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'TOMORROWLAND" BIG GAME SPECIAL LOOK- SHOT BY SHOT
Some agonizing minutes after the countdown clock on TakeMeToTomorrowland.com reached zero, the TOMORROWLAND Big Game Special Look was aired and went live online.
Here's a in-depth, shot-by-shot analysis of the spot considering what we have learned from The Optimist ARG, the New York Comic Con footage, the Before Tomorrowland prequel novel, and the Destination D footage:
Slide Captions:
-Casey Newton (Britt Robertson) - presumably in her bedroom - gazes up at a NASA shuttle model hanging above her. Elsewhere in the film, she is seen wearing a red NASA baseball cap, and is said to be seen watching the dismantling of the last launch platform at Cape Canaveral.
-Casey touches the pin after its mysterious appearance.
(As seen in the first Teaser Trailer.)
-Casey uses cloth to block her hand holding the pin so that she can control her transport to Tomorrow.
-A cryptex cycles random numbers, with the PLUS ULTRA secret society logo flashing among them.
-Frank Walker (George Clooney) approaches the device, located in the Eiffel Tower -- a significant Plus Ultra location. (The society was founded by Tesla, Edison, Eiffel, and H.G. Welles at the 1889 World's Fair.)
-The young robot Athena (Raffey Cassidy) who has not aged since Frank met her at the 1964 World's Fair, when he first glimpsed Tomorrow through a transport platform hidden under the It's A Small World attraction.
-A transport we are affectionately calling The Nonorail.
-David Nix (Hugh Laurie) shows Frank the city. An armed guard stands close behind. When young Frank met Nix at the 1964 World's Fair, he was rejected by him and kicked out of Tomorrow.
-Casey looks at Frank's network display of doomsday monitors.
-A jetpack-wearer zooms into the cityscape.
-Frank asks Casey if she wants to go to Tomorrow, after she successfully gains access to his booby-trapped home.
-A rocket ship that occupies the same physical space as the Eiffel Tower in the alternate Tomorrow dimension. Presumably, after Frank's rejection, the transport platform underneath It's A Small World was closed off in its relocation to Disneyland from the 1964 World's Fair.
-Frank prepares for liftoff.
-The rocket lifts off from its Eiffel-styled gantry.
-The Parisian landscape gives way to the revealed Tomorrow dimension.
-When the spot is watched on TakeMeToTomorrowland.com, the iconic Tomorrowland pin appears at three different points. When clicked, they open one of three panoramas of the futuristic city. (Click the images below to go directly to the panorama and explore in detail.)
These are reminiscent of the Syd Mead concept artwork released at New York Comic Con:
This concept art, however, depicts a less developed Tomorrow landscape. The boy in the foreground is young Frank, after gaining access through the platform underneath It's A Small World attraction at the 1964 World's Fair.
The abundant construction depicted in both the Big Game spot as well as the panoramas indicated Tomorrow has changed quite a bit in the years following Frank's first visit. Is Nix planning for an influx of citizens to Tomorrow?
Underneath the video player on the site, another Nixie-tube countdown clock cycles through countdowns to randomly generated dates, with Plus Ultra society logos flashing between the 9 and 0 digits. Stay tuned for future updates on any potential puzzles or Alternate Reality Game developments.
-PANORAMA 1: FULLSCREEN IT https://web.takemetotomorrowland.com/exp/pan1/pan1.html
-PANORAMA 2: FULLSCREEN IT: https://web.takemetotomorrowland.com/exp/pan2/pan2.html
-PANORAMA 3: FULLSCREEN IT: https://web.takemetotomorrowland.com/exp/pan3/pan3.html
Source: http://www.tomorrowlandtimes.com/2015/02/tomorrowland-big-game-special-look-shot.html
tags: TOMORROWLAND, SHOT BY SHOT, SUPERBOWL AD
Monday 02.02.15
Exclusive footage from TOMORROWLAND'S World's Fair sequences debuted tonight at D23's Destination D event.
The scene begins with young Frank Walker (the childhood version of George Clooney's character) arriving at the 1964 New York World's Fair via Grayhound bus. He carries a large canvas backpack with him. As the bus lurches to a stop, the driver exclaims, "Flushing Meadows, Corona Park, World's Fair! Don't forget your valuables, and enjoy the future."
