James Bamford Talks ‘Air Force One Down,’ Katherine McNamara, And Trusting Stunt Coordinators

Director James Bamford spent over 25 years as a stunt man, and that experience has served him well as a filmmaker. Air Force One Down centers on a rooke Secret Service agent (Katherine McNamara) who is taked with saving the President’s (Ian Bohen) life. CinemAddicts co-host Eric Holmes, who loved the film, praised Air Force One’s action sequences. Bamford talked to Holmes about shooting the action, working once again with McNamara (the pair worked together on Arrow), and why directors would should be trusting their stunt coordinators!

Katherine McNamara was a natural when it came to executing the action scenes. “Kat embraced the choreography and the realism of it,” said James Bamford. “She did a lot of training not only before she arrived on set to rehearse (but) in Los Angeles she was at the gun range, training with knives and boxing and doing all sorts of things before she arrived with the stunt team.”

**Check out Eric Holmes’ review of Air Force One Down on CinemAddicts:

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On the filmmaking side, Bamford offers up this one piece of important advice. “Listen to your stunt coordinator.”

“The ones who were the best at what they did trusted me with the action and handed it over and handed over the set and said ‘Go for it, it’s yours,'” said Bamford. “Being able to run with that is the key and being able to trust your stunt team and realize that they designed this fight. Therefore they should know how to shoot it properly.”

Air Force One Down, co-starring Anthony Michael Hall, is now out on Digital (including Amazon). Let us know your thoughts on the movie!

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