Man About Town

Man About Town Starring Ben Affleck. Produced by Jack Binder. Distributed by Lionsgate Films.

A top Hollywood talent agent (Ben Affleck) finds his cushy existence threatened when he discovers that his wife is cheating on him, and as well, that his journal has been swiped by a reporter out to bring him down.

The Cast

The cast includes Ben Affleck, Rebecca Romijn, John Cleese, Jerry O’Connell, Kal Penn, Adam Goldberg, Amber Valletta, Gina Gershon, Bai Ling, Damien Dante Wayans, Sam Ball, Howard Hesseman and Mike Binder.

Distributor

Lionsgate Films distributed the film which was produced in Vancouver, Canada and Los Angeles, CA .

Producer & Director

Produced by Jack Binder (also DGA UPM, Second Unit Director)
Written and directed by Mike Binder

IMDB

View the Official Trailer featuring Ben Affleck & John Cleese.

Production Notes

Filmed in Vancouver, British Columbia Canada at Lionsgate Studios. The film was shot on soundstages and in the streets of downtown Vancouver.

Studio versus Location

Many practical locations were used as well. This included Chinatown, which was a grueling endeavor to shut down the busy shopping zone during daylight. Working with the Chinese community and the local authorities (and a very hard working Location Manager) we were able to secure the location for three days shooting.

A giant office set was built by the construction crew on the soundstages at Lionsgate Studios Vancouver. The office set consisted of many rooms, a large conference room and grand central office space.

Key Production Features

Translights and backings were shot of Los Angeles to be included as backings for the window shots giving a realistic feeling of being in Century City, Los Angeles, the heart of the Hollywood entertainment business.

A complex VFX sequence was overseen by Producer Jack Binder with Rainmaker VFX. The most challenging shot was a pull out from outside the window of Ben Affleck’s character’s (Jack) office to turn and zoom down Olympic Boulevard. The fast moving, flying shot careens toward downtown Los Angeles and find Jack’s Mercedes.

The camera finds the car and dives into the sunroof, finding Affleck and swiveling down into a side raking profile shot of Jack driving.

Airplane photography was utilized to map the route of the camera motion. The sunroof shot was achieved with a snorkel cam on the soundstage with greenscreen for the passing storefronts, which Jack Binder filmed with handheld shots in a convertible automobile.