A Buck Fifty and A Lost Camera Lured Us Into Our Destiny

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By Titus Watts

As the crowds dwindled and the last of the passengers strolled arm and arm with their loved ones, my eyes studied the desolate luggage carousel making its never ending rounds. My heart began to pound rhythmically in my chest and I held my breath as I heard those six words that no cameraman EVER wants to hear: “We lost your camera, Mr. Watts…and it could be anywhere in Europe right now”.

Haunted by my careless decision to put our ONLY movie camera into “check-in baggage” and not “carry-on”, I felt paralyzed; I had squandered our only chance of getting the final shot we needed to finish our movie, “The Roman Trilogy”. We only had 18 hours on the island of Malta to film a sunset and a sunrise and our camera was somewhere, anywhere, but not in my possession.

Three days before we left the USA on our trip, we felt a word from God to add the Republic of Malta to our very full itinerary. Our worldwide search for ruins that resembled Ancient Rome had lead us to that island. In a miraculous turn of events, my wife Angela was able to secure two first class, roundtrip plane tickets for our director, Richard Gazowsky, and myself to Malta from Rome for only $1.50 each. You read that right, a BUCK FIFTY each per ticket. But we had less than 24 hours on the Island to get the wrap-around shots we needed.

Determined not to lose this battle, Richard and I reviewed the miracles that had brought us to this unique place. The buck fifty plane tickets, the paid-in-full location trip, the meeting we’d had in London just days before regarding the future of our 70mm camera innovation. So many miraculous things had already happened on this trip and even though our only camera was lost, surely God would not bring us to this little island in the middle of the ocean just to send us home again with nothing to show for it. What was the answer, God? Surely He had a plan and we had to run the race and finish our course. Like the Apostle Paul who was shipwrecked on this very island, we were determined to fight the good fight, run the race, and not lose the faith.

This very goal drove Richard and me out of the airport in search of a camera with which to film. As we meandered through the pot-holed, dusty streets of Valletta, we looked for anything that might lead us to a film camera. We were on a great adventure, our adrenaline pumping, knowing the clock was ticking. Richard led the way as to where we would go and our first stop was inquiring at a gas station, then on to a car battery store. We figured that since cameras need batteries, a battery store might lead us to our BIG FIND. To our amazement, the store clerk, in his broken English, pointed to a huge, shabby warehouse right across the street which housed the island’s largest television station. Like greased lightening, Richard ran across the street busting the doors wide open while I peeled out, dodged parked cars and one-way streets and finally parked the car.

As I entered the station, I saw Richard in his element. Within five minutes we were in the producer’s office explaining our journey and insisting that we must have a camera within four hours to get the sunset shot. Amazingly, the producer cut his work short to meet with us and immediately got on board. The momentum was building, our team was growing; now all we needed was a camera. There was only one man on the island who had what we needed and the producer nervously insisted that Richard be the one to make the call.

“NO WAY! I won’t do it and I don’t like Christians”, he yelled in his harsh German accent. With a few heated words here and there, he also said he needed one week to prepare for our shoot, secure his team, the location, and prepping the camera. Knowing this man, Mr. Jens Klein, was the only person who had a camera capable of getting the right shot, Richard was determined to get a green light from him. Jens was the BEST cinematographer on Malta, perhaps the best in Europe, filming commercials and big budget movies in Malta. Here we were, a Pastor and his cameraman nephew pushing a man of Jens’ stature to his limit. Booked for months, God cleared his schedule and after a heated conversation, Richard with his tenacious go-to-it-ness, got Jens to finally agree. The heavenly host of angels started to do show off their stuff!

Like a red bullet, our dented, scratched, broken tail lighted vehicle with its black soiled interior, darted to the other side of the island in record time; narrowly avoiding other cars on the dirty, winding roads. It was like someone dumped the Sahara dessert on the Autobahn and threw a mountainous roller coaster ride smack dab in the middle. The transportation adventure made the famed Dakar Race in Africa look like the Autopia ride at Disneyland.

We approached the charming fishing village and within minutes we were making our way up a flight of stairs to meet this German Maltese transplant. As if he stepped out of a European Vogue magazine, Jens with his bronze glow, stonewashed jeans, form fitting tee shirt and perfectly aligned hairstyle, greeted us with excitement and intensity. He handed us his remaining three rolls of film and as he stepped aside a rugged, just as tanned and exotic looking film crew made their way down the staircase. We were off to our first location.

Within two hours of our lost camera dilemma we were actually within minutes of capturing the very shots we needed. My heart raced as we acted like kids in a candy store, as we squeezed into two little cars heading out for a wild ride. Our first stop would be a panoramic shot of an old city that easily mimicked ancient Rome. Hopping in and out of the car, make that one shot, two shot, three..and more…we were in the center of a whirlwind that just kept twirling.

For the final shot, as dusk was setting in, we made it to an old Army fort where we stopped under an archway. The seven story fortified brick building was built at the bottom of a steep dirt road. It spanned 600 feet from corner to corner. It was worn and torn from years of battles and usage Our team drove to the bottom of the road and began to climb up the unstable concrete and wooden planks to get an Arial shot. As Richard called out for one more take, we heard the rustle of voices creeping out behind rusty steel doors. Within seconds a drunkard stumbled out of the doorway and summoned a motley crew of a hundred bandits after us.

My life flashed before my eyes. I wondered if I would see my wife and children again, or would I end up walking the plank and taking my last swan dive off a sheer cliff into the tepid waters of the Mediterranean Sea. It wasn’t the gangs of people with fire torched sticks hurling our way, but it was the bottle rockets and bullets that zoomed passed us and made it’s marks on the relic walls of this fortress. We ran breathlessly to our cars, yelling. “Go, go, go”, while the bandits got in their cars and chased us up the hill determined to hunt us down. We were thankful for all the dirt and smoke that camouflaged us as we were able to ward off the partygoers and make a clean getaway in the dark. I never complained about the dust and dirt again that night.

The icing on the cake for our trip to Malta occurred in the wee hours of the morning as I nodded off on Jens’ couch. As Richard reviewed Jens’ body of work on a show reel, he noticed that Jens had done a complete CGI model of Ancient Rome, exactly what we needed for our film. Through all the ups and downs of this trip, from the miracle of losing the camera, to almost getting shot, to meeting Jens, (who would come give his heart to the Lord, move to America and start a family of his own), we also got the shot we needed. All by forming a relationship with another man. This journey we are on is not all about getting the project completed, but it is about the people you meet along the way, with the hope and anticipation of loving them into God’s kingdom.

Oh, and yes we did get the camera back. It arrived in Malta on the very flight we were to depart on some 18 hours later.

Titus Watts was Grip team leader for the films “Guardians” and “The Roman Trilogy” and now, he and his wife, Angela, are team leaders of the finances for the film “Gravity.”

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