Empire UK

vehicle started to lift. It sailed all the way
over “straight as a die”. Then Corbould
asked Nolan where he was thinking of
doing it. “He said ‘On LaSalle Street (in
the heart of Chicago’s financial district).’
Oh God why?! You couldn’t have chosen
somewhere more difficult than LaSalle
Street. It’s ridiculous there!”
The problem being beneath
the street for most of its length are
underground bank vaults. Not the best
spots to drive huge pistons with 100-
odd tons of force behind them. Still
they found a small stretch where it
was solid. All they had to do was make
sure the spikes were driven down at
precisely the right point. Which they
did. Impossible achieved.

OU MIGHT IMAGINE
that Chris Corbould’s
greatest joy is blowing
shit up good. Yet with
only a few exceptions
— including notably the monstrous
ka-boomer he orchestrated for Spectre
— he doesn’t even press the button
himself. “My passion really is the large
rigs that we build” he says. “It’s the
mechanical side of it I really love. The
spectacle having something big.” He
fondly recalls the sinking Venetian
house from Casino Royale’s climax

of running along a rotating corridor.

Though it was rubber-walled there were

still the corridors coming off it. “When

it was level it was fine. But when it went

to 90 degrees all of a sudden there was

a ten-foot drop going down there.”

Of course Corbould tested it

himself. But not before Nolan. “Chris

was one of the first ones to go in. He said

‘I’m not gonna put an actor in something

I wouldn’t go in myself.’” It’s a pleasing

image: Christopher Nolan tumbling

around like a bingo ball in one of his

own spectacular contraptions.

HERE WAS A TIME WHEN

Corbould thought it would

all be over that he his

siblings all special effects

teams around the world

would get another five years out of the

business if they were lucky. It was of

course when digital effects took off

and CGI became the visual cement and

mortar of the blockbuster. For a while as

Corbould recalls he and VFX departments

“were banging heads into each other.

‘Oh I can do it better than you.’”

Now it’s different. “The other planet

hitting the Earth I can’t do” he says “but

then there’s the destruction that goes

around it whether it be cars flipping up

into the air or buildings blowing up. The

and how he dropped it into the water

while a group of visiting studio

executives were inside. “I think one of

them freaked out a little bit” he grins.

“The looks on their faces were worth

a million dollars.” Though he’s quick to

point out “They were perfectly safe.”

Then there’s Inception. Nolan

wanted a hotel corridor whirling in

a subconscious storm. Corbould had

it built full-size and could spin it up

to six revolutions per minute. “Which

doesn’t sound a lot but when it’s 30-foot

across that’s goingfast. Though when

it came to the reality of shooting it we

never actually took it above three [rpm].”

Too much of Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s

performance was lost says Corbould to

concentration on the physical challenges

Top:Skyfall’s

spectacular Tube

crash.Above:

Corbould (in hi-viz)

playing the role of

the Tube driver.

“Sam looked at

me and said

‘This is a Bond fi lm.

We do it for real.’”

CHRIS CORBOULD

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