Flathead High alumnus turns aging actors into powerful prizefighters

Like many other dads around the country, Bruce Jones took his family to the movies on Christmas Day.

Missing from his family’s trip to the theater, however, was a debate about what film they should watch. They drove in from Bigfork to see a specific film, “Grudge Match,” for a specific reason: Jones helped make it.

“Everybody liked it, actually,” Jones said in a Dec. 26 interview.

“My daughter liked it. She’s 14, so it hits that demographic,” Jones added. “My mom liked it, and she’s 75, so it hits her demographic. Those of us in our 30s, 40s and 50s, all of us liked it. ...

“It’s humorous, but it’s a drama still. We felt it was the perfect family movie.”

Jones, a 1975 Flathead High School graduate, has worked in film and television since even before he graduated from the University of California, Santa Barbara. His credits include three Star Trek series (“The Next Generation,” “Deep Space 9” and “Voyager”). He has also worked on a number of movies, including “Drag Me to Hell,” “The Italian Job” and “The Green Hornet.”

In 2009, Jones was putting together graphics presentations for Michael Jackson’s “This is It” tour. The tour never happened; Jackson died less than two weeks before it was scheduled to begin. But Jones’ work is featured in the documentary film named after the tour.

His jobs these days often include visual effects and directing, both of which he did for “Grudge Match.”

The movie is a story of second chances. In their prime, Billy “The Kid” McDonnen (Robert De Niro) and Henry “Razor” Sharp (Sylvester Stallone) each scored a victory against the other. Then, on the eve of their third, decisive match, Razor announced his retirement.

Thirty years later, the boxers get an unexpected opportunity to find out which of them is the best, when a promoter offers to get them back in the ring to settle the score once and for all.

As the movie’s second unit director, Jones was in charge of directing action sequences. In this case, that meant putting together the big fight between the two boxers.

To do that, Jones and a crew filmed at an actual event — a mixed martial arts fight in Las Vegas in front of a crowd of about 30,000 people. De Niro and Stallone doubles walked through the crowd in spotlights, and the filming was timed perfectly between actual bouts, Jones said.

People in the crowd were “semi-aware” a movie crew was there, Jones added. The crew put up signs to let the audience know if they entered the arena, they could end up on camera.

“That gives the film a little more scope, having a large event,” Jones said. “It looks just like we’ve got [the actors] in a giant arena.”

The fight itself was shot on set, but the scene “all played out like we were in a giant venue,” he said.

It wasn’t the only large venue featured in the movie. A second scene — a monster truck rally — was filmed at a Saints game in front of a crowd of 50,000 at the Superdome in New Orleans.

In addition to directing action sequences, Jones was the film’s visual effects supervisor. When filming wrapped up, Jones’ work had just begun. He spent the next several months making aging actors look like young fighters.

“We took a 70-year-old [De Niro] and a 67-year-old [Stallone] and in the opening few minutes had boxing matches designed to look like period pieces,” Jones said. “We made [computer-generated] heads and put them on the young bodies of actors. ...

“It was all designed by us and digitally manipulated to make it look like they were in their 30s instead of their late 60s.”

That work took about six months. Editing took about two more months, and visual effects took another few months, Jones said.

He’ll use those skills on his next movie, “Horrible Bosses 2,” the sequel to the hit movie starring Jason Bateman, Jennifer Aniston, Jason Sudeikis and Kevin Spacey. Those actors are back, Jones said, along with a new evil boss, Christoph Waltz, and his evil son, Chris Pine.

“They’re really talented guys,” Jones said. “They bring a whole new level of craftsmanship to the show.”

Filming should wrap up by the end of the month, and then Jones will get to work on the movie’s special effects.

Jones said he was pleased with how the effects for “Grudge Match” turned out. Overall, “it’s a cute film,” he said. “We’re pleased.”

It’s a light-hearted film intended to entertain, Jones said.

“It’s not ‘American Hustle,’ but it’s not trying to be,” he said. “It’s not taking itself too seriously.”