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Occasionally there is a movie where the plot, the direction, and the special-effects magic all fall by the wayside, and people have just one question: “What was it like working with the star?” It is one of our first questions.
“Well, he’s very demanding,” says the film’s director Dougal Wilson. Then, perhaps fearing retaliation, he corrects himself. “No, he’s very reasonable, very hardworking, and very professional.”
He is talking about Paddington Bear, the star of Paddington, Paddington 2, and, of course, the video of him drinking tea with Queen Elizabeth for her platinum jubilee. Wilson is directing Paddington’s next movie outing, Paddington in Peru.
Meeting the Brown Family (Again)
As well as the bear himself, across all three films the Paddington series has showcased a stellar cast, including Hugh Bonneville, Julie Walters, Madeleine Harris, Samuel Joslin, and Ben Whishaw (although we’ve not spotted his face in any of the films, so far). But Wilson himself is new to the series since its regular director, Paul King, was busy making Wonka.
In coming to Paddington, Wilson brought experience from another British institution—directing the John Lewis Christmas adverts that annually take British social media by storm.
“I like that they don’t ram the sentiment down your throat,” Wilson explains. “They also have a certain British quality and a certain understated humor—at least that’s what I was endeavoring to find—and the Paddington films have a lot of similarities.”
Wilson was not the only new addition to the film, with Sally Hawkins, who played Mary Brown for the first two films, opting not to return. This time the character is played by Emily Mortimer.
“Mrs. Brown is the emotional core of the Brown family,” Wilson points out. “She’s the one with the deepest emotional connection to Paddington. Emily seemed to have that similar demeanor and felt like she was connected emotionally to Paddington without having to express it verbally too much.”
One of the big debates during the film’s production was whether to reference the recasting in the story. “We debated whether we should acknowledge it but thought that it just drew attention to something we can’t do anything about. So we decided to just not say anything and, hopefully, if audiences enjoy the story, they’ll go with it,” Wilson says.
Taking Paddington Home
Paddington in Peru sees Paddington go back to his homeland to reunite with his Aunt Lucy, getting embroiled in a treasure hunt along the way.
“It was the decision of [Paddington and Paddington 2 director and writer] Paul King, Simon Farnaby, and Mark Burton [a screenwriter who provided additional material for Paddington 2], and they liked the idea of a circular feeling to the story, with Paddington returning to the origins established in the first film,” Wilson says. “We are continuing the themes of home and being an immigrant and coming back to where you are officially from and how you feel when you get there.”
To research the film, Wilson spent two months traveling around South America, looking at locations while the script was being developed. At the same time, the budget for the film was being planned out, and Wilson quickly realized that a bit of creativity would be necessary.
“We worked out we just couldn’t economically take the main unit and the actors to Peru,” Wilson recalls. “What we could do was take a second unit to Peru and shoot a lot of environments, especially because it would be easier to put [digital character] Paddington into those backdrops, but for the rest of the cast, it was more of a technical challenge.”
After precisely plotting out the story and shooting the necessary locations in South America, the human cast was shot on sets and exterior locations in the UK, carefully matched to the on-location footage by visual effects house Framestore.
“I think it’s in the tradition of British films shot in the UK like Powell and Pressburger’s Black Narcissus, which was shot on very art-directed stages in the UK, and then the Himalayas were put in using matte paintings afterward. It has this wonderful stylized feel. With our film, there wasn’t any other way of doing it budgetarily, so we embraced it stylistically.”
The second unit film crew took 360-degree cameras down rivers in Peru and Colombia, and those backdrops were used for the boat set in the UK, mounted on a big rig that was able to match the river’s real movements.
“We shot in Peru, but not with the actors,” Wilson says. He then adds: “But Paddington went to Peru. We took him there in his special trailer.”
Filming Paddington
But while Wilson is quick to sing the praises of his starring bear, the production also used some ingenious special effects to bring him back to the screen.
“We have various techniques for how Paddington is filmed and this was established in the first two films,” Wilson says. “We have a brilliant animation director, Pablo Grillo, who works for Framestore, and created Paddington for the first two films. We also had a brilliant actor who plays Paddington on set, Lauren Barrand, and she wears Paddington’s hat and coat and acts in the scenes as Paddington with the actors for the first couple of takes.”
As well as Barrand, the film also makes use of another performer to handle Paddington’s more physical stunts, Javier Marzan.
“He worked with us in prep as well to devise some of the physical scenes and slapstick scenes. For example, for the photobooth scene, we set up a little photobooth in our studio when we were in prep and would workshop it with Javier, Pablo, and myself, and we would come up with the small details. We had the gist of what was going to happen written and developed the scene with them,” Wilson says. “When we actually shot scenes like that or the chase scene with Antonio Banderas towards the end of act three, often Javier would be running around the set. Obviously, he’s a bit bigger than Paddington, so we’d stick a Paddington face onto him at waist height on both sides, and that would give us some indication as to where Paddington was.”
After the first few takes are complete, Paddington’s human substitute is taken out of the scene and the other actors have to use their imagination to picture where Paddington is. “It helps that the actors are great performers,” says Wilson. “For example, when Olivia Colman is talking to Paddington, she delivers the performance in a way that you really believe she’s speaking to someone.”
As it arrives in theaters, Paddington in Peru has a lot to live up to. After all, it is the sequel to a film that Nicolas Cage accepts as one of the greatest films ever made in The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent.
“I was approached with this opportunity [to direct] and I had mixed emotions,” Wilson admits. “My first feeling was that I was flattered, then it was overtaken by terror and anxiety and extreme apprehension because it was a very tall order to follow that second film and some would say only a fool would attempt it. But I thought, God, if I don’t try, then I definitely won’t succeed!”
But with a combination of special effects and great performances, Wilson and his cast and crew have brought Paddington in Peru to life.
“And sometimes Paddington is genuinely there,” Wilson adds. “When he comes out of the trailer, he’s great.”
Paddington in Peru opens in theaters Jan. 17, 2025.
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