( CNN ) -- As the director of `` Pirates of the Caribbean '' Nos . 1 , 2 and 3 , filmmaker Gore Verbinski is intimately familiar with the massive needs of a potential summer blockbuster . The explosions have to be bigger ; the scenes more captivating ; the action sequences more believable and awe-inspiring . `` I think every director who 's making a big movie this summer has gone through the same thing , '' Verbinski told CNN 's Nischelle Turner . `` That 's what audiences expect , and you 've got ta be really entertaining . It 's competition . '' On July 3 , Verbinski will enter the summer box office race not with pirates , but cowboys . With Jerry Bruckheimer producing ( as he 's done with the `` Pirates of the Caribbean '' franchise , among several other top Hollywood titles ) , Verbinski has enlisted Armie Hammer and `` Pirates '' star Johnny Depp to help him reinvent and tell the origin story of the masked seeker of justice . `` The Lone Ranger , '' which just released its fourth trailer on Wednesday , was shot over five months across Colorado , Utah , Arizona , New Mexico and California . It was a strenuous , stressful undertaking as the crew pulled 18-hour days in places such as Rio Puerco , a location so arid `` we 're still getting dust out of our ears and nose and eyes , '' Verbinski said . `` Nobody understands how difficult it is actually to do it , '' Bruckheimer added . `` The grueling hours , the lack of sleep . [ Verbinski 's ] always looking for another location -- he lost a location , he 's got to shoot something else the next day , an actor 's sick . ... It 's just unbelievable that you 're running this thing for a number of months and you 're moving an army five states . '' All in the name of the summer blockbuster . And the locations , which were painful but necessary to endure given that `` The Lone Ranger '' is a Western , were just half the challenge . Verbinski , it seems , was n't willing to settle for a fake locomotive -- those trains you see roaring through the TV spots were man-made . `` Everything is real , '' Bruckheimer said . `` Gore does n't like to do it with the visual effects , so those guys are really on the train , the train is actually moving , it 's not a CG shot -- so everything you see here is real . So it had to be built . You ca n't imagine how many people it takes just to keep the train running ; to get the stunt guys to keep the guys on top of the train ; the rigging so they 're all safe and the amount of extras [ to be ] the people in the background ; it 's just a lot . '' Is it any wonder that , on a scale of difficulty ranging from 1-10 , Verbinski puts making `` The Lone Ranger '' at an `` 11 '' ? `` Eleven , definitely . This is the hardest movie , '' Verbinski said . `` I mean , hats off to [ 'Stagecoach , ' 'Searchers ' director ] John Ford and [ 'Once Upon a Time in the West ' director ] Sergio [ Leone ] and all those kinds who make these Westerns because they 're really hard . I mean we all know what a train looks like and we all know what horses look like and it 's not a giant robot or a flying saucer , so what are you going to [ do ] , put someone against a blue screen ? '' That 's not to say that the popcorn sci-fi flicks are more forgiving , because `` there are no easy movies -- those movies are really hard too , '' Verbinksi said . `` But we know what that [ Western ] reality looks like , there 's a whole language that 's been established about what we know and feel from real horses and real dirt and real trains , and they 're hard movies . This movie has Comanche and cavalry and trains , and we went and shot in five states . It 's a big movie . '' But by now , `` big '' is just what we expect from Verbinski , and especially when paired with Bruckheimer , and they 're hoping `` The Lone Ranger '' will come across as an explosive , fresh take on a familiar story . `` [ Verbinski ] makes big movies and that 's what audiences love and that 's why summer movies become blockbusters , because you give them a lot of punch for their 10 or 12 bucks , '' Bruckheimer said . `` [ We 're ] reinventing the tale of the Lone Ranger , but starting with the origin . It 's the origin story , told through Tonto 's point of view , who 's not quite accurate with what he remembers , so it 's a lot of fun . '' Johnny Depp 's latest movie projects . CNN 's JD Cargill contributed to this report .
Director Gore Verbinski says audience expectations are high for a summer blockbuster . The demands for a movie as big as `` The Lone Ranger '' are even greater . Between the weather and creating the sets , the production was grueling . Producer Jerry Bruckheimer : `` [ Verbinski ] makes big movies and that 's what audiences love ''