On February 12, a new IMAX movie that celebrates America’s national parks premieres in select theaters. Sierra Club’s Orli Cotel spoke with producer Shaun Macgillivray about the upcoming 100th anniversary of the National Park Service and what it was like to film in such iconic locations around the country. The following Q&A is adapted from their recorded interview. 

Tell us about how you came to this project and how you decided which parks to feature in the film.

My dad started making surf films back in the late 1960s and early 70s. They did well, so he got to go to Hollywood and work with the likes of Stanley Kubrick. Then he got tapped by the Smithsonian to make its first IMAX film, To Fly!  That was back in 1976. Since then, our company, Macgillivray Freeman, has made over 38 IMAX films, but we’ve always wanted to make a film about the national parks. We’re so lucky and excited that we were able to do it for the celebration of the 100th anniversary of the National Park Service, which is a big deal.

There are just over 400 national park sites; obviously we couldn’t go to each one of them in a 40-minute film. But we knew we wanted to capture some iconic parks, like Yellowstone, Yosemite, Everglades, and the Grand Canyon, and also some hidden gems, like Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore up on Lake Superior.

What was your goal as producer of the film? What were you trying to accomplish?

Our biggest goal was to immerse people in these incredible places and inspire them to not only care about these parks, but also want to protect them for the next generation. The way we live now, we spend so much of our day stuck in an office or in big cities. You really need to experience these places for yourself in order to realize how important they are and how much they do for our soul. One of the great things about these types of films is that you feel like you’re being taken somewhere. You’re immersed in an interesting new environment. I think that can change behavior and inspire people to actually go outside and experience this for themselves.

Who is the target audience for the film, and how many people are you hoping to reach with it?

These are giant-screen films that play in museums and science centers around the world, so you’re looking at a diverse audience—the 4-year-old up to the 94-year-old. Twenty-five percent of our audience is usually on a school field trip—fifth, sixth, and seventh graders. And a lot of families. We also get a more affluent crowd, people who love to travel. So it’s an interesting mix, but one that I think is important.

What was it like to work with Robert Redford as the narrator for the film?

We were very excited to have Robert Redford as a narrator. He is obviously a fantastic fit; he is so passionate about the environment and truly what people think of as a kind of Americana brand. When he said yes, we were jumping for joy. We are recording him this month, and so it’s going to be a real treat to be able to meet him and get to hear his voice cut to the film.

When is the film opening, and where will people be able to see it?

It comes out on February 12 and will be playing in just over 50 theaters in the United States and in more around the world. It will be in or near almost every major city in the States. On the West Coast, it will be showing at the Pacific Science Center in Seattle, the California Science Center in Los Angeles, and the Tech Museum of Innovation in San Jose. We’ve got some fantastic establishments where it will play for six months to a year.

What were some of your favorite scenes to film and produce?

Oh man, that’s a tough question. There are just so many great national parks. Yellowstone, obviously, was incredible—seeing the geysers. Yosemite is special for me because it was the first national park that I went to with my family. But I love the lesser-known parks, too. I had no idea that Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore even existed, or that you could go on a frozen Lake Superior and see ice caves that look like they’re on Mars; the icy waterfalls there are some of the best in the world for climbing.

Tell us about the 3-D effects in the film. Is it more difficult to shoot a movie that has some 3-D in it?

Yes, it is, and it’s even more difficult to shoot a movie for a giant screen. We shot the majority of the film in 15-perf 70-millimeter film, which is 10 times larger than 35-millimeter. You get three minutes per load, and then you have to reload. When you’re shooting with this big 300-pound IMAX 3-D camera, it costs $2,000 per minute. So when you press Record, you want to make sure you’re recording what you want to record. And you’re lugging about 5 to 10 thousand pounds of equipment around to facilitate the production. It’s a major logistical effort. We also shot with five different crews—an aerial crew, two ground crews, and two time-lapse crews. We were able to work with the National Park Service to get shots of stuff that nobody’s even seen before. It was exciting, it was tough, but in the end I think it looks amazing.

I’ve heard that you worked with actors who played John Muir and Teddy Roosevelt. What was that like?

One of my favorite scenes in the film is a re-creation of what has got to be the most famous camping trip of all time, when John Muir and Teddy Roosevelt camped together in Yosemite for three days and laid the groundwork for what would become the National Park Service. We found two actors that really embodied John Muir and Teddy Roosevelt. In fact, they never went out of character. They were Teddy and John. They were so good at their craft that it felt real. That’s one of the highlights of the movie for me. It gives the film a spiritual feeling, and it showcases how monumental it is that we’ve been able to protect these places for the past 100 years, and hopefully for eternity.

What’s your hope for how people will respond to the film?

I hope people come out of the theater with a new appreciation for how incredible the national parks are and how we have to continue to fight the good fight to protect them.

To see National Parks Adventure, search for dates and locations near you.