scene, which kick-starts the action in The Fast and The Furious: Tokyo Drift, has Black's high-school loner Sean going head-to-head against the school's blowhard football quarterback. Following several months of filming in Southern California and a brief Thanksgiving holiday break, cast and a partial crew comprised of two separate film units traveled to Tokyo for four weeks to film exterior scenes. Amidst the chaos of filming in the heavily populated city where officials and citizens are unaccustomed to hosting large film productions, Lin quickly reverted to his origins as an indie filmmaker.  He relished the opportunity to plant an actor (Black) in the center of the kinetic Shibuya, the “Time Square of Tokyo,” with a camera (mounted on Windon's shoulder) and just start shooting.  Similar filming styles followed at other familiar landmarks such as Tokyo Tower, Rainbow Bridge and the teen fashion center Takeshita Dori near Harajuku. Recalls Lin, “We ended up shooting guerilla style around the city and grabbing whatever we could.  It was great for me, because it reminded me of all the independent films that I made where we were running and gunning and going with your gut…it was a lot of fun.” The actors took it all in stride, but definitely found living and working in a very different culture an adjustment.  Says Southern-born Black, “Coming from a small town in Alabama, I never thought I'd visit a city like Tokyo.  It's a humongous city with lots of people…it was cool to live and work in this new culture, but I got homesick quickly,” he remarks. Equally important to capturing the Tokyo zeitgeist was tapping into the style of a city known for co-opting music, fashion, cars and style from American and European culture…and making it her own by deconstructing and reinventing it. The director offers, “Tokyo is a place where they rebuilt the city, and it has taken a little bit of everything from around the world in its reconstruction.” Costume designer Sanja Milkovic Hays, a frequent collaborator with Moritz, accepted the challenge of raising the bar she established with trendsetting looks for the previous The Fast and the Furious films to visualize the quirky, often intangible fashion sense of the pop-culture-worshiping Tokyo youth. “I started looking at Japanese fashion magazines for the first Fast and Furious, because they are so forward in street fashion.  With this film, I'm able to fully push the envelope,” she remarks. From teen girls clad in sexy Victorian-inspired Gothic Lolita garb, the lacy-white-adorned Bo Peep personas to the Rockabilly, Mods, Punks and Hip-hop wannabes hanging out at Harajuku Station, Hays took the avant-garde looks and amped them to rival the fast cars of the drifting culture.  At times, while filming at the pseudo fashion runway of Takeshita Dori, it was often difficult to discern Hays-garbed background actors from the regulars taking their afternoon strolls. The soundtrack for the film was as much an eclectic blend as the other aspects of Tokyo Drift's production and design. Songwriters and performers from Pharrell Williams and Kid Rock to the Teriyaki Boyz, Shonen Knife and Mos Def contributed to the sometimes frenetic, sometimes soulful music that follows Sean's journey from the streets of Los Angeles to Tokyo. For example, with former Guns 'N Roses guitarist Slash performing on “Mustang Nismo” and “Welcome to Tokyo,” the blend of Far East and Western culture can be felt throughout the soundtrack. Introducing the sexy, high-octane style of drifting into the mix was something the filmmakers knew would excite moviegoers and car buffs who like their cars fast and their culture furious.  Attention to detail, coupled with inventive, mind-blowing action and a fresh new cast of characters ensures that this installment will enthrall the second an audience member's foot hits the gas, the minute he shifts gears, and the instant she slams the emergency brake. In The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, movie lovers will feel the rush of screaming through a corner to hit 75 mph…and experience an assault on their senses they haven't felt in, well, three years since the last film.  Next Page: About the Cast