PICTURE PERFECT

In case you hadn't heard, Hoover Dam wasn't built to tame the Colorado River or generate electricity. As it turns out, President Herbert Hoover ordered the dam's construction to hide a giant energy cube from outer space that can turn everyday machines into evil, murderous robots.

So goes the plot of the summer blockbuster "Transformers," which is merely the latest motion picture to use Hoover Dam as a backdrop.

The dam entertained its first movie crew in 1934, two years before the structure was even finished. The film is called "The Silver Streak" and features a train racing to the Boulder Dam construction site with medical supplies and no time to spare.

In the decades since, dozens of movies, documentaries, television shows and commercials have been shot on, inside and around the iconic structure 30 miles southeast of downtown Las Vegas.

But long before a director shouts "Action!" at Hoover Dam, the production company must secure a right-of-use permit, a requirement for any commercial photography at facilities managed by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.

The process involves something that might surprise you: script approval.

In order to receive a permit, an applicant must supply the bureau with a script, outline or storyboard for the production.

For the record, the permit requirement does not apply to newspaper photographers and television news crews.

"It's a very regulated process," said Bob Walsh, bureau spokesman at Hoover Dam. "We don't want something shot down there that would be inappropriate."

That means no pornography or racist propaganda. It can also mean nothing that might cast the bureau or the dam in a negative light.

As Facility Manager Bill Bruninga put it, "Hoover Dam is a public icon, and we do what we can to protect that image."

Ultimately, dam officials are free to deny filmmakers access to secure areas of the installation for almost any reason at all, though they try not to be capricious about it.

"We try to accommodate as much as we can, but we have the ability to say no in a very objective review of what they want to do," Walsh said. "It's an objective review, not a subjective review."

In other words, officials at the dam try to use federal regulations governing everything from civil rights to decency -- not their own sensibilities -- to guide their decisions.

One story arc sure to get your permit application rejected is an attack or other catastrophic event that damages or destroys the dam.

"We don't want Hoover Dam shown as a danger to the public," Bruninga said.

Obviously, that hasn't always been the case. The 1978 "Superman" movie was filmed at the dam, and it climaxes with a massive earthquake that topples the structure. Alfred Hitchcock's 1942 film "Saboteur" involves a plot to blow up the dam.

Walsh acknowledged the bureau is a bit more conservative than it used to be. Hoover Dam doesn't provide the same level of access it once did to film companies or even documentary makers.

The change came as a result of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Edward Harran is production manager for the Nevada Film Office, the state agency that assists productions filming in the Silver State. He said their office used to get "tons and tons" of inquiries about filming at Hoover Dam, but the post-9/11 security restrictions made it harder to get a permit.

Lately, though, things seem to be loosening back up.

"They've become a little more film-friendly again," Harran said.

Dennis McBride, executive director of the Boulder City-Hoover Dam Museum, isn't surprised that so many filmmakers want to use the dam as a backdrop.

"It's one of the most recognizable landmarks in the world," he said. "It's like the Eiffel Tower or the Taj Mahal. It's dramatic in its sweep."

The biggest reasons for rejecting film permits are safety and disruptions to visitors or vehicle traffic. Evaluating such things is usually pretty easy. The hard part for staff members is not laughing in the faces of some applicants.

One film production wanted to shut down the road over the dam -- that's U.S. Highway 93, the main route between Las Vegas and Phoenix -- for an entire week. Another wanted to lower cars into the spillways and race them around.

Walsh said most filmmakers are willing to change their plans to conform to what the bureau will allow. Others simply go shoot somewhere else.

Walsh said he knows of only a couple of applications that were rejected based at least partially on content. One was a request to film a terrorist attack on the dam, and another had a "mentally deranged" individual running around the dam shooting people, he said.

The bureau had no such content concerns with "Transformers," which Bruninga described as "a very exciting action movie with some of the best special effects I've ever seen."

And even though the movie portrays Hoover Dam as the central figure in a massive government cover-up, Bruninga doesn't think very many people will mistake it for the truth.

"I will leave it to each person's discretion to see it and decide how much of it is real. It's pretty far out," he said.

Just in case, though, Bruninga has warned tour guides at the dam to expect some strange questions from visitors.

So far, Walsh said, a few guides have received requests to see robot villain Megatron, "the cube," and the secret base known as Sector 7.

No one at the dam is terribly surprised.

After the 1996 romantic comedy "Fools Rush In," a staff member fielded a call from a woman who wanted to have her baby in the middle of the dam, just like Salma Hayek does in the film.

Walsh said permit applications for feature film productions only come in once every couple of years. The vast majority of requests are for commercials and documentaries.

"It kind of comes and goes in spurts," he said.

Filming at Hoover Dam isn't cheap.

The dam charges a scouting fee of $1,000 per day. A four-hour film permit costs $2,500 plus expenses, while an eight-hour permit costs $5,000 plus expenses.

Still photographers can expect to pay $1,000 per day plus expenses for a commercial shoot.

Any production company permitted to film at the dam must provide proof that it is bonded or insured for at least $1 million and that the Bureau of Reclamation is listed on the policy.

The dam also charges a $200 application fee to cover the cost of processing permit requests.

In the case of "Transformers," the production company shelled out about $110,000 to rent an entire parking lot for all its trucks and trailers and pay all the federal employees who had to be there with them at all times. That included security guards, guides and electricians.

The shoot lasted about a week last summer and involved director Michael Bay and most of the cast, including veteran actors Jon Voight and John Turturro.

Scenes were filmed in numerous locations not generally accessible to the public, including the generator floor, penstock tunnels, power plant roof, and the Lower Portal Road leading to the bottom of the dam from the Nevada side.

Bruninga said the right-to-use permit is like a contract, and the staff at the dam does all it can to live up to its end of the deal.

"Hoover Dam goes to a lot of effort to support" permit holders, he said. "We want them to get what they need and get off site as safely and quickly as possible. That's what they want too."