Director Sam Hargrave pushes the envelope in ‘Extraction 2’

CEBU, Philippines — Sam Hargrave would not have “survived” on the set of “Extraction 2” had he not intensified his workout regimen prior to filming the sequel to Netflix’s 2020 blockbuster action film. He may be off screen capturing the unrelenting action, but that’s not say he isn’t breaking out some serious stunts behind the camera.

“When you have to keep up with this guy…” Hargrave began, gesturing to his lead star Chris Hemsworth, “I’ll never keep up with the look, but physically he’s running all around the set and I have to keep up with that, I got to carry a camera and it’s actually heavier.”

“It’s survival. So yes, my training was upped a notch because I’m running around chasing these guys. I have to able to be there with them, because nobody wants to say ‘Let’s go again ‘coz I’m out of breath.’ I was definitely trying to stay in shape so they didn’t have to wait on me.”

The American director, stuntman and actor – whose good looks didn’t go unnoticed among the attendees – joined Hemsworth for a June 5 press conference at Conrad Manila in Pasay City, before gracing a fan event in the evening at the Musical Hall of SM Mall of Asia.

In a roundtable interview the following day, Hargrave listed off among the stunts he did behind the scenes were traversing the top of a moving train and walking underneath the rotors of a helicopter. He also had to out-run Hemsworth and the other actors while holding a camera.

“I don’t know why I decided to do that rather than use a camera vehicle,” he quipped. “I had to strap myself to the front and back of moving vehicles with the camera arm to try to get in places we were unable to get a vehicle on. I was on wire rigs dropping from second stories…a lot of crazy stuff.”

But nothing crazier, he added, than what he would do as a stunt performer – a background he thinks allowed him to position his camera in places not often seen in other action flicks.

Hargrave is known for his collaborations with the Russo brothers (Joe and Anthony), notably as stunt coordinator for several films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The Russos wrote and produced “Extraction”, which is Hargrave’s directorial debut. He was also second unit director for season two of “The Mandalorian.”

In “Extraction 2,” premiering June 16 on Netflix, Hemsworth returns as Australian black ops mercenary Tyler Rake who finds a new purpose when he accepts another deadly mission: to extract the wife and two children of a Georgian gangster from the prison where they’re being held.

Iranian-French actress Golshifteh Farahani (Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, Body of Lies) reprises her role from the first film as Nik Khan, the mercenary partner of Rake. Idris Elba, Adam Bessa, Olga Kurylenko, Daniel Bernhardt and Tinatin Dalakishvili also co-star.

Deeper and wider

While the first dealt with guilt and redemption, “Extraction 2” pushes those ideas further by going deeper and wider in scope.

“What really haunts him is his son, and so in this movie we felt like exploring the impact of that on your life, but also, of how you have family around you that you’re born into, and also those you choose. And so he has this team around him, with Nik and Yaz [Adam Bessa] – how does he interact with this family?” said Hargrave.

“And then we bring in other characters that he has to interact with and that his decisions have an effect on. It broadens that idea of redemption and family which we try to hit on a little bit harder in this sequel.”

Reuniting with Hemsworth was a delight for Hargrave, who would repeatedly mention how the Australian star made his job so much easier – referring to him as a hardworking filmmaking partner instead of his actor.

“Filmmaking is one of the most collaborative art forms, and when you get the opportunity to work with someone like Chris who is not only supremely talented in his lane, but as a filmmaker, he’s so collaborative and knowledgeable about storytelling, writing, and where to put the camera,” said Hargrave.

Like walking under a hurricane

Probably what the duo is most proud of is pulling off a longer oner (a single continuous action) in “Extraction 2” via an epic prison scene that took months of rehearsals and up to eight takes.

“We really pushed the envelope because the first movie timed in at about 11 minutes and 40 seconds or something, and this one is 21 minutes and seven seconds,” he said.  “It takes a lot of preparation. I think we rehearsed for three to four months to get all of the elements in place.”

“And our version of the oner is, the experience is as if it was one shot. But because we had so many different elements and moving parts – sometimes literally moving trains and helicopters and Chris Hemsworth – that we had to break it up into slightly smaller pieces and it’s stitched together so it feels like one continuous shot.”

Among the “crazy” camera shots in “Extraction 2” for Hargrave was landing a helicopter on a moving train.

“I was operating the camera, and I don’t know if you’ve been under a helicopter trying to keep itself off the ground…there’s a lot of force that allows that bird to fly, and walking under that is like walking under a hurricane. So to walk along the side of it, close enough where I can high-five the pilot – that was a difficult shot to not be blown off the train.”

But no more difficult for Hemsworth, who had to maintain a stone-cold killer expression while his face was actually freezing over.

“The shot doesn’t seem as complicated in the movie when you see it, but when he shoots down the helicopter, we had to do this little do-si-do [a square-dance figure] on top of a moving train and it was so cold. It was below zero, just the air temperature, but then you’re moving 50 miles an hour, and the wind’s blowing and you feel like your faces are about to fall off. And I know all he wanted to do was say ‘Get something around my face, I’m freezing!’”

The Sam Hargrave way

With impressive action flicks churned out year after year, how does Hargrave come up with fresh tricks that get audiences still excited? It’s a tough nut to crack, he admits.

“How do you compete? How do you keep up with the level of action when the bar is raised every time? Again, working with somebody as talented and hardworking as Chris, we look at each other and we say, how can we push each other to do something that we’ll be proud of even 10 years from now and try to make it something memorable for the fans?”

He approaches the challenge by looking at it from the perspective of a fan.

“I’m a fan of action movies, like I’m super excited about ‘Mission Impossible.’ So I think about what would I as a fan want to see and how can I do that in a way that’s interesting or maybe hasn’t been done before,” said Hargrave, who takes a lot of my inspiration from old Hong Kong cinema.

“My spirit and soul is inspired by that – has been since I was 14, 15 years old when I started watching Jackie Chan, Jet Li movies. The way they used action as a storytelling device…because they weren’t able to keep up with the special effects and CGI of Hollywood. So how can we differentiate ourselves? And they did it thru the physical movements and stunts performed by the human body.”

A lot of that physicality has been ingrained in Hargrave, and so when trying to come up with stunts, “a lot of it is real, it’s not like, ‘Oh we can do this in visual effects.’”

“How do we put Chris Hemsworth on a train rather than on a green screen…where he can feel the wind, feel the helicopter 20 feet away, and for the audience to experience that adrenaline rush. It’s more experiential and that’s the kind of style I’d like to experience as an audience,” he said.

With so many skilled action designers in the industry, Hargrave feels it’s impossible to “out-choreograph” them.

“But I might be able to photograph it in such a way that’s unique to my point of view. And then that just becomes the way Sam Hargrave does an action scene, rather than ‘Oh, it’s the greatest action scene ever.’ Ten other directors might do it 10 other ways. It’s my point of view, and hopefully audiences enjoy it.”