Walking the grounds, the Fair is revealed in its full, recreated glory. Frank visits the Carousel of Progress, where the classic Sherman Brothers song "Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow" can be heard. He witnesses a demonstration of a "Probability Machine," at the IBM pavilion. The demonstrator explains, "Now, these balls fall in a random pattern, but advanced computing determines exactly where they will end up."
Frank sits on a bench where he us joined by young Athena, played by Raffey Cassidy.
"Don't turn around," she says. "Be cool. Count to twenty, then follow us." She presents Frank with a pin -- more on that in a minute.
Frank hops the It's A Small World attraction queue and sneaks onto an empty boat with his bag. He floats through the ride we all know and love ... until he reaches the France segment. From the tip of the Eiffel Tower, a laser scans Frank's pin. His boat is isolated on its path, and the entire track DROPS into a ramp, sending him BENEATH the ride.
His boat approaches an isolated station in a black void. A faint blue fog represents the horizon. Lines of light encircling the station flicker on. Frank enters a retro-styled aluminum enclosure -- an elevator -- in which signs indicate directions for "WORLD'S FAIR" and "TOMORROW."
A modulated voice greets him, "Good afternoon. Please step aboard the transport. The site is active." The lights begin to flicker, and Frank himself begins to phase and distort.
He falls to the ground, the lights return, and the distortion normalizes. He schleps his bag onto his back and faces the door, which opens as binding white light spills in. The music swells, Frank walks out ... and the clip ends.
Except, we know what sight greets him:
The Syd Mead concept art released by Disney depicts this scene.
What's in the bag? Anyone who purchased the Funko NYCC exclusive Frank ReAction Figure knows ... IT'S A JETPACK!
As for the pin? In our previous pin comparison, we noted that extras were spotted during the filming at Disneyland wearing a version of The Optimist pin with inverted colors. (Orange "T" on blue backing.) This was the same pin.
And the Eiffel Tower? As we learned in The Optimist ARG -- and soon to be featured in the BEFORE TOMORROWLAND prequel novel -- the Plus Ultra secret society (of which Walt Disney was a member) was founded at the 1889 World's Fair by Edison, Tesla, and H.G. Wells in a meeting ... at the top of the Eiffel Tower. The exact same location the laser scanned Frank's pin from in the Small World model.
Even though the scenes shown were brief, they were absolutely gorgeous. They also give us some idea of the film's themes. Tomorrowland Supervising Art Director Ramsey Avery elaborated, "Probability. Everything that happens has a mathematical reason for happening."
From the locations in Small World directly correlating to filming locations around the world featured in the rest of the movie, to a prominent closeup on The White Rabbit walk-around character, it's clear this narrative will be steeped in mythological tradition. Echoes of Wizard of Oz and Alice in Wonderland as Frank, almost literally, "falls down the rabbit hole."
"TOMORROWLAND" RELEASE DATES"
20 May 2015
Czech Republic21 May 2015
Kazakhstan21 May 2015
Netherlands21 May 2015
New Zealand21 May 2015
Ever since she was cast as a lead opposite George Clooney in the Disney tentpole Tomorrowland, Britt Roberston has been riding a swell of hype—one that will come crashing ashore on May 22, when the sci-fi odyssey hits theaters. At that point, she will likely land atop casting director wish-lists and in front of prying paparazzi lenses as Hollywood's newest leading lady. But before Robertson explores a futuristic society in Tomorrowland, the 24-year-old actress will appear in a movie that's pretty much the opposite. White Rabbit, a charcoal-black drama about a troubled high school student (Nick Krause) spiraling towards tragedy, can be seen this Friday in select theaters and on VOD after successfully funding a Kickstarter campaign. Robertson, who also stars in the upcoming Nicholas Spark weepie The Longest Ride, recently spoke to NYLON about her impending fame, missing her Super Bowl commercial, and why she kinda feels bad for Jennifer Lawrence.
Is it weird talking about this tiny film that you did a few years ago when so much has happened in your career since then?
It’s not weird. It’s hard to talk about because I don’t really remember the experience as well as I remember the other experiences. It has been so long. That definitely is the weirder part, for sure.
What made you take on such a pitch-black film?
