Cinefex Weekly Update | Issue 13

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Book Review by Joe Fordham

"What is there to be said that is new about Ray Harryhausen?" asks writer Ray Bradbury in his forward to the current book by his life-long friend. The answer, as chronicled by stop-motion legend Harryhausen and film historian Tony Dalton in Ray Harryhausen: An Animated Life, is quite a lot -- 304 glossy pages crammed with text, photographs, film posters, diagrams and sketches -- many previously unpublished from Harryhausen's personal archives.

The book, which appeared last November in the United Kingdom -- where Harryhausen has resided for decades -- has now been released in the United States with considerable fanfare and a full-blown book tour by the author. This is Harryhausen's second book, following the slim, technically deficient Film Fantasy Scrapbook -- which first appeared in 1972, with revisions in 1974 and 1981 -- a mostly-pictorial guide to creatures that have populated the effects maestro's films. An Animated Life towers over that. The book is part confessional -- revealing techniques never previously divulged by their creator -- and part love letter to a craft that Harryhausen describes in meticulous prose as 'dimensional animation.'

Bradbury sets the tone in his spirited introduction. Tony Dalton's preface continues in similar vein, recounting his 30-year friendship with Harryhausen -- almost half the length of time Bradbury has known him -- and outlines his journey into the archives of the British Film Institute, where much of his research material was obtained. The book is an exhaustive historical study, five years in the making, covering the production of every one of Harryhausen's films, written by the man himself with the support of close contemporaries.

While fans may be familiar with the films described, Harryhausen is quick to shoot down frequently printed fallacies, such as the origin of the material used to skin his first animated creature, the title character in Cavebear in 1935 -- not purloined illicitly from his mother's favorite fur coat! He also goes to pains to place his peers in context -- tracing how his first employer and mentor, Willis O'Brien, made the transition from sculptor in a San Francisco marble shop to the creator of King Kong -- and outlining his own lineage.

Fred and Martha Harryhausen are pictured as the loving parents of a strange, but talented only child in pre-World War II Los Angeles, assisting their son in fabricating miniature costumes, props and creature armatures, as long as their manual dexterity remained. Harryhausen lists other early influences -- including the fiction of H.G. Wells, the art of Gustav Doré, John Martin and Charles R. Knight -- touchstones that remained with him his entire career, as illustrated in atmospheric pencil and charcoal creature concepts, from his earliest student renderings to Force of the Trojans, an unrealized project that was to have followed his 1981 swan song, Clash of the Titans.

Unrealized projects abound in the back pages of the book, which contains a catalogue of 53 'Lost Worlds,' including some titles now in development by present-day filmmakers. Harryhausen relates how he decided J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit was not suitable for a live-action/dimensional-animation treatment, then adds: "How wrong I was!" Harryhausen also recalls how, following The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, he and producer Charles H. Schneer discussed, and rejected, the idea of doing an adaptation of Edgar Rice Burroughs' John Carter of Mars: "We felt the story simply wasn't strong enough." Harryhausen states the unrealized project he most wanted to pursue was The War of the Worlds, retaining H.G. Wells' Victorian setting. The book contains illustrations of Harryhausen's proposals for the film, which he submitted to producer George Pal in 1950, before learning that Pal had already been in discussions with Paramount to mount a contemporary adaptation.

A chronological filmography follows, listing Harryhausen's short films, television commercials, documentaries for the Army Signal Corps and 16 feature films. Harryhausen and Dalton then supply a glossary of filmmaking terms, which are quite poetic in their descriptions of photochemical and stop-motion paraphernalia. Digital artists should take note as Harryhausen reveals methods by which he rigged saucers to fly in his 1956 production Earth Vs. the Flying Saucers -- physically hand-painting wires prior to exposing every frame to render them invisible. Unfortunately, the book then concludes without an index to provide easy reference for this compendium of a lifetime's achievement.

