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Ice Station Zebra (1968)
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Gord Green
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PostPosted: Fri May 22, 2020 8:47 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Should put this on our chat room list!!
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Morbius
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PostPosted: Sat Jul 04, 2020 10:42 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

A remake would be fitting, a great film.

The secret of steel?
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Gord Green
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PostPosted: Sun Jul 05, 2020 2:29 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Just a great Russian Cold War Era movie with great actors and a superior story!

And in Cinerama to boot!

What could be better????

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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Sun Jul 05, 2020 8:59 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Morbius wrote:
A remake would be fitting, a great film.

A science fiction version might be good.

Like, a story about an alien artifact on a planet in the Magellanic Clouds which contains a vast storehouse of knowledge from thousands of extinct civilizations. Two groups are striving to gain possession of it — one group of moral beings and another group of amoral and dangerous ones.

Wait . . . that sounds familiar. Confused

Oh, right. That's my novel, Sail the Sea of Stars . . . with borrowed ideas from Ice Station Zebra! Embarassed

Notice the submarine-like "sail" on the starships.




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Pow
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PostPosted: Wed Feb 17, 2021 11:16 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Just watched today my recently arrived dvd of ISZ and totally enjoyed it as I always do when seeing the motion picture.

Producer Martin Ransohoff had hoped to capitalize upon the blockbuster success of "The Guns of Navarone" (1961).

ISZ did well but did not equal the smash that TGON had been.

Ransohoff thought that ISZ would cost $5,000,000 to make. It was budgeted at $8,000,000 and ultimately cost $10,000,000.

The sets and visual FX reflect that hefty price tag.

The scenes with the USN Tigerfish under the ice remain awesome looking to this day.

I agree with Bud, the USSR military jet fighters FX scenes are weak.

There is also a scene where we see the turbulent ocean waves & stormy sky with the ice pact in the distance. The waves and sky look just fine. But the ice pact is clearly a matte painting.

Famed writer Paddy Chayefsky was hired to write the script for the movie.

The United States Department of Defense objected to Paddy's screenplay.

They felt that it was "an unfair distortion of military life and would damage the reputation of the Navy and its personnel." Meaning: Paddy probably wrote an accurate account of Navy life and the Pentagon didn't like it.

Laurence Harvey was replaced by Ernest Borgnine.

Ernie played an officer on the 1958 submarine film "Torpedo Run" with Glenn Ford as the captain of the WWII submarine.

Star Trek: TOS connections.

Lloyd Haynes (October 19, 1934~December 31, 1986) played one of the Tigerfish crew. He's one of the men using the acetylene torch in the finale in order to melt the ice encasing the all-important satellite canister containing the vital film footage.

Lloyd is best remembered as high school history teacher Pete Dixon on the TV series "Room 222."

Prior to that, Lloyd was the communications officer on board the star ship Enterprise in the second pilot for Star Trek : "Where No man Has Gone Before."

James Goodwin (1929~1980) portrays one of the survivors that is questioned at ISZ. Jim played crewman Farrell on three episodes from the first season of ST:TOS.

He was in "The Enemy Within" from October 6, 1966, "Mudd's Women" from October 13, 1966, and "Miri" from October 27, 1966.

William O'Connell plays another survivor at ISZ. He played the Orion espionage agent Thelev on ST: TOS episode "Journey to Babel" from November 17, 1967.

The sequence where one man falls into a crevasse is still a nail-bitter as the ice pact shifts to enclose him.

David Jones (Davy Jones locker) played by Patrick McGoohan refers to the submarine as a ship. A submarine is a boat in Navy terms and never a ship.

Commander Ferraday (Rock Hudson) and the others are exploring ISZ when they first arrive. At one point, he steps into a building while two Marines with rifles are behind him.

I'm gonna guess this wouldn't happen in a real military operation. The Marines would have investigated the building first and not the captain of a submarine.

*SPOILER ALERT FOR A 53 YEAR OLD MOVIE*

Exactly when did British secret agent Jones figure out that Vaslov (Ernest Borgnine) was a double agent?

I never quite caught what finally tipped Jones off.

Notice that at the end the Soviets walk away leaving Vaslov lying in the snow. Guess he went back on the Tigerfish and into prison.
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 18, 2021 12:08 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

________________________________

Terrific post, Mike! I too have a DVD of this movie, and I enjoy it very much.

