Well, it certainly has been an adventure! From that first image of Christopher Nolan, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Ken Watanabe that surprised us with some early filming in Japan to the final leg of the film’s production at the Arctic Fortress, closely following the production of Inception has been one heck of a journey.
Starting out in Japan in mid-June, we found out that this was only one of six countries this film was scheduled to shoot in. We didn’t know what else to feel but excitement. Even though the June filming was a bit early, on July 24th, Warner Bros. announced that principal photography had begun and filming was already under way in London. On August 17th, the first real production images started to come in from Paris. This was getting so exciting way too quickly. On August 25th, one of our readers who lives in Morocco informed us that the Inception crew were in city of Tangier. According to a local shop owner, the filming location was being set up to look like Kenya.
After hitting Asia, Europe, and Africa, on September 3rd, the Inception crew made it to every film’s favorite city, Los Angeles, California to kick the film’s production into overdrive. For the first couple of weeks, they were filming inside of a closed shoe factory. Later in the month of September, they brought the action to the streets and with some supernatural rain, a train, and a few automobile accidents. Oh! And who could forget about those strange license plates? As images from the LA production continued to roll in, we were able to catch a glimpse of one single day of filming on the beaches of Malibu.
On November 26th, we got word that Inception’s production team had packed their bags and heading north to complete their production in the Canadian Rockies. They began shooting at a snow fortess in Kananaskis, Canada and later that week, moved on to the Fernie Alpine Resort to create some avalanches. What a fitting ending.
Overall, Inception’s production spanned four continents and six countries. Following this film’s production from start to finish, we’ve written a total of seven production update articles and have posted 397 production images. We hope you’ve enjoyed our articles and we’re looking forward for more to come. Thanks for reading.
Production Updates:
Production Update #1: Global Production Commences
Production Update #2: Inception Filming in Tangier
Production Update #3: Coming to America
Production Update #4: Rain, Trains and Automobiles
Production Update #5: Suits and Leather
Production Update #6: Storming the Beaches
Production Update #7: That’s a Wrap!
Also! Be sure to check out The Nolan Fans Podcast’s 10th Episode were Teddy and I discuss this production update.
UPDATE: The last day of shooting was November 22, 2009.