But Ray Harryhausen: An Animated Life is a rare entity. Despite its considerable bulk, the book is immensely readable, a hoot from front to back, as well as a treasure trove of imagery and reference material. As anyone who has stood in line to meet the man will attest, Harryhausen is a bright and witty storyteller, with a craftsman's passion for film and an intolerance for interfering producers. All the anecdotes are here -- the 'sixtopus' from It Came From Beneath the Sea and, at last, the real story of how he choreographed seven sword-fighting skeletons. Throughout, the narrative enthralls and captivates.

Ray Harryhausen will be making book-signing appearances in California and New York in conjunction with the publication of An Animated Life:

April 17 -- Monsters in Motion, Placentia, California -- 10 a.m.

April 18 -- Dark Delicacies, Burbank, California -- 2 p.m.

April 22 -- Edwards South Coast Village Cinema, Santa Ana, California -- 7 p.m. (With screening of a remastered print of Jason and the Argonauts. Tickets available online at OCshowbiz.com or at the door on April 22.)

April 24 -- Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, UCLA Campus, Los Angeles, California -- 1 p.m. (Appearing with Ray Bradbury.)

April 25 -- Los Angeles Comic Book and Science Fiction Convention, Shrine Auditorium, Los Angeles, California -- Noon.

April 28 -- Rafael Theatre, San Rafael, California -- 7 p.m. (Accompanying discussion with Phil Tippett and Arnold Kunert.)

May 2 -- George Eastman House, Rochester, New York -- 2 p.m. (With screenings of Jason and the Argonauts, early fairy tale short subjects and other rarities. Phil Tippett will present Harryhausen with the title of George Eastman Honorary Scholar. Advance tickets available by phone: 585-271-3361, ext. 218.)

May 5 -- Barnes & Noble, Lincoln Center, New York, New York.

May 6 -- New York Film Festival, Lincoln Center, New York, New York -- 8 p.m.

May 10 -- ASIFA Tribute, School of Visual Arts, New York, New York -- 7:30 p.m.

