Award-winning cinematographer Autumn Durald Arkapaw breaks down how she approached that crazy one-shot sequence in the third episode of Loki.
There was a time when tracking shots were the absolute pinnacle of filmmaking in audiences’ estimations, a certain sign that a movie or television show is far superior to its contemporary counterparts in terms of technique and understanding of the motion picture arts. Now, they’re a flexing tool that most directors utilize at least once just to let their colleagues — and the industry at large — know that they’ve got it made.
When it comes to Loki, however, we’re confronted with a cataclysmic sequence that seamlessly plays out as the God of Mischief and his female counterpart, Sylvie, try to escape Lamentis-1 while the city crumbles to fire and dust. It’s also unironically one of the most visually stunning scenes that MCU has ever produced, so it makes many a cinemagoer wonder how director Kate Herron and Autumn Arkapaw developed it.
Well, according to what the latter has recently told Variety, two iconic pop cultural phenomena were a huge influence in the creative process.
“Both John Wick and Children of Men were influences for that sequence. At one point we wanted a motorcycle in there, that they would get on and jump off after, but that made it complex. We wanted it to feel humanistic. When you turned the corner, you felt like you got a different emotional response to the color. I had never worked with UV paint. We did a pre-light the week before shooting and dialed in all the colors to see what looked good on camera.”
If you’re one to nerd out over the technical details of principal photography, then Arkapaw has got you covered.
“We needed to fit two characters into the frame, but we also needed to see the world, but you don’t want to be too wide that you can’t come in close on someone’s face. You don’t want too long of a lens because you don’t want the background to be compressed.”
It’s still unclear if Arkapaw will be back for Loki season 2, but you’ll be able to catch her work again later this year on Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.