'Peter Pan' kids have world on a wire

Some young stars of the movie were apprehensive at first about "flying" on the end of a cable, but eventually, most found it exhilarating. Universal Pictures

By Claudia Puig
USA Today

Who hasn't wanted to fly? The young cast of "Peter Pan" had that universal wish fulfilled — with the help of wires, harnesses and computer animation.

Granted, they were not out in the open sky. The crew shot on eight stages in Queensland, Australia, and the soaring took place about 40 feet above ground in one of them.

"It was a dream come true," says Jeremy Sumpter, 14, who plays the boy who won't grow up in the latest version of the J.M. Barrie classic. "There's probably not a single person on Earth who doesn't want to fly, unless they're scared of heights. Even then, they still might want to fly, just not too high."

Many days were spent tracking the airborne movements of Peter and Wendy.

"Going into this picture, we knew that flying would initially be a really tough issue," says Scott Farrar, visual effects supervisor. "We had to approach it with a sense of artistry and choreography. We knew we had to use harnesses and wire work and belly boards and scissor lifts to accomplish it."

Rachel Hurd-Wood, 13, who plays Wendy, went from jitters to elation as she grew used to zipping around above ground.

"I got up really high, and at first I was really nervous," Rachel says. "Then, bouncing around on the clouds was probably my favorite scene to film."

There were some physical challenges in swinging on harnesses.

"It was painful sometimes," Jeremy says. "Just getting used to the harness is tough. It bites and pinches you, and you go home with bruises on your legs. After all that, though, you get used to it, and flying is like the greatest thing in the world."

The technical process was complex. The kids might be lifted on a big arm mounted on a track, which enabled a quick rise and fall as well as a rotational sweep.

"We wanted the shots to dovetail into another, so the flourish of movement and pattern of flight would feed into the next like the gears of a fine Swiss watch," Farrar says. To simulate a rolling or pitching motion, wires would be attached to wrists or ankles to maneuver the kids. ("They're actors, not gymnasts," Farrar says.)

But Jeremy had a little of the gymnast in him. And a daredevil's instinct. "I did all my own stunts except one," he says. "They'd shoot me straight up to the top of the stage and straight down. They were yanking me everywhere. It was fantastic."

When the hydraulics failed to achieve the desired effect, filmmakers would turn to computer animation.

"You can only get so much good work out of wires until there's a move you can't accomplish," Farrar says. "For instance, we might erase the body and keep the head. With Tinkerbell, they would lose her lower torso and with animation replace her feet and put in flutter kicks to make her more pixie-like."

Ideally the animation and the real thing are so seamless that even the actors won't be able to tell when a leg or torso was replaced.

"It's quite common that the actors don't know which bits and pieces we end up using," Farrar says. "Everything is heavily manufactured. Jeremy might have a memory of swooping around the stage, but whether that ended up in the movie is hard to say."