We’re just a few days away from Birds of Prey. While the reviews aren’t out yet, early social media reactions by those critics lucky enough to attend the world premiere have been largely positive and the film’s action sequences, in particular, have garnered a lot of buzz.
This shouldn’t come as a surprise considering Birds of Prey helmer, Cathy Yan, worked together with stunt company 87eleven on all the action scenes. For those who do not know, 87eleven was founded by the ridiculously awesome stunt coordinator/2nd unit director turned helmer himself, Chad Stahelski. That’s right! The director of the John Wick movies. Not only that, it turns out that Stahelski himself helped to conceptualise some of the action sequences during reshoots. In an interview with Collider, Cathy Yan had this to say:
He did some of the second unit directing for the reshoots, but also his company—because we were lucky enough to get him, his company 87eleven we’d worked with for the entirety of the shoot, and that’s because I really liked the way they did action. It felt very practical. Our stunt coordinator Jonathan Eusebio and I really got along and we really love like the old Jackie Chan movies, and the way that those stunts were done and the way that you shoot that kind of action—which is what 87eleven is sort of known for, as well. So they’d been training our ladies for months, and they did most of their own stunt work. Then when it came time to actually adding even more action in reshoots, it was just amazing to get to work with Chad too.
I was already excited to catch Birds of Prey but now I’m super pumped! Chad Stahelski is easily one of the best action directors in the world right now and his work in the John Wick movies has been revolutionary.
Birds of Prey synopsis:
Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) is a twisted tale told by Harley herself, as only Harley can tell it. When Gotham’s most nefariously narcissistic villain, Roman Sionis, and his zealous right-hand, Zsasz, put a target on a young girl named Cass, the city is turned upside down looking for her. Harley, Huntress, Black Canary and Renee Montoya’s paths collide, and the unlikely foursome have no choice but to team up to take Roman down.
Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) is set hit theatres 6 February 2020.