Compiled by Joe Fordham

Ray Harryhausen: VFXPro reports the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will be screening five newly-restored prints of stop-motion guru Ray Harryhausen's fairy tale short subjects in the Samuel Goldwyn Theater, Friday, April 23, at 7:30 p.m. The films were animated by Harryhausen in his garage home studio from 1946 - 1953. The screening will include 35mm prints of Mother Goose Stories, The Story of Little Red Riding Hood, Hansel and Gretel, The Story of Rapunzel and The Story of King Midas. Leonard Maltin will moderate a discussion with Harryhausen and artists who helped restore the films. For tickets and more details click here.
Ella Enchanted: Click here for fairytale castles, misty lakes and a sprinkling of kung-fu in this whimsical live-action fairy tale, in the Shrek and Princess Bride mold, directed by Tommy O'Haver for Miramax. Visual effects -- including work by Double Negative, Cinesite and The Moving Picture Company -- were supervised by Angus Bickerton.
Spider-Man 2: Take the phone off the hook, pull down the shades, crank up the volume and click here for the latest Spider-Man 2 trailer featuring Spidey, Doc Ock and the Big Apple, back in big-screen comic book glory when the sequel opens in theaters June 30. In a report at About.com, Marvel Enterprises movie mogul Avi Arad also confirms that Spider-Man 3 is on track for development at Columbia.
Metroid: The Hollywood Reporter announced that action filmmaker John Woo has optioned the movie rights for this Nintendo video game, and plans to produce the science fiction project with an option to direct for Tiger Hill. Terence Chang and Brad Foxhoven will also produce, with Suzanne Zizzi of Lion Rock Productions. Foxhoven states it will be a big-budget production, scheduled for release before 2006. No screenwriter has been announced yet, but the story will concern "the origins of the game's female protagonist, sexy bounty hunter Samus Aran, and relate her adventures battling the insidious life-sucking Metroids and their controlling force, Mother Brain."
Dungeons and Dragons 2: Variety reports Studio Hamburg's international production arm World Wide Pictures and Silver Pictures are producing this sequel to Dungeons and Dragons, the 2000 film adaptation of the popular video game. Warner Brothers will distribute the sequel in the United States. Gerry Lively will direct, with shooting slated to begin in Europe this year.
The Day After Tomorrow: Click here to see storyboards illustrating more mayhem in Roland Emmerich's upcoming global warming disaster movie, made available by Twentieth Century Fox and ComingSoon.net.
Star Wars 3: Lucasfilm has announced it will be releasing its final Star Wars film, the still-untitled Episode 3, a little earlier than anticipated. The film will appear in the United States and Canada and near-simultaneous international territories Thursday, May 19, 2005. Japan will have its premiere, as it traditionally does, in July. North American Star Wars premieres have always occurred between the magic dates May 16 and May 25.
Fantastic Four: LatinoReview.com reports Tim Story, the director of Barbershop, will helm this Marvel Comics adaptation for Marvel Enterprises and Twentieth Century Fox. For the uninitiated, the four blue-suited superheroes -- Reed Richards, Sue Storm, Benjamin Grimm and Johnny Storm -- receive their superpowers after being irradiated by cosmic rays while testing an experimental spacecraft. No cast has been announced, but Michael Chiklis, star of TV's The Shield, is rumored to be in talks to play rock-man, The Thing, and Tim Robbins is rumored to be interested in playing the villain, Doctor Doom. Yahoo Movies reports Samm Hamm, Doug Petrie, Tristan Patterson and Mark Frost have contributed to the screenplay; and states the film is scheduled for release July 1, 2005.
Casino Royale: SciFi Wire reports, in an interview with filmmaker Quentin Tarantino, that the director has been speaking with Pierce Brosnan about helming the actor's fifth and, apparently, final Bond film, tackling a remake of Ian Fleming's Casino Royale, with the emphasis on characters rather than pyrotechnics. Tarantino is quoted as saying: "Wouldn't it be great to have a James Bond movie that didn't cost $115 million and only cost $40 million or something like that...? You know it's going to make its money back, and we [would] all do good. Maybe we win the critics this time, then you're back in business the way you were before."
Watchmen: The Chicago Sun-Times reports that Hellboy and Tomb Raider producers Lawrence Gordon and Lloyd Levin have declared that they will not be making a third Lara Croft film, but are now turning their attentions to adapting Alan Moore's 1986 graphic novel Watchmen. Describing the premise, Levin said: "It's about a group of superheroes who reunite to figure out who is trying to kill them off... it's different characters, but it's really a unique story because it deals with the spiritual aspect of being a superhero." Yahoo Movies states Watchmen will be a Sony/Revolution Studios production, tentatively scheduled to start shooting sometime in 2004 in Prague, for a 2005 release; Screenwriter David Hayter is in talks to direct.
Kill Bill, Volume 2: Click here to see a new trailer at Apple.com for Quentin Tarantino's upcoming second installment of his chop-socky tale of feminine empowerment and flying limbs.
Lemony Snicket: An Unfortunate Series of Events: Click here to See Moviebox.net's presentation of a TV trailer for this Paramount/Dreamworks/Nickelodeon feature, with Jim Carrey transformed by makeup artist Bill Corso into a wonderfully twisted Count Olaf. The film, due out in December, is based on the popular children's books by mysterious fictional author Lemony Snicket.
Pattern Recognition: The LA Times reports producer Steve Golin has acquired the rights to cyberpunk author William Gibson's 2003 novel Pattern Recognition. Set in present-day reality, or at least a Gibson-esque version of it, the story follows the efforts of Cayce Pollard, a 'cool hunter' marketing executive, who attempts to track the origin of a mysterious videotape let loose on the Internet. Director Peter Weir is rumored to be interested in the project.

Keyframe™ is digital entertainment. For three seasons KDP has generated thousands of effects for the huge sci-fi series Mutant X. Simultaneously, they worked on films such as, Bullet Proof Monk and Secret Window, created effects for the TV series Adventure Inc. and PlayMakers, developed their own internal animation called HUGGLERS™ and won the prestigious Accolade Award of Excellence for their animation in The Littlest Light on the Christmas Tree. Keyframe™ is truly one of the elite talents in the industry today.