Bumblebee (2018)

Throughout the film, the main character has a pet dog, who is seen performing such mild action as sitting/standing/lying, being held or petted, and walking/running on or off leash. For all of these scenes, trainers used hand signals and verbal commands to cue the mild action, which the trained dog was accustomed to performing. The barking/growling was also a trained behavior.

In the scene where the actress eats breakfast and her dog jumps up on the table and begs for food, the trainer brought the dog to the set and placed an apple box out of frame, which acted as the dog’s starting place. On action, the dog walked across the kitchen and placed his paws on the table. The cereal bowl on the table contained cereal and was lined with baby food.

In the scene where the girl gets in the abandoned car and is driven away by a beehive, a professional bee wrangler was hired to navigate bee usage on set. There were several safety meeting before the bees were brought to set. Wranglers used bees specifically that were safe to be released into the wild. Beehive is plastic. Magnets are attached to the top of fake hive and allows hive to be attached to wheel well. Proir to shooting the scene the wrangler placed a handful of bees on the dashboard of car. Production filmed bees walking a small area- approximately six inches in diameter on the dashboard area. The actress was filmed separately from the bees, she was never near real bees.

In the scene where the actress drives the car with the dog in a carrying case in the backseat, and the dog barks out the window, the dog was walked to the stage on a leash by the trainer. Prior to shooting the scene, the trainer placed the dog into a crate and placed it in the back window of the VW. Small wedges have been placed to stabilize the crate in place so it wouldn’t tip over. The trainer stood off-camera with a bait stick to get the dog to look towards camera lens. The trainer also cued the dog to bark out the window.

In the scene where the dog is lying down in the garage watching television, when Bumblebee comes to life and the dog escapes through the doggy door, the set was an enclosed garage built on a sound stage. The rug the dog sat on was made secure with non-slip material under it. In the moment where the dog reacts, he was placed on his mark. The trainer was on the garage side of the door with a bait stick to elicit the dog’s reactions. On the next take, the trainer called the dog and he ran through the doggy door. The same technique with the bait stick was used in the rest of the scene where the dog jumps off the couch in the living room and runs around.