Peter Berg stands to the side, whittling down a toothpick between his teeth. He squints his eyes menacingly, sizing up a group of interlopers on the set of his latest action opus Mile 22 – damn film journalists (*myself included*).

A couple of the journalists let out a light-hearted chuckle, smiling, nodding to Berg. But he doesn’t smile back; just stands there, judging, contemplating… After a moment, he points to two of the intruders and motions for them to follow. The chosen look at one another uneasily. Berg stops and turns back slightly annoyed by the delay. He motions again for them to follow. He still has yet to say a word.

At this point, I’m unsure if I should be grateful or disappointed at not being picked. I mean—it’s not out of the realm of possibility that Peter Berg is about to sacrifice these two poor saps to appease the ‘Film Godz’ for a plentiful day of takes and coverage. To play it safe—I follow the sacrificial lambs a couple paces behind.

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Image via STX Films

Berg leads us through a roadway of fake rubble and debris to a crashed car, its front side bent in. A film crew stands around the vehicle, awaiting direction on what shot to film next (or perhaps to surround us—so there’s no escape). Berg smiles at his AD devilishly, “I think I found two new stunt guys.” He points to the sheepish journos he picked earlier, then leads the duo through their ‘big break’. They, armed, will attempt to take out martial-arts star Iko Uwais (The Raid), cuffed in the backseat of the aforementioned car. Needless to say – this doesn’t end well for them.  Journalist-turned-Stunt-Guy #1 approaches Iko directly. Big mistake. When he’s within arm’s reach, Iko grabs him, turns him around and fake strangles him with a seatbelt. Meanwhile Journalist-turned-Stunt-Guy #2 approaches from the side. Another big mistake. Iko releases the limp body of #1, grabs #2, and flings him through a car window (the glass to be added later in post). Watching from the sides, Berg struggles not to smile. We’ve hardly been on set for fifteen minutes—and he’s already ‘killed’ two members of the press. After the take finishes, the two Journos get back up, no worse for the wear. Berg looks them up and down… “Let’s take it again.”

Peter Berg’s last three films (Lone Survivor, Patriot’s Day & Deepwater Horizon) have all blended action adventure spectacle within true-to-life dramas. Mile 22, however, seems to be a change of pace for the filmmaker – eschewing the real life heft of those previous features and going all in on some good ol’ natured fun. In the film, Mark Wahlberg (in his fourth collaboration with Berg) stars as James Silva, the leader of a top-secret tactical team, assigned with transferring a police officer (Uwais) twenty-two miles out of hostile territory. Of course, things don’t go according to plan – various factions attempt to stop the team and kill the officer at whatever cost necessary. Gunfights, car crashes and sky-high explosions ensue – as they’re wont to in a Mark Wahlberg-Peter Berg film.

Today’s day forty (out of forty-three) on the film shoot. For the first two weeks, the production shot in Atlanta, before moving overseas to Bogota, Columbia for the remainder of filming. Bogota’s perhaps most notorious for its high crime and murder rates – a city marked by a 50-year civil war and the resulting violence therein. In 2016, however, a peace deal was struck between the Columbian government and the FARC rebels (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia), ushering peace and stability into the country. As a result, the crime and murder rate has steadily dropped in subsequent years. Now to further clear its image to the rest of the world, Bogota’s opened its doors to Hollywood, allowing productions (like the tv series Narcos) a cheap and (most importantly) safe, exotic location to film. “Shooting in Bogota… it's like shooting in Washington, D.C,” producer Stuart Besser adds, “We're in the middle of a major city, with all government buildings. We shot at the president's palace. We shot at the mayor's office. We closed down the middle of the city. And the whole thing has worked out really well. They've been really supportive, and the community has been great…”

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Image via STX Films

On set, Berg moves on to the next set-up, now working with the actual stunt team for the car assault sequence. On the sidelines, Journalists-turned-Stunt-Guys #1 & #2 pick up their recorders and notebooks, returning once again to their given profession (Hollywood’s a tough business).

It’s thrilling to watch Berg run between setups, effortlessly lining up each Camera Operator (three in total), so they’re capturing what he wants in the scene. Three cameras --not including a drone overhead-- going at once may seem chaotic, but Berg somehow makes it feel effortless. He never looses his cool and never once shows any indecision or worry.  As costar Lauren Cohan (The Walking Dead) puts it: “There’s a calm in the chaos.”

“I was doing a Funny or Die episode with Kevin Bacon when I got [the Mile 22 role],” Cohan confides, “[Kevin] was like, ‘Pete Berg. No marks Pete.’ Everybody was like, ‘You won't get marks and you won't get preparation.’…But the most fun part is Pete will be like, ‘Okay, so what do you think if we do this? Just roll! Action’… I remember hearing a story about when [Pete] did Friday Night Lights, and they'd have the actors and the football players coming off the bus, to go to set, and there would be cameras just there in their faces to capture everything before anybody was ready to act. That's the most refreshing part, is that it's just capturing the action and interaction. It doesn't even feel like acting.”

Late in the shooting day, Berg gathers the press around him for an impromptu interview. With a sly twinkle in his eye, he then proceeds to give only one sentence answers (if lucky) to whatever question’s asked.  My favorite exchange—

Q1: How did the script change after Mark Wahlberg got involved?

Berg: More commas.

Q1: Does Mark like commas?

Berg: …Everybody likes commas.

I’m pretty sure after the ‘interview’, Berg (not so) secretly wants to throw the press through a car window and strangle us all with a seatbelt. But my hypothesis is challenged towards the end of shooting. In the final shot of the day, the tactical team’s car gets blown up—and I mean BLOWN UP, as in a plume of black smoke rises so high, you can see it ten/twenty miles away, as in debris and rubble flies so far, the crew needs to stand a good fifty feet away for safety. I remark to the Publicist that I’ve never seen such a big explosion on set before.  He chuckles— Yeah, this wasn’t planned for the day. The car explosion wasn’t even in the script, instead added at the last minute in a classic Peter Berg ad lib. The Publicist looks at us, the press, marveling at the huge explosion—“I think Pete just wants to impress you.”

Mile 22 explodes into theaters August 3rd.

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Image via STX Films