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Journey to the Center of the Earth (1959)
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Pow
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PostPosted: Sun Dec 05, 2021 4:07 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Along the lines again of the suggestion that Errol Flynn would have done a fine job as Captain Nemo in the classic Walt Disney movie.

Uncertain Glory" April 22, 1944. Errol stars as Jean Picard (maybe related to Captain Jean Luc Picard?), who is a thief and murderer that has been sentenced to death via the guillotine in Paris.

An air raid attack delivers a direct hit to the prison just as Picard is standing at the guillotine. Many are killed, but not Picard, who promptly escapes. French Surete Inspector Marcle Bonet (Paul Lukas who would co-star later in Disney's Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea) immediately goes on the hunt for the escaped murderer.

Bonet does manage to recapture Picard and is bringing him back to Paris.

On their journey backto Paris they are delayed when saboteurs destroy a bridge and a German-troop train.

100 hostages will be executed in 5 days by the Germans unless the perpetrator is found.

Picard asks how Germans execute saboteurs? When he is told that it is by a firing squad, he offers to masquerade as the saboteur in order to escape the guillotine. Wikipedia.

I think this is one of Flynn's best roles he ever did where he shows a range that too often he wasn't allowed to do by Warner Brothers Studio. Their films with him as the larger-than-life swashbuckling hero made the studio lots of money. That's what the public craved from Errol and that's the rigid formula Warners mostly stuck to doing.

Reviewers were impressed by Errol's performance showing he was more than a one-note actor.
"Restrained, earnest and believable portrayal, grim rebellion" were some of the comments from the critics.

Had Errol been offered the Nemo role, and had he brought this persona to it, he'd have made it work beautifully.

If you've never seen this film, Bud, please check it out and see what Flynn could do when given the opportunity...and whenever he kept his wild hedonistic lifestyle in control. Which wasn't often, unfortunately.
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Pow
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PostPosted: Wed Dec 21, 2022 10:11 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I rather liked the bioluminescence explanation for the explanation as to why there is light in the caves. Fungi, bacteria, and microorganisms can produce and emit light. Why can't we establish that they have managed to grow throughout subterranean tunnels and cover the place? It is science fiction after all.

In the classic Jules Verne novel the intrepid spelunkers encounter a fierce battle between a icthyosaur & plesiosaurus while on the underground ocean on their raft. Excellent scene for O'Bie or Ray to have stop-animated.

Later on the explorers encounter a herd of mastodons and a prehistoric humanoid over twelve feet tall. Another sequence for O'Bie or Ray.
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Maurice
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PostPosted: Sat Jan 14, 2023 12:43 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Pow wrote:
In the classic Jules Verne novel the intrepid spelunkers encounter a fierce battle between a icthyosaur & plesiosaurus while on the underground ocean on their raft. Excellent scene for O'Bie or Ray to have stop-animated.

Eek. It would have to happen below the surface, otherwise you have to deal with the surface of the water, and that's not something you can animate stop motion. I know Harryhausen cheated it in some movies, but man, doing a fight scene...


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Pow
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 16, 2023 12:35 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Maurice wrote:
Pow wrote:
In the classic Jules Verne novel the intrepid spelunkers encounter a fierce battle between a icthyosaur & plesiosaurus while on the underground ocean on their raft. Excellent scene for O'Bie or Ray to have stop-animated.

Eek. It would have to happen below the surface, otherwise you have to deal with the surface of the water, and that's not something you can animate stop motion. I know Harryhausen cheated it in some movies, but man, doing a fight scene...

I'm not suggesting that such a sea battle by the dinos would be a walk in the park for either O'Bie or Ray to execute. They'd require the proper amount of time & budget to make it work well at all.

However, after reviewing the mutant octopus attack on the boat in Harryhausen's It Came From Beneath the Sea, it could be done and done well.
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 16, 2023 2:49 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

__________________________________________________

Mike, I was all set to respectfully disagree with your statement above, but I decided to take another look at the "ship sinking" scene first.

Thank goodness I did. Shocked

The YouTube colorized version below really brings out the agitation of the ocean's surface, demonstrating just how well Harryhausen blended the animation with the shots of the churning water! Very Happy

Even the YouTube thumbnail shows how well Ray did.


The Monster Strikes! It Came From Beneath The Sea


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I should point out that Ray performed that miracle on a shoestring budget. So, with a big-budget 20th Century Fox film like Journey to the Center of the Earth, a Harryhausen/O'Brien team could have worked wonders!

By the way, I almost said something stupid, namely that the octopus was never describe as a "mutant".

But then I remembered the frequent references to the fact that the monster was radioactive. Therefore it's gigantic size might have been caused (at least partially) by the same wacky effect that radiation had on the giant ants in Them, along with other living things in several 1950s movies.

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