Thread by @ATRightMovies

DUNKIRK was released 6 years ago today. Christopher Nolan’s first war film, and acclaimed as one of the great World War II movies this century, the story of how it came to be is as epic as the film…

A THREAD

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In 1992, student filmmaker Christopher Nolan and girlfriend Emma Thomas took a trip across the English Channel – a recreation of the Dunkirk evacuation route. Nolan said it took 19 hours, freezing cold, and very tough, but it did give him an idea…

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In the following 15 years, Nolan would go on to become one of the biggest filmmakers in Hollywood. The idea for a Dunkirk movie stuck with him all that time and, after he had a few big blockbusters under his belt, Nolan decided the time was right for his war film.

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Nolan’s first idea was for the film to be mostly improvised by actors. Emma Thomas (Producer and by now Nolan’s wife) told him that wasn’t going to work so Nolan wrote a script. Even then, it was only 76 pages long – less than half the length of any other Nolan screenplay.

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Nolan’s screenplay was divided into three segments: land, sea and air. The land narrative takes place over 1 week, sea over 1 day, and air over 1 hour. Then all three are spliced together to create a non-linear narrative. This is reflected in the design of the logo too.

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Nolan said: "For the soldiers who embarked in the conflict, the events took place on different temporalities. Do not repeat it to the studio: it will be my most experimental film."

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In casting the beach infantry, Nolan wanted to reflect reality so went for young, inexperienced actors. The lead, Tommy, was cast after thousands of secretive auditions lasting several months. The part went to Fionn Whitehead, performing in his first theatrical role.

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Back in the 1940s and before, British infantry soldiers were nicknamed Tommy Atkins. Even the German troops apparently referred to them as Tommys. This is why Whitehead’s character is named Tommy.

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Tom Hardy is top billing as Spitfire pilot Farrier. He spends most of the movie behind a mask and goggles. Nolan said “he has the most expressive eyes” after working with Hardy as Bane in The Dark Knight Rises, where he is behind a mask for the entire film.

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Farrier is not based entirely on a real person, though his story reportedly resembles Alan Christopher Deere, a New Zealand pilot. He was at Dunkirk and forced to crash-land on a beach. Though, he escaped and wasn’t captured.

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Mark Rylance was cast as civilian boat owner Mr Dawson. In preparation, Rylance read books about people involved in the evacuation and listened to Imperial War Museum recordings. He also learned to helm his character’s boat and did it every day.

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Dawson’s story is based on that of Charles Lightoller. He took his boat Sundowner, picked up survivors and took them back to Dunkirk. He also lost a son fighting in the RAF. (Incredibly, Lightoller was also a surviving crew member from the Titanic).

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Kenneth Branagh is Commander Bolton, the pier master at Dunkirk. Nolan said the character was a composite of several real-life officers, mostly Commander James Campbell Clouston. Clouston stayed until no more could be evacuated, but was killed on the journey home.

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Cillian Murphy had worked with Nolan 4 times before so cast as Shivering Soldier without going through a full audition. He did research into WWII psychological trauma and PTSD suffered by soldiers.

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German troops are shooting at and bombing the allies throughout the movie, but no German troops are seen until the final shots (further below). And then, they’re dimly lit and out of focus.

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One Direction star Harry Styles was cast as Alex. Nolan said it had nothing to do with his fame and that “I auditioned literally thousands of young men… [Harry] had it.” Styles had a personal bodyguard on the set because fans would turn up at the locations.

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Many thought this is one of the few Christopher Nolan movies Michael Caine does not appear in. Not true, Caine has an uncredited voice cameo as the Royal Air Force flight leader.

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In researching the event, Nolan worked with historian Joshua Levine. They interviewed veterans who were part of the evacuation, and Nolan used elements he was told in the film. Levine later wrote a book Dunkirk: The History Behind the Major Motion Picture.

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The film was shot in the real locations and some stand-ins, including Dunkirk, Netherlands, Swanage, Weymouth, and the Point Vicente Interpretive Center and Lighthouse in California. It had the working title of Bodega Bay throughout the shoot.

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To create the intense sound design in the film, Nolan used a Shepard tone. This is a tone with ascending loops to make it sound like they’re rising in pitch . He reflected this in the narrative, when one storyline peaks, we cut to another where tension is still rising.

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The ticking sound effect pays a key part too. Nolan sent composer Hans Zimmer a recording of his own pocket watch. Zimmer then put the sounds into synthesizers and altered them in various ways before incorporating them into the score.