When the script first came to us I thought it was a really interesting story to tell. I thought it was a really important story to tell. I was grateful to be a part of it, and I thought that Julie would be a really fun character to explore. She goes through so many ups and downs and twists and turns, so I thought that was challenging.
Do you ever think that because of Tomorrowland, you’ll never be in a film this small again? It’s a very specific type of filmmaking that you might have to say goodbye to.
Yeah, that would be so sad if I didn’t get to experience it ever again. But I hadn’t really thought about it, actually. It’s such a good point. With low-budget movies like that it’s such a different experience than studio filmmaking. But since then I’ve done a small indie over the holidays. We shot in 23 days and we were shooting like 16 scenes a day. So it isn’t lost on me and I do appreciate that world, and I think it makes me a better actor in some ways, so I’ll always return to it if I get a chance.
What were some of the bigger adjustments you had to make while shooting something like Tomorrowland? You just mentioned shooting 16 scenes a day, but for something like Tomorrowland it might take you several days just to shoot one scene.
Yeah, there’s more coverage and we have a lot more time to spend per page per day. But then again in certain scenes—I remember we had a couple of car scenes that we shot and we would shoot like eight pages a day for those car scenes. But then we would have one scene that we would spend three weeks on. I think the biggest adjustment would be staying fresh. When you’re used to shooting quickly and going, going, going, everything is fresh. You have so many chances to give it a shot. So I think the biggest adjustment is keeping fresh with the material for as long as we had to work on it.
I noticed that White Rabbit had a Kickstarter campaign to get money for distribution.
No way, is that true? I had no idea.
Yeah, and they raised the money. It was like $45,000. But I wanted to ask you how strange it must be to work on one film that is trying to raise $45,000 to get distribution, and this other film, Tomorrowland, spends that much on catering in a week. What is that disparity like?
I think it just makes you appreciate different aspects of filmmaking. The focus would be on just getting the material when working on a movie like that since you don’t have a lot of time or money. It's a bit like guerrilla filmmaking. That’s almost what brings out the heart and the emotion in these kinds of films. You pour your life into it, it takes so much more. For a movie like Tomorrowland, it costs so much to make that movie and because of how huge it is, the scope is just more than I can even describe. But little movies like White Rabbit, they don’t need a lot of money. You can do it for a million dollars.
And that’s kind of the beauty of it.
Yeah, I think you just have to embrace what you’re given because every chance is going to be different and every film is going to be different depending on the budget or just depending on the script.
Did you get to watch the Tomorrowland Super Bowl teaser live on TV?
No—I was house-hunting and I got home twenty minutes late so I didn’t see it.
Were you trying to make it or did you just not care?
I mean, I knew that it was going to be airing, but I didn’t know what time so it was just my luck that of course the twenty minutes that it took to get back home it aired. I wanted to see it, but there were just other things happening. On the way back from house-hunting, I think the person in my car got a text message from someone that was like, “Britt on the Super Bowl, woo!”
A lot of publications are pegging you as a breakout star for 2015, someone who’s on the verge of a new level of fame. Is that something that’s on your mind at all?
Fame?
Yeah, or the loss of your relative anonymity.
I think it’ll be fine. I don’t know, I haven’t really thought about it because I guess I’ve been working for so long—not that I’ve ever had anything like this happen to me, but I feel like I’ve done things and it’s never really been that big of a deal. I just work, I come home, it’s fine. So I’m hoping that it all stays the same. I’m sure it will.
I'm thinking of someone like Jennifer Lawrence, who a few years ago was starring in a tiny film like Winter’s Bone and now has to hide from paparazzi constantly, all because of the size of movies she started to do.
Which is a nightmare. Poor girl. She didn’t sign up for anything like this, just working as an actor and now she’s hiding from the world. It’s really unfortunate—super sad. I don’t think there’s anything you can do to avoid that.
As Tomorrowland gets closer to the release date, how do you feel about it? Is it nerve-wracking? Is it exciting? Are you worried that people are not going to like it?
Yeah, I mean that’s the scariest thing, just not having seen it and having worked on it so long. I just loved it so much and I hope that it’s good and people like it, and I hope that they go see it. But if they don’t, that’s okay too. Ideally, I like it. As long as I like it, then I can sleep at night.-Nylon Magazine
