When people talk about movies, the conversation usually starts and ends with the stars on the screen. Maybe a director or composer gets a nod, but the hundreds of people who make those magical moments possible? They’re often overlooked. And yet, without them, without the crew, there is no movie.
After spending more than 40 years in the film industry as a key grip, grip, dolly grip, gaffer, electrician, and more, I’ve seen firsthand how much heart, sweat, and talent goes into the making of a film. That’s why I wrote Let’s Roll Some Film—to give credit to the people who rarely get
the spotlight, even though they’re the ones holding it.
The film crew is the glue that holds the production together. We’re the first ones in and the last to leave. We build sets, light scenes, rig equipment, move cameras, manage props, and troubleshoot problems no one saw coming. And we do it all in 12 to 16-hour days, five to six days a week,
sometimes for months on end.
Take the shoot for Shoot the Moon in Marin County. We built an entire house from six trucked-in sections, reconstructed a wine barrel to hold water, and worked through relentless rain. One of our guys spent a full day clearing poison oak from the set—only to end up in the hospital, covered head to toe in rashes. That’s not in the script, but it’s the reality of film work.
Or look at the imploding house scene in Poltergeist. No CGI. Just hours of rigging, cabling, building a scale model, lining up fans and vacuums, and rolling high-speed cameras while praying nothing jammed. That’s not just labor. That’s craftsmanship.
At ILM, we weren’t just crew—we were inventors. When we needed to show 25 objects floating around a child’s room for Poltergeist, we filmed each one separately and layered them together.
When a book needed to fly and flap its pages, we built a rig from scratch using wires and
hand-squeezed triggers. That was the kind of hands-on magic we created before computers took over.
Working on Return of the Jedi, we created the speeder bike sequences by filming at just 2–4
frames per second in the redwoods, then playing it back at 24 fps to make the bikes fly. It took
days of building ramps and walkways deep in the forest just so a Steadicam operator could walk the path smoothly.
And then there were the truly wild days—like when we worked in a warehouse filled with 25,000 live cockroaches for Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Or when our crew pushed hundreds of pounds of gear a half-mile through mud to shoot Ewoks: Battle for Endor. Or the time a trolley pole sent one of our grips flying during a late-night shoot for Howard the Duck.
Still, through it all, we showed up. We worked through heat, cold, injuries, exhaustion, and frustration—not for fame, but for pride in the work. We knew that what we were building would become part of something bigger than ourselves.
So the next time you watch a movie and marvel at the scene, take a moment to think about the
people who made it possible. The ones who set the stage, lit the shot, held the boom mic, ran the cables, reset the props, and wiped down the floor between takes.
Those are hidden heroes of the motion picture business. And yes, they deserve a standing ovation.
Want to hear more untold stories from behind the scenes? Grab your copy of Let’s Roll Some Film at davidchildersbooks.com and step into the world of the real movie makers.