The music by Michel Legrand is a big plus for the movie, as is his score for The Three Musketeers in 1973.


_ Ice Station Zebra | Soundtrack Suite (Michel Legrand)


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Krel
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 18, 2021 1:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

The ice station set was filmed outside in the MGM water tank, where the C-57-D landing was filmed. It was filmed there because of the vast painted background space needed for miniature scenes, was needed to portray the arctic sky.

Of course the tank was empty so the actors wouldn't be walking through waist deep water. Laughing

David.
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 18, 2021 3:14 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Krel wrote:
Of course the tank was empty so the actors wouldn't be walking through waist deep water. Laughing

Well heck, now THAT's a perfect example of why I would make a great studio head! Cool

I would have just left the water in the tank and then waited for Los Angeles to experience a rare cold snap which froze the water and covered it with snow!

Then the set designers could sculpt the snow into the shapes needed for the Arctic landscape — with the background painting to finish the effect!






If a few key scenes could be shot while the snow was still falling it would add to the atmosphere (no pun intended) and saved the studio even MORE money!

And the actors wouldn't have to spend all those uncomfortable hours wearing cold weather clothing in the normally warm California climate — the way the cast of The Thing from Another World did during the "crash site" scenes at the RKO Ranch in Encino! Shocked

* I'm just joshin', of course, but it's a funny idea, ain't it?
Laughing
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johnnybear
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 20, 2021 9:35 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

This is around the time that Patrick McGoohan took a brief hiatus from filming the Prisoner in England and leaving Nigel Stock to take on his role of the Prisoner with a mind swopping storyline in which the Prisoner wakes up in another man's body back in London and must find the genius who can swap him back to his old body and not reveal the process to the evil masterminds who control the Village!

It wasn't exactly a success as Stock, as number six, romances actress Zena Walker and seems to promise his return afterwards, but somehow I couldn't see Patrick McGoohan and Zena Walker together which is what we're told was going on before his sudden kidnapping and imprisonment in the Village!
JB
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Maurice
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 27, 2021 5:31 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Bud Brewster wrote:
Note from me: I guess part of the reason for Rock's high opinion is the fact that his character is so macho. If is so, that's kinda ironic, ain't it? Wink

Suggesting because he was gay he couldn't be macho, Bud?
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 27, 2021 1:47 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

________________________________

You're right. That was an insensitive remark. I apologize. Embarassed

And it was also inaccurate.

"Macho" means showing aggressive pride in one's masculinity. Rock's character was certainly "manly" in the best sense of the word, but he earned that description by displaying intelligence, leadership abilities, and bravery.

The word "macho" would only apply if we simply wanted to acknowledge that this character was "a helluva man" so to speak.

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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Sat Jul 10, 2021 4:36 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

________________________________

Here's few more IMDB trivia items for this production. Very Happy
________________________________

~ This film was originally shown in Cinerama venues. In order to put it into these theaters, MGM pulled 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) while it was still having a successful run.

Note from me: Strange that the studio would do this, especially since the movie isn't even true Cinerama.

~ Charlton Heston was originally offered the role of Ferraday but turned it down, saying there was no characterization in the script. Gregory Peck was then offered the part and early adverts in Variety magazine carried mention of Peck's casting, together with Laurence Harvey as Jones.

Note from me: I think Charlton didn't like the fact that most of the captain's behavior was written to show how calm he was under pressure.

~ Principal photography was originally slated for April 1965. However, the United States Department of Defense objected to some of the depiction of navy activities in the script by Paddy Chayefsky. As such, this and scheduling conflicts delayed the production of this movie, and the screenplay had to be re-written.

Note from me: I wonder what the DOD didn't like.

~ When a new screenplay was written for this movie, the original cast could not do the film anymore due to scheduling conflicts, so they were replaced with a new lead cast.

Note from me: Gee, thanks a lot DOD. Rolling Eyes

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PostPosted: Sat Jul 10, 2021 10:14 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

As I've said before, I'm a huge fan of ISZ and wouldn't change a thing.

But strictly for fun and as an exercise with my imagination I wondered what if this had been a Ray Harryhausen movie?
Ray never set any of his movies within the spy genre.

