Back in May I had a post about the visit to Albany by the film crew for the Angelina Jolie movie Salt. Apparently Albany is a prime place these days for shooting chase scenes, because now we have a crew in town to shoot scenes for the Will Ferrel/Mark Wahlberg movie The Other Guys. While the movie is a buddy cop flick set in New York City, apparently some of Albany’s streets can serve as stand-ins in a pinch.

This movie’s different from Salt in that there’s much more shooting and crashing of cars – and buses – involved. (The only crashing I saw on the Salt set was when the driver of an SUV absentmindedly backed into a guardrail after a take.) On the first day of shooting for The Other Guys, a parking lot next to my building was filled with shiny multiple copies of different cars and SUVs, as well as a healthy supply of NYC yellow cabs and NYPD squad cars. As time goes on, the lot seems to be gradually morphing into a junkyard, with a growing variety of banged up cars and buses.

Various prop vehicles, including a tour bus that's been speared by a Chevy Malibu

Today’s shooting was right outside my office windows, so the day was occasionally punctuated by the sounds of squealing tires and the curiously roaring engine of a Toyota Prius. (I have NEVER heard a Prius sound like this one…and what’s with having a Prius in a chase scene?) Intentionally of not, it appeared the Prius made it through the day unscathed, even if it came close at times to either spinning into a curb or sideswiping some other car or truck. But that’s OK – they have three more identical red Priuses, all with primer gray right rear doors. Something tells me bad things are going to happen to at least a couple of those cars…

Lots of people gathered around the star Prius, getting it ready for the day's shooting. Note the suited dummy in the background - it's probably not going to be a good day for him either.

Much of what I said back in May still holds true – the altered reality of a Hollywood production tends to alter your perspective on everyday sights. It also can raise questions about what is “real” versus what’s just part of the movie set. A recently installed sculpture in a nearby park raised the question “was it part of the movie, or was it a new part of the park?

However this time I seem to have a new perspective on all the goings-on: a sense of deja vu. Having seen similar activities only 4 months ago, there’s not as much novelty this time around. In spite of the occasional sounds of squealing tires and automatic weapons fire, I find myself feeling a growing ennui about the whole enterprise. I feel kind of like a New Yorker trying to wade through a crowd of tourists gawking at the towering skyscrapers looming overhead; I’ve seen this all before and just want to get on with my daily routine.

It’s almost like I’m adopting a New York mindset to this pseudo-New York film shoot. Talk about movies altering our reality…