Handheld cameras. Ground-level urgency. True stories reframed as thrillers. It’s the Paul Greengrass formula – and in “The Lost Bus,” the director applies it to California’s deadliest wildfire.
As the 2018 Camp Fire spreads, jumping canyons and roads as it engulfs the Butte County town of Paradise, the film follows two fronts of the wildfire: Battalion Chief Ray Martinez (Yul Vázquez) battling a blaze he can’t contain, and school bus driver Kevin McKay (Matthew McConaughey) racing to outrun the flames that threaten to consume him, teacher Mary Ludwig (America Ferrera) and the 22 children in their care.
The parallel storylines converge into a harrowing portrait of survival in Greengrass’s latest film that is part historical drama, part thriller.
The British screenwriter and director is well-known for the Jason Bourne action movie franchise, but Greengrass got his start making documentaries. He has an affinity for dramatizing real events – from “Bloody Sunday,” his 2002 retelling of the massacre of Irish protesters, to “United 93,” his intense 2006 imagining of the 9/11 passenger revolt against hijackers on the titular plane that crashed in a Pennsylvania field, and “Captain Phillips,” his 2013 sea piracy drama.
Filmmaker Paul Greengrass, center, during the filming of “The Lost Bus.” His goal was to make escaping the 2018 Camp Fire an immersive experience. (Melinda Sue Gordon/Associated Press)
So, when actor Jamie Lee Curtis and her producing partner Jason Blum brought him “Paradise: One Town’s Struggle to Survive an American Wildfire,” former Chronicle reporter Lizzie Johnson‘s account of the Camp Fire, it seemed like a natural fit. He knew about the fire but had never heard the story of the bus.
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“The Lost Bus” (R) opens in Bay Area theaters Friday, Sept. 26. Begins streaming on Apple+ on Friday, Oct. 3.
“I just thought, well, this is like ‘Stagecoach,’ the John Ford movie, or it’s like ‘Captain Phillips’ on the cargo ship. It’s got that simplicity about it, and then the contemporary thing of our world is burning,” Greengrass told the Chronicle at the Toronto International Film Festival where “The Lost Bus” made its world premiere earlier this month.
“It just was an instant decision (to make the film).”
Initially, the realism “The Lost Bus” achieves through a combination of practical pyrotechnics and digital wizardry was not what the director envisioned. But after seeing U2 perform at Sphere during the band’s Las Vegas residency, he said he “was absolutely amazed.”
“The Sphere has that huge wraparound screen, and when they want you to feel you’re in the desert, they build the desert in front of you on the screen,” he recalled.
A scene from Paul Greengrass’ “The Lost Bus,” based on a true story inspired former Chronicle reporter Lizzie Johnson’s account of the 2018 Camp Fire. (Apple TV+)
He planned to build that kind of virtual environment for “The Lost Bus,” but the documentarian within him rebelled. He needed the actors and the audience to experience something of the reality of Paradise on that day.
“I wanted to be out in a world – on a bus, really moving through a world – so you could feel it,” Greengrass said.
That’s when he decided to film on a “huge, deserted campus, just outside Santa Fe with many roads” for all the bus sequences.
Vázquez remembered visiting the bus set, where propane tanks were rigged into trees to shoot out real flames to surround the actors, heightening the intensity of each scene. In these moments, it was clear that along with Ferrera and the children, fire was McConaughey’s costar.
“It’s a natural instinct when working with fire to stay away from it and not get literally burned,” McConaughey said. “You feel the heat. When you’re over your mark, your body tells you, ‘Whoa, I’ve gotten too close.'”
The big payoff is in those terrifying scenes when fire rages around the bus and sometimes around Kevin when he steps outside to look for a safe exit.
“It was really well-choreographed,” McConaughey said, praising Greengrass’s ability to keep the cast safe. “There’s a lot of moving parts. All one person has to be is just a second early or a second late with their cue when you’re playing with fire, and it could create a real problem.”
America Ferrara, left, and Matthew McConaughey play a teacher and a schoolbus driver fleeing the 2018 Camp Fire in “The Lost Bus.” (Apple TV+)
“The Lost Bus” was McConaughey’s first experience with Greengrass, whose devotion to keeping things real extended beyond staging fiery stunts.
Sure, Greengrass unknowingly cast McConaughey’s teenage son, Levi, as Kevin’s angry son, Shaun, after Levi submitted an audition tape under an assumed name. But once the director realized the family connection, he leaned further in, recruiting 93-year-old Kay McCabe McConaughey to play the family matriarch. The result was a family drama rooted in actual family ties.
“Matthew’s mom stole the show – she was fantastic,” Greengrass said. “Some of those scenes together are absolutely tender and beautiful.”
Given the opportunity to see the finished product ahead of the world premiere, Vázquez walked out of a New York theater shaken.
“I had a level of anxiety that was off the rails,” he said. “It’s a horror film where the monsters are fire that you see.
“And what Paul did with the visuals – no pun intended, but it engulfs you. It’s huge.”
Pam Grady is a freelance writer.
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