When word began spreading around Detroit that filmmakers were planning to use the MotorCity as a backdrop to film a remake of the 1980s hit movie ‘Red Dawn’, few people around town thought much of it.

The tax incentives recently offered up by the state - aimed to lure Hollywood types to Michigan to boost the economy - have made it fairly common news that a film crew is planning to visit for a day or two. But few imagined the scope of what the ‘Red Dawn’ gang had in mind.

Smack in the middle of downtown, where Michigan Avenue, Lafayette Boulevard and Griswold Street come together (across Michigan Avenue from where the American Coney Island comes to a point), there’s a five-story parking structure that’s been completely transformed into the movie’s police headquarters. A huge red banner with a fictional political symbol at the bottom cover the façade of the parking structure, and many others hang over the streets. There are even a couple of them draped over the Coney island building. That three-street intersection was completely shut down for nearly a month as ‘Red Dawn’ constructed a stage on which to stage political rallies. For more than a week, it was commonplace for people downtown to hear explosions and machine gun fire.

During down time on the set, Detroiters have gathered by the hundreds around the perimeter of the Campus Martius area. The American Coney Island has at times become a sort of “green room” for the movie’s cast and crew. Leads Josh Peck and Isabel Lucas were spotted lounging at American Coney Island more than once.

Away from that “center stage”, filming has also taken place at various other points downtown and throughout the city. A few blocks away, just 100 feet off Woodward in a quiet little section of Clifford Street, the movie crews took a broken-down, burned-out storefront and destroyed it further to recreate war wreckage. Not far from there, filmmakers set off an explosion that “rattled downtown,” according to local media reports. And on Griswold near GrandCircusPark, camouflage war jeeps and tanks (all featuring the American flag with the movie’s mock Communist political logo set over it) are parked in a fenced in area beneath the People Mover.

With much of the film being shot in an urban setting like Detroit, it’s fair to wonder how much this ‘Red Dawn’ will deviate from the original, where high school kids in a rural town fended off invading Soviet forces. Reports say that this, stars Chris Hemsworth, Peck, Lucas, Josh Hutcherson, Adrianna Palicki and Connor Cruise will defend their town against invading Chinese and Russian forces. The movie is set to be released in November 2010.

Director:                                    Dan Bradley

Screenplay                                 Carl Ellsworth

Story:                                        Jeremy Passmore

Cast

Chris Hemsworth                         Jed Eckert

Josh Peck                                   Matt Eckert

Isabel Lucas                                Erica

Josh Hutcherson                          Robert

Adrianne Palicki                           Toni

Will Yun Lee                                Captain Lo

Connor Cruise                             Daryl

Kenneth Choi                               Smith

Matt Gerald                                 Hodges

Alyssa Diaz                                 Julie

Edwin Hodge                               Danny

Kelly Jennings                              Erika’s mother

Rusty Mewha                              Brian

Lucas Kerr                                  Raznor

Noah Smith                                 Joe

Others rumored to be in the cast include Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Brett Cullen and Michael Beach, Mark Schlereth and Julia Alcaraz.