Barbarella Chats with THE DEVIL'S MOUTH'S Director of Photography James Kniest

Hey friends! Barbarella here. THE DEVIL’S MOUTH is currently available on Prime. This latest entry into shark-versus-people stories follows a group of friends on one last adventure before they enter the realm of adult responsibility. The group finds itself in a cave that recently flooded, bringing creatures from the ocean into its freshwater passages. Despite the fact that the characters in this adventure prove really stupid (they actually think turning off their flashlights will prevent the shark from finding them), the movie still proves to be somewhat suspenseful and has some fun moments. Shot in Thailand, the photography is gorgeous, and I had the opportunity to speak with Director of Photography James Kniest. Check out the conversation.  

Barbara: When people talk about filming underwater, around water, anywhere near water, they always say it's just such a disaster, but you gravitate towards that kind of stuff. What is the appeal for you?

James: Well, I've been saying for years that water is my church and my therapist. It's super therapeutic; I've always loved it. What got me into the industry originally is I wanted to make underwater documentaries. I watched Jacques Cousteau almost every day as a kid, so I just love the environment. Filming in it is definitely challenging. I think over the years, you learn things to avoid, and you're constantly learning new tricks, how to build yourself up for success, and to avoid the pitfalls. A lot of elements are constantly changing that you can't control, so you need to be able to adapt accordingly. 

Barbara: Thailand is beautiful, and the footage you got of Thailand is just gorgeous. It made me want to go there. Did you have any free time while you were there? 

James: Once we wrapped, I had a weekend that I went to Phuket and hung out at the beach. Not a lot of free time, but I didn't feel like I needed it. Filmmaking for me is so exciting that just being in that environment and having a purpose every day is what felt like a vacation, to some degree. Getting paid to do what you love in a beautiful environment is not really work. The people are incredible. The food's incredible. I was often in the water, so I guess I was enjoying it. At first, the safety divers were like, "Oh no, nobody can go in the water." And then after we had a rapport, and they understood my background in the ocean and stuff like that, they let me do what I wanted to do. I'd jump off and swim. I always found excuses like, "Oh, I need to go over there," so it was a little bit of a mini vacation to some degree, I have to admit. 

Barbara: Nice. How is filming in Thailand different from filming elsewhere?

James: It's very hot there, and there were a lot of environmental challenges. One thing that I learned is that being on the equator, the sun is always really steep, so polarizers don't really work for the sky. Sometimes it turns into a white sky, which was kind of an eye-opener. 

I have to say that the people are incredible. They are just tireless. They work sunup to sundown, never complain. Everyone's really happy and joyous; I think it's infective. I really watched the Thai handlers with the cast. They were just incredible. They would sing and dance in between takes. They would beat drums and celebrate the cast as they came off set, and I just think that that culture established a joyous environment for people to work in, which brought the best out of everybody. It's hard to complain when everybody's smiling around you. 

Barbara: Right. That's awesome. So how much of this was shot in a manmade versus a natural environment? 

James: As far as an actual percentage, I would say it's close to probably 40% in real nature. The rest was on stage in these giant caves and water systems we built. 

Barbara: What kind of equipment did you use to shoot? 

James: We had four Sony Venices. We had a Technocrane almost every day. We had it on a barge in the ocean. We had floats with different cranes on it in the rivers. We had two underwater housings. We had long lenses to reach from shore or reach from the side of the tank. We made our own underwater lights because they're not really available in Thailand, so that was fun. We employed a lot of LED lights. We had a whole little system that moved around and we could hide behind stuff and control things electronically from a distance. 

Barbara: Would you describe what it was like working with the director, Jeff Wadlow? What's his style in relation with you? How involved is he? Does he just kind of give you the brief direction and then let you run with it? 

James: Jeff is involved with everything. He's tireless. He works his butt off. We did a lot of prep. We sketched out everything we could. We scouted ad nauseum to beautiful places. I think we would've shot more in real places, but unfortunately some of them were not deemed safe for us as a crew. There are a lot of elements: four cameras, five to six cast, water, everything floating, everything moving. There are no real hard marks. It's just open water. We had a little system where we had a whiteboard, and we'd have the day’s set drawn on the whiteboard, and then we could make diagrams and stuff. We would all come out of the water, have a team huddle, then we'd all go back in the water and execute. 

He was a tremendous leader. I think he really brought a sense of organization, a sense of fun, and a sense of importance to it all. It was a lot to track in terms of where we were in the path of the characters’ swim through the caves. Sometimes you get lost in a dark space like, "Wait, are they going left? Are they going right?" 

They trained for it. They all got certified in scuba. They all took breath training. I think at one point, Nico [Hiraga] could hold his breath for three minutes or something. I think Kathryn Newton hadn't really spent too much time in the water prior, but by the time we wrapped, she was like a fish. It was incredible. It was really fun to watch their maturation with their water skills throughout the process. 

Barbara: How long was the shoot? 

James: I think it was forty shoot days. And then we had quite a bit of prep; I think we had six weeks of prep, so that was helpful. Alec Hammond, the production designer, was just incredible. Everything was very detailed. We built these giant caves on stage. They all had inter-moving parts and ceilings that could move so that we could make each cave look different. It was a very collaborative process.

Barbara: What was your favorite day on set and why? 

James: I think every day was really enjoyable. I think one of the most fun times I had was we had a day where we had a number of squalls come and hit us. For some reason, I really like inclement weather, as dangerous as it was. We had to beach a couple of the boats for fear of them capsizing, especially the one with the Technocrane on it, but I felt like the scene where the priest in Caddyshack – I know this totally dates me – is golfing in the rain, and he's just loving it. I felt like that, standing on the bow of a boat as a squall hit us, and I was just enjoying every moment of it. 

Barbara: If you had to be trapped in a cave with one of the characters, not the actors, but the characters, which one would you want to be trapped with? 

James: That's a good question. I almost want to say the shark. I would have to say Kathryn Newton's character.

Barbara: Who would you say is the MVP on set? 

James: Wow. I don't know. Everybody was just tremendous. My gaffer Wirot [Sittiwech], who was a Thai gaffer, very talented, very smart, very calm individual, so for me, he's one of the MVPs. I also had an underwater camera operator who just really rose to the occasion, and I don't want to sound like I'm kissing up, but I think Jeff did a tremendous job about morale and keeping everybody on track. There's a lot of different personalities and abilities on a set like that in the water, and I thought he did a really, really good job about just keeping things moving.

 

THE DEVIL’S MOUTH is currently available on Prime, and if you’re like me, you’ll probably be cheering for the shark. ;-)

FYI, this trailer has major spoilers in it. It's spoiler free until they get into the cave, so you can watch that far, but if you go much past that, you will encounter a ton of spoilers.