You keep the exact same espionage plot just as it was in ISZ. However, once the Tigerfish arrives at the scientific outpost we discover that the reason for loss of contact from ISZ is actually twofold. One, the secret agents battle and sabotage just like the plot turn from the movie; Two, a clan of savage abominable snowmen who've attacked the station.

The rest of the film is having the leads figure out just what happened between the agents that were at ISZ just as was done in the movie.

But now they must also find a way to fight the snow creatures once they secure the film. They would have part of the battle take place at the demolished ice station. Except I would have had more buildings than we saw in the movie, and I would have had a few of 'em intact so that the crew could have some degree of shelter.

The rest of the film would see a running battle as the crew attempts to flee back to their sub while being hunted by the snowmen.

The Soviets then parachute down as seen in the original movie. Now they are also caught up in this debacle and actually join forces with the USN to fight the snow creatures.

Both sides suffer losses but do finally make it back to the Tigerfish. It is touch and go as the military men frantically get into the submarine. The creatures continue their attack of the sub as it submerges. The Tigerfish is able to get away.

The vital satellite film has been lost or destroyed during the battle.
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Sun Jul 11, 2021 9:27 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

________________________________

What a wild idea, Mike! Thanks for pitching it to us. It inspired me to take a shot at coming up with my own alternate version of Ice Station Zebra. Very Happy

Here's what I came up with.

Suppose a starship with a group of stop motion aliens were in orbit and saw the satellite reenter the atmosphere, and they followed it down.






Then they began covertly observing the conflict between the humans when the aliens became curious about the reason for it.

These aliens wear "stealth suits" which make them virtually invisible in this snow-covered, monochromatic environment. (Think "Predator", with a dash of "The Thing".)

In the climax, when the aliens eventually learn what the satellite film reveals, they decide to take it and study the vast amount of information it contains.

The movie ends with the Americans and the Russians deciding that they must unite and be ready for an invasion after the aliens learn where all our military bases are located! Shocked

In other words, the very threat that the Russians and Americans feared from whichever nation obtained the film is now much worse — because the aliens have it! Shocked

~ And in case anybody is wondering . . . yes, I'm now thoroughly in the mood to watch Independence Day, which is sort of a sequel to what I just described! In fact, I already had the DVD in my player, paused and ready when I wrote this post!

That's probably what gave me the above idea! Laughing

Having said that, I can't resist the temptation to say again that the reason the aliens in ID4 were tricked by the virus is because — after studying us for decades (according to the movie) — their computers were deliberately designed to interface with our computers so they could use our satellites against us.

That capability turned out to be their Achilles heel. The arrogant aliens never suspected that we'd figure that out and feed their computer a simple "self-replicating code" (the laughing skull), which briefly overwhelmed their systems.

A few years ago I debated this extensively with Alltare on the ID4 thread, but he just kept telling me I didn't understand how computers worked. He insisted that Jeff Goldblum's computer couldn't possibly have figured out the alien computer's operating system! Rolling Eyes

Obviously that was NOT necessary. The aliens came to Earth already equipped to understand our operating systems. Cool

To put all this in simple terms; I don't have to learn French to speak to a Frenchman . . . if he already speaks English. Very Happy

FYI: A "computer virus" is defined by the Oxford Language dictionary this way.

A piece of code which is capable of copying itself and typically has a detrimental effect, such as corrupting the system or destroying data.

Simple. Easy. Effective. End of discussion.

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PostPosted: Sun Jul 11, 2021 4:28 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Another marvelous idea from the mind of Bruce.

Your concept would be a movie that I'd gladly want to see.

I remember thinking about an idea for a sci~fi film once that would involve a peaceful alien civilization arriving at Earth in the midst of World War II.

What would the aliens make of it? How would they determine what side had just cause without knowing anything about the history of our planet or the causes for this war?

I then thought of my idea in the context of Star Trek.

What would happen if the Enterprise had orders to make first contact with a world that when they arrived there that world was at war with itself without the Federation having any prior information whatsoever about the war or its reasons?

Assuming it was a technologically sophisticated world that would allow contact by the Federation of Planets; just what would be the responsibilities of the captain of a star ship?

Intervention, if that is possible? But how do you sanely intervene in the midst of insanity?

Does a star ship have any protocols established for such a thing?

Could any intervention unintentionally make the situation worse?

Might have made for an interesting episode. Perhaps a two-part episode.
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