Based on the true story of the Boston Marathon bombing in 2013. Boston police and the FBI do everything they can to find the people responsible.
Blaine: “Patriots Day” is one of those movies you get so sucked into because of how real and powerful it feels. The police and the FBI didn't stop until they found the brothers, Dzhokhar and Tsarnaev. You’re rooting for them to find those boys and make sure they don’t get away with it. A lot people would ask why anyone would make a movie based on something so dramatic as the events that happened during the Marathon Run in 2013, including Mark Wahlberg. But then Mark thought about making something that represented how strong Boston is. Mark is from Boston and he wanted to show something very supportive of his home. He also wanted to do it before someone else did and make sure it would be done perfectly. It had to show the strength of Boston, of what the Police Department and everyone else did to find the two people responsible for the bombings.
Mark wanted Peter Berg to direct it after working with him on “Lone Survivor” and “Deepwater Horizon” and he knew a project like this was right for Peter. Peter Berg felt an event like the Patriots Day marathon bombing was disturbing, haunting and powerful. But showing that Boston stayed strong and went through a lot to catch those boys made him want to make a movie. Peter wanted to shoot the movie in the real locations in Boston and Mark Fitzgerald, the location manager, went to see if they could shoot the film in those real locations. Peter and a few others went around seeing what areas were available to shoot and which ones weren’t. It took a lot of meetings and a lot of work to make the city of Boston understand that they are respecting the city with this movie. They respect the police, the paramedics and the fire fighters for everything they did by helping injured people during the Boston Marathon bombing in 2013.
The Watertown Street where the shootout happened lasted 13 minutes in real life, but it would take six nights to shoot the scene. They had a feeling that they wouldn’t be able to get Watertown if they were going to be there for 6 days so they built their own Watertown which took 6 weeks. They took pictures of the real Watertown in order to make sure their set matched every look and detail as the real one. Of course there were some houses in Watertown that they got to shoot at like Sergeant Jeffrey Pugliese’s house and the Watertown Police Department.
Boston was nice enough to allow them to shoot the race at Boylston Street, but they had to wait a week before shooting because it’s a busy active street in the middle of the city. They only had one day to shoot the race and it was an intense and very emotional day to shoot it. Peter Berg let everyone know on set what this project meant to him, what it represents to the people of Boston and that he wasn’t going to let them down. They only shot the race. The fake bombing explosion they had to shoot somewhere else because it would have been too much to recreate the disaster that happened in Boylston Street. They found an old air force base that was 1,000 feet long. They rebuilt parts of Boylston Street there and like the Watertown set they made sure they got every detail.
A lot of the police in the background are real because Peter wanted that. Even though they are extras in the background still he wanted real police to play them. A lot of them were part of the manhunt in 2013. They would show up on set wearing their police uniforms. A lot of people from Boston were very supportive for this film because it shows that Boston is strong. People would show up to the set from their day jobs to be a part of the project and relive the marathon. The actors spent a lot of time with the people who were around that crisis and they became a huge part of “Patriots Day”.
My rating on “Patriots Day” is five out of five stars
