Georgia is taking the movie industry from the city of stars. Hollywood producers, actors, and directors are finding an oasis in temperate climate, low taxes, and heavy traffic of the state of Georgia.
Georgia is the No. 1 filming location in the world, according to FilmL.A. Georgia’s up-and-coming film industry is bringing economic gain to the state.
Pair, in his experience, sees the importance of Atlanta to the movie industry.
“Over $2 billion in revenue and over 12,000 jobs created has made Atlanta and Georgia the Mecca of movie making,” Pair says.
Driving through the heat of Atlanta’s summers and seeing filming signs such as “extra parking” is not out of the ordinary. Equipment trucks and actor trailers can be seen in any vacant parking lot. Detours to veer cars out of the way of filming are made all around the city. This affects the Grady Cluster near Inman Middle School, where “Ant Man 2” is being filmed.
If you’re driving through downtown Atlanta and there is a fire in the middle of the zoned- off street, don’t be alarmed. “Avengers: Infinity War” is now shooting downtown with elaborate special effects and explosives. This mega blockbuster features Robert Downey Jr. (Iron Man), Scarlett Johannson (Black Widow), Chris Evans (Captain America), Mark Ruffalo (the Hulk) and Chris Hemsworth (Thor), the list goes on and on. If any of your favorite Marvel characters are still alive, they’ll be in this film and are in Atlanta.
Having worked for twenty-six years in the film industry as a film technician and camera grip, Grady parent Tripp Pair is used to traveling all over the country to film movies.
“This job takes you year round and over time in all types of weather,” Pair said “My workplace is my home state,” Pair said. “In Georgia over the past year, 17 movies have been filmed, according to the Atlanta-Journal Constitution.”
“Bad Moms 2,’’, which was filmed in the heat of the Atlanta summer, required mounds of fake snow to be littered across neighborhood lawns.
“Our house did have some Christmas decorations and fake snow,’’ Mary Shaltis, whose house was used in the movie filming, said. “It was interesting to see how they made a snowy winter scene in the middle of summer.”
Because the scenes were filmed outside of Shaltis’ house, she was to see two of the movie’s stars: Mila Kunis and Christine Baranski. Shaltis said only two to three scenes were shot at her home, but she didn’t realize just how short each take is, and how many times the same scene is shot over and over again.
“They must have shot that same scene at least 10 times,” Shaltis says. “When you watch the movie, you don’t realize that it’s just many many scenes edited together to make it look like it was all filmed at the same time.”
Not only have so many movies been filmed in metro Atlanta, but two movies in two years have been filmed at Grady. “Spiderman Homecoming” and “Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda” were both filmed at Grady, using Grady students as extras in both.