A new documentary film directed and produced by Rachel Mason (Circus of Books, An Update on Our Family) titled Last Take: Rust and the Story of Halyna, premieres Tuesday, March 11 on Hulu.
In the film, director Rachel Mason investigates the tragic accident on the set of Rush when her friend cinematographer Halyna Hutchins was fatally shot and director Joel Souza was injured when a live round was discharged from a prop revolver that actor Alec Baldwin was using.
“Halyna was dear to me for many reasons. Not only was she a friend, she was a collaborator. While she was alive, I could never have imagined making a film about her. My hope was to make films with her, and to support her in all the many films that she was sure to make. In the media frenzy which followed her death, it felt as if Halyna was erased, her loss eclipsed by the surrounding controversies. Our film aims to keep her at the center, while offering a portrait of the experience of those with whom she spent her final 12 days, which hopefully, through their efforts, offers the world a very much unfinished portrait of Halyna,” director Rachel Mason said in a statement.
On October 21, 2021, on the set of the movie RUST, a prop gun held by actor Alec Baldwin fired a live bullet, wounding the film’s director and killing its cinematographer, Halyna Hutchins. Within hours, the catastrophic accident was enveloped by a frenzy of media attention. For months, then years, as lawsuits flew and criminal trials unfolded, the tabloid spectacle around the case overshadowed a private, personal tragedy.
In “Last Take: Rust and the Story of Halyna,” Halyna’s friend, director Rachel Mason, goes beyond the public narrative to reveal the untold human story of that terrible day and all that followed – from the vantage point of the people at the center of the tragedy. The film weaves together the accounts of those who were on the set of RUST that day and of those, like Mason, who not only lost a cherished friend and colleague but who are still navigating the trauma of the aftermath.
Working with public court records, behind-the-scenes material from RUST, and unprecedented access to key individuals and materials, including Halyna’s personal archives, the film examines the official investigations into the safety protocols on set and explores the private moral reckoning of all involved. It probes for answers to the questions those closest to Halyna all carry. How could this have happened? And how do we possibly make sense of it?
Rigorously reported, emotionally raw, and deeply personal, the film seeks to redeem the core of the story that the media exploited – that of a talented cinematographer whose life story was minimized, yet in death gave her colleagues an unexpected opportunity to heal from unimaginable loss by completing the film that mattered deeply to her.