Ray Harryhausen: Special Effects Titan

[mr.negativity]

From Bleeding Cool:

[canofhumdingers]

I must own this.....

[william newell]

[Tom R VanSlambrouck]

[MouthForWar]

[The Giant Pacific Octopus]

I really want to see this too. But on a related note the Willis O'Brien DVD CREATION: THE LOST WORLDS OF WILLIS O'BRIEN is another dream come true release. Unfortuantly it doesn't look like it will be finished.

Check out the trailer.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hHcKZaoVJs

Jim Danforth did his own recreation of the spider pit scene.

[MouthForWar]

[The Giant Pacific Octopus]

I know. I'm an O'Brien, Harryhausen and Tsuburaya fanboy and proud of it!!

I know you are too. Unlike most young people your age that I know, you respect and admire these legends. Unfortunatly most youginns' that I know are overstimulated by the digital age and make fun of these men's work. That's why I wish more young people had class like you.

Anyway I digress...

That DVD has been in production for years. Here is the site.
http://home.earthlink.net/~philnoir/gal ... oductions/

Unfortunatly this is what the producer had to say recently on another board

Hi folks. Steven Austin here -- the filmmaker who made the trailer that some people just discovered. It's true, I began a documentary and have an hour's worth cut. At least another hour's worth of useable footage exists. Sadly I cannot continue.

It's a LONG story... Due to the very kind efforts of Don Shay I had access to virtually all the correspondence from OBie, Dar, Marcel, Cooper and a hosts of other notable FX artists related to Kong & stop-motion. It began as a labor of love and I invested my own money traveling around the state conducting interviews with Wah Chang, Phil Kellison, Phil Tippet, Steve Chiodo, Ray Harryhausen etc. Wah and Phil K. have passed, so I believe I have their final public commentary on the subject.

I enlisted the extraordinary Jim Danforth to direct & animate a few shots for the trailer. My intent was to have Jim direct/animate the entire Spider Pit sequence as he saw fit. I believe I was the first person to propose this re-creation idea. I'd been thinking about it since I saw the fuzzy stills in Famous Monters, as a monster kid in the 60s. That was the initial impetus... just to do that scene.

Eventually as I came to learn about & appreciate the art of stop-motion I decided to make a fictional biopic based on OBie's fascinating life. (Cinefex article come to life!) But no producers in town were interested -- they'd never HEARD of O'Brien! So I decided to educate the ignorant with a documentary.

It snowballed from there. Part of the doc was going to be the pursuit of a star for OBie on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. That effort was for naught as I discovered that the stars are actually purchased for a starting bid of 15k. It's just a sham/show for the "Mayor" of Hollywood to funnel money into the city coffers, while nuzzling up to starlets. A posthumous award to a deserving individual is performed as a token gesture. Regardless, I was happy to see Harryhausen receive his star and elated to hear him cite OBie on the spot.

The doc was going to end with OBie getting his own star, but now, knowing how the system works it's highly unlikely...

One reason I've not made any forward movement is due to a tangled horrorshow that involves Peter Jackson and his decision to make the stop-mo recreation for the Kong DVD. I am certain he was very aware that an indie filmmaker in the states was ALREADY doing the exact same thing, because I spoke directly to one of his crew about Jim Danforth's work-in-progress prior to Peter's announcement. I won't get into who that crewperson was, but Jim spoke to him as well. Again, BEFORE they'd even started their version.

I also had meetings with WB execs (who hold RKO copyrights for clips at 10k per minute, I might add!!!) and their farm-out DVD company who produced their Pit sequence. They ALL saw the booklet which outlined my work in progress, plus a DVD of the trailer. I'd seriously considered a lawsuit. A very well connected copyright firm advised me that though I DID have a valid case... WB could easily tie me up in court for years, at great personal expenditure. Already being in the red for enough money to put my kid in college, I decided to halt work.

It's been a huge disappointment which I cannot fail to be reminded of every day, as I sit in my office looking at my Bob Burns armature recreation. The experience was so traumatizing that I've been unable to watch Kong ever since. And that used to be a pleasure I'd revisit about 6 times a year... since the grand old ape was released on video.

If anything positive came out of the experience, I still value the contact I had with Jim and Don; always thankful for their friendship & advice. Chris Endicott also played a crucial role and deserves my thanks. Hopefully this clears up a bit of the mystery....

Best to all! Keep animating...

...

[Gwangi]

[MouthForWar]

[mr.negativity]

[mr.negativity]

[MouthForWar]

Any word on a DVD/BD release for this thing yet?

[MouthForWar]

FYI, this thing is on Netflix Instant now. I'm gonna check it out soon.

[KaijuZoo]

Wow, thanks for sharing, just watched it on Netflix. It was so cool to relive many of the films that I saw as a kid and to get the back story on how they were made.

[O.Supreme]

This was amazing fun. Glad to see it wasn't the same documentary on the Harryhousen collection DVD's

[klen7]

Slightly OT, but better than starting a new topic.. check out these great Clash of the Titan Posters from Mondo
http://www.slashfilm.com/mondo-does-two ... mondo-con/

[Henry88]

[lhb412]

Watched this doc a little while ago on Netflix and enjoyed it, but I have to say I preferred the '98 documentary The Harryhausen Chronicles, which, despite its less than feature length run time, is more packed with interesting content. Special Effects Titan had a lot of very famous industry types gushing for a good deal of the runtime, but I preferred Chronicles' mostly one-on-one with Ray with only a few interruptions for accolades (and all tied together by narration by Leonard Nimoy!).

I also feel that Chronicles was just more in-depth about Ray's creative process. You know; the good stuff. Still, it's good to have two nice docs on Ray.

[Gwangi]

The only disappointing thing about "The Harryhausen Chronicles" was zero footage on "One Million Years B.C." I would assume thay had a hard time secruing the rights from Hammer, or perhaps it was something else that prevented them from showing any scenes.

As a Harryhausen nut, I still have to see this thing. With his passing last year, we are likely not going to get anymore programs like these.

[Gwangi]

After all of these years, "Ray Harryhausen: Special Effects Titan" will finally be available on blu-ray and DVD this June! (June 28th to be precise).

[lhb412]

My review may have been lukewarm, but I'll nevertheless be happy to add this to my Harryhausen Blu-Ray collection!