5 Movies That Would Have Benefited From Drones

The first ever New York City Drone Film Festival is rapidly approaching. Tickets are sold out but there is talk of a second day of screening so it’s not too late to try and nab a spot. The festival will be showing a bunch of short films shot with drones that aim to showcase precisely why aerial cinematography is so groundbreaking. If you can’t make the festival, you can check out some of the work Hollywood has done with drones right here.

Discussing this around the office lead to a conversation about old movies that would have benefitted from UAV technology so we figured we would share what we came up with.

To be clear, Dronelife is not saying these movies should be remade, we are simply saying using a drone on set would have enhanced the experience.

1) Jaws

Jaws is famous for both taking beach town tourism down a notch and for the most uncooperative machine in movie making history. The mechanical shark (dubbed Bruce, after Spielberg’s lawyer) sank, fell apart, and required more maintenance than Lindsey Lohan’s career. The shark was literally dead in the water and that is why Bruce is only on screen for a total of 4 minutes.

This is where the drone comes in. Not only could we get the sweeping aerial views of the beaches of Amity Island, but through some camera trickery, it wouldn’t be that difficult to make a stationary shark look like it’s swimming.

2) Jurassic Park

In audience’s first trip to Isla Nublar, we got some helicopter shots of the island itself but that was pretty much it. Drones would make it really easy to capture the sweeping vistas and dinosaurs could just be added in post production. It would have given audiences a better idea about the scope of the park and contextualized the characters’ movements (i.e. how did the T-Rex manage to show up at the welcome center at the exact right moment to save Dr. Grant and co. from the raptors).

The good news is it’s not too late to send drones to the park. Jurassic world comes out this summer and there are opportunities abound. Drones could also be used to show a pterodactyl’s point of view which would make this scene pretty awesome:

Better yet, put out a virtual tour of the park as seen by a drone as part of the marketing campaign… the drone flies through the iconic doors, tours the indoor exhibits and facilities but also has the ability to fly over the aforementioned vistas and into the physical enclosements of the island’s more ferocious attractions… actually, you know what Universal? Just give us that. Scrap Jurassic World and give us a virtual tour of the park via drone. In IMAX.

3) Waterworld

I understand drones are expensive and that buying more equipment would have put Mr. Costner’s infamous flop even further under water, but wouldn’t it have been better to use aerial shots of the catamarans and floating pirate fortresses on the actual ocean instead of the sub-par green screen we got? Also, there could have been twice as many high speed jet skit chases.

And speaking of outrageous stunts in bad movies…

4) On Her Majesty’s Secret Service

As Skyfall and November Man proved, drones are right at home accompanying James Bond to a movie set. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service is widely recognized as the worst Bond movie by many fans and simply ignored by many more so any influx of technology would be a welcome one in that train wreck.

5) Ben Hur

Just for the chariot race scene. If every chariot in the circus maximus had a ‘follow me’ drone flying overhead, we could have had third person shots of every participant in the race. Granted, the movie would have ended up being even longer, but if audiences can watch nine guys walk around New Zealand for 17 hours, I think a bird’s eye view of one of the most iconic action sequences in history would be well worth the extra time.

What other movies would have benefitted from UAV technology? Let us know in the comments.