The A-Team

Joe Carnahan’s 2010 film comes from the NBC series Frank Lupo and Stephen J. Cannell launched in 1983. It sat in development from the mid 1990s, passed through John Singleton, and reached Carnahan in 2008; he wrote it with Brian Bloom, who also plays the villain Pike. The series’ Vietnam veterans become soldiers in the last days of the Iraq withdrawal. The structure rests on one habit: Hannibal says the plan aloud first, then the scene shows which part breaks, so the tension is which piece fails, not what happens. The tank dropped from a cargo plane is its peak. Rhythm & Hues built the clouds in Houdini, generating a fresh HDRI per frame so the light shifted as the plane moved through; parachute bullet holes were marked, then opened procedurally by wind; close shots used a flight simulator gimbal driven by a one to one maquette. All of it was shot in Canada: Kamloops, Vancouver, Cache Creek, Ashcroft. After the credits Dirk Benedict, the series’ Face, appears in the tanning salon beside Bradley Cooper, and its Murdock, Dwight Schultz, plays the doctor examining Sharlto Copley. A good fit if you want Hannibal to name the plan before it runs, then watch the scene find its weak joint. Not for anyone needing a physical reason for the tank to fly.