For a few days, a portion of downtown Oklahoma City has been transformed into 1950s Texas for the filming of an independent movie.
Casey Affleck donned a light-colored cowboy hat and a dark blue suit Saturday as he walked past an old bank building that was serving as a Fort Worth train station for the filming of "The Killer Inside Me." Signs directing pedestrians to the trains were posted on the side of the First National Building and a Texas flag flew overhead.
"It's the first chance we've had to give some real scale to the movie. It's the first time we've shot on streets this size with all of the extras," producer Andrew Eaton said.
Affleck went through one take after another during an hour-long session when reporters were allowed to watch, walking down the street with a group of extras and turning a corner before heading into the building near a pair of flagpoles.
He was also filmed walking back out of the building and crossing a street, as dozens of cars from the era drove by.
The filming, which is about halfway through a five-week stretch in Oklahoma, is the fruitful finish both for producers, who've been struggling to get the movie off the ground, and for the Oklahoma Film and Music Office, in its efforts to secure a significant motion picture to be shot in the state.
The film that also stars Kate Hudson and Jessica Alba is considered the biggest movie to be shot in Oklahoma since "Twister" in 1996.
"We started trying to prep this film when the credit crunch just happened. That was last October, and we lost the financing twice," Eaton said. "We were supposed to start shooting in January and here we are in June still shooting the movie.
"It's been a pretty rocky ride to get to this point. It's the hardest film experience I've ever had to get to this point."
Even the time in Oklahoma has had its bumps. Affleck, who plays the main character, pulled a muscle in his back while lifting Alba and filming had to be stopped for four days, Eaton said. That occurred at about the same time that Alba ran into trouble for allegedly hanging up posters about great white sharks and became the subject of a police investigation.
"It wasn't a distraction at all because as it turned out, it happened just before just before she started working with us and then Casey did his back and so then Jessica had to leave town anyway because we couldn't shoot with her until the very end," Eaton said.
"I think it was really quite fortuitous that she wasn't in town when that story broke."
All in all, though, producers said they've been pleased with Oklahoma as a site for the movie — which is actually set in west Texas.
"Obviously, we all know that you guys have a fabulous film subsidy and that's very important to us," producer Brad Schlei said. "Really, we went to Texas, we went to New Mexico, we went location scouting all over the place and (director Michael Winterbottom) really loved it here.
"It has everything we need."
Schlei said he had even begun considering bringing two other film projects to Oklahoma: one based on the A.M. Homes book "Music for Torching" and another based on the Iceberg Slim book "Mama Black Widow."
"It's a real American town and the people make you feel that way, too," Schlei said. "They make you feel wanted and accepted."
Eaton said filming would move to Cordell this week to shoot scenes at a courthouse on the town square, then head to Tulsa for scenes at a refinery and an office building serving as a hotel. After that, more filming is planned in Oklahoma City before wrapping up around July 1 with scenes to be shot at the town square in Enid.
"The great things about these towns is they've got squares that haven't changed that much since the '50s," Eaton said.
Jill Simpson, the director of the state film and music office, said she hopes word of mouth draws other directors to Oklahoma. The state recently increased its incentive package for filmmakers, attracting the creators of the movie "You Can't Win" to film in Guthrie — where "The Killer Inside Me" began filming.
Schlei said the only issue with Oklahoma has been the need to bring in some crew members from out of state when more experienced workers were needed.
That problem can be fixed as more films are made in Oklahoma, Simpson said.
"It's always been a catch-22. You need the work to train the crew base. You need the crew base to attract the films," Simpson said. "It's two things that you're simultaneously trying to develop."
Eaton said Oklahoma's attractive incentives could steer some filmmakers away from neighboring New Mexico.
"The bottom line is, unfortunately, it's usually about money. I think if the incentives are high enough that people will come here," Eaton said. "My understanding is that the incentives increased again to an even higher level, and I know from the phone calls that I've been getting the last few weeks that people are starting to pick up on that.
"I think that will definitely bring more movies."
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