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Zimmer wrote the score as one epic 1 hour 42 minute piece of music. It was then split down into several separate pieces, the common theme between all pieces being the ticking clock.

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Nolan wanted the military outfits to be worn and battered so costume designer Jeffrey Kurland had the outfits drenched in water, then dried with a blow torch, then scrubbed with a brush. This was done over and over to achieve the effect.

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Nolan wanted historical accuracy for the costumes. The wool used for uniforms during WWII isn’t used anymore, so Kurland’s team had to make every outfit from scratch, tailoring them for every cast member and every extra.

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DP Hoyte Van Hoytema worked with Nolan on Interstellar and returned for this film. 70% of the film was shot in IMAX so he and his team were constantly working with camera weighing anywhere from 46 lbs to 250 lbs. HVH said it was one of his more difficult shoots.

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The film includes the most footage shot on 65mm IMAX yet. 1 hour and 19 minutes in total. Nolan did this to maximize the visuals as much as possible on the big screen.

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American billionaire Dan Friedkin donated two Mk1 Spitfires from his collection for use in the movie. Reportedly, the only person who owned more Spitfires was the Queen! And it was Friedkin flying the Spitfire in the final shots as it approaches the beach.

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Prior to production starting, Nolan screened 11 movies to the crew: All Quiet on the Western Front, The Wages Of Fear, Alien, Speed, Unstoppable, Greed, Sunrise, Ryan's Daughter, The Battle of Algiers, Chariots of Fire and Foreign Correspondent.

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The pier the soldiers stand on was called The Mole. It was built on top of a Dunkirk monument that now stands there from blueprints of the original Mole. The Local Port Authority approved it, as long as it was no longer than 12 weeks.

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The film has been criticised for not reflecting the diversity of the event. 4 companies of the Royal Indian Army were at Dunkirk but not in the film. There were also complaints that the movie ignored the French Army, which held back German divisions during the evacuation.

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Nolan hired over 6000 extras for the film. On top of this, hundreds of cardboard cut outs were created and placed among the extras to create the illusion of even more soldiers on the beaches.

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During pre-production, Nolan reached out to Saving Private Ryan director Steven Spielberg for advice. Spielberg told him research was everything and also sent Nolan a print of Saving Private Ryan that had only been seen 12 times.

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Nolan famously prefers practical effects over CGI when possible. He used real navy destroyers for the battle sequences instead of CGI and at one point there were 62 ships in the water during filming.

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The medical ship seen at the beginning was M/S Rogaland, a 1929 Norwegian passenger ship that was in World War II and sunk in 1944. She was later raised and rebuilt, and now functions regularly as a cruise ship in Norway.

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When the Spitfire crashes into the Channel, an IMAX camera was strapped into the cockpit causing it to sink very quickly. The camera filled with water so the film had to be specially shipped to L.A. to be saved. That take is in the film.

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Large portions of the movie were shot on the beach at Dunkirk where the evacuation took place. When scouting the location, Nolan found a button from an English soldier's uniform in the sand which had presumably been there decades.

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For the cockpit shots, a two-seat plane was rigged so the front and cockpit looked like a Spitfire, but with non-functioning controls, and the actual pilot sat in the rear seat to fly the plane.

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The scene in which Farrier lands on Dunkirk beach was done on-location with an actual Spitfire - it was the first time a plane landed on that beach since 1940.

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The crew only had a 45 minute window to get the shot before the tide came in and, after they finished, the Spitfire got stuck in the sand. There was a frantic rush to get the plane to safety before the tide came in.

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The soldiers are seen arriving at Woking railway station, and it was shot at Swanage station in Dorset. The station was redressed entirely to recreate Woking in 1940, even though Nolan knew we’d only see a tiny part of it from the train windows.

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The ending was originally the shot of the burning Spitfire. Nolan changed his mind after seeing Whitehead’s quiet reflection as Tommy on the train, and thought it the right way to end the film.

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Before release, the movie had a five-minute IMAX prologue that played in front of Rogue One and Kong: Skull Island. This is a Nolan trademark after he also did it with The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises.

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Approximately 30 Dunkirk survivors in their mid-90s attended the premiere in London. They said it accurately captured the event, but the soundtrack was louder than the actual bombs, feedback that amused Nolan.

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Warner Bros. marketed the film as an action blockbuster rather than a prestige war movie. It paid off as from a $150m budget, Dunkirk made $525 million worldwide, surpassing Saving Private Ryan as the highest-grossing World War II film.

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