Left Behind - Producers Diary

What do seven septic trucks, 100 tons of sand, riot gear and massive explosions all have in common? They are all a part of the challenge of making Left Behind-The Movie.

I would have to say the last few days have been some of the most unusual days in our experience of filmmaking. From hail, to torrential rain and severe thunderstorms' we've seen some of the most bizarre weather ever in this part of Canada. But, by the grace of God we've only lost about half a day. That is nothing short of miracle and we'll take it!

I've been sharing with you the effect rain is having on our Israeli desert. Well we've had seven septic trucks pumping the water out of our desert for the last 72 hours and at least the large lake is gone. We were beginning to think we would have to rewrite Chaim's formula. I mean it is no surprise that things are growing in the desert when it gets 4 inches of rain a day! However, to top things off we dumped over 100 tons of sand onto the set today. I should also let you in on the movie terminology that on a movie set septic trucks are not called that. They are called Honeydew trucks. I have no comment on that, but it is the reason that the parking lot for all the crew trucks, Winnebago's and support vehicles is called Honeyland. And here's one piece of advice. If you are on a movie set and you see a Honeydew truck coming to do its real job run for your life! I don't know what people are eating on our set but...

Well, by now you know our saying (Paul and I) that 'it's not a real movie until you blow something up.' Well, Left Behind is a real movie now. We blew Allan Tomkins and his car to kingdom come tonight. It was awesome. We were about 200 yards back and you could feel the heat wave from the blast blow right by us. The Lalonde brothers are happy filmmakers.

We were shooting by a freeway (The Gardner Expressway for you Toronto folks) and Paul swears a guy almost drove off the road when he saw the fireball (actually there was sign warning motorists of the movie shoot). This is one of the areas, where for the sake of a two hour movie we've made a change as the explosion takes place in New York and not in London. We just needed to make the timelines work for the movie. So Allan is now a Fed and not Scotland Yard. If you have a spirit of inflexibility please forgive us.

Kirk had another heavy day today. This guy is working himself to the bone. The last time I saw him on Saturday night he was in shock. We had just done an effects sequence where a computer blew up in front of him. He said he wasn't nervous at all until just before the shot when he looked and saw all the crew behind him under explosion blankets in full riot helmets.

Tomorrow an Israeli desert. We've packed our rubber boots and here we go...