Undead Backbrain

At the instigation of Mysterious Pants, the Backbrain scouted out Attack of the Giant Gull (US/Canada-2002; dir. Jonathan M. Parisen), which does appear on the Internet Movie Database as a video release, though no release date is actually given.

After a bit of a search, I found a conceptual poster mock-up that was done for the film by Shawn L. Fratis:

Fratis is a digital artist who “created many models and test shots” for the film, “including fire/explosion effects”. He also did “effects and animations of the giant seagull attacking New York”. [ref] In his resume, he lists the film as an “uncompleted project”.

Here are some test SFX shots [ref]:

This independent film is listed as being produced by Parivision Entertainment. I think it fair to say that it was a low-budget project that may or may not have been completed.

There’s a giant monster bird movie out there that is more recent than the infamous The Giant Claw (US-1957; dir. Fred F. Sears).

It’s called Big Bird — but it’s not this one by artist Jonni Good (click here to view Flash movie… it’s very short).

Nor does it have anything to do with this guy:

Kaiju Search-Robot Avery asked me if I’ve ever heard of the film that goes with the  poster on the right. Supposedly it’s a Thai film, and Avery says he first became aware of it via a 2005 issue of Fangoria, where it was mentioned — along with Deep Sea Monster Reigo and Mega-Snake — in an article on the American Film Market for that year. It is also mentioned by Foywonder (which is where the poster comes from).

But it still hasn’t … um… flown in.

Anyone heard of it? Details, please?

I guess it’s a spoof, if it even exists…

Famed stop-motion animator Willis E. O’Brien made motion picture history when he animated a series of dinosaurs confronting modern humanity in the 1925 version of Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Lost World. The SFX of this film were astounding at the time — and early tests are said to have convinced some who saw it that O’Brien had found a way of photographing the past. Sure, to us, in these post-Jurassic Park days of almost seamless CGI techniques, O’Brien’s creatures appear much less real — but we’re a jaded and less naïve bunch who have, possibly, seen too much for our own imagination’s good. Yet somehow, even today, director Harry O. Hoyt’s The Lost World works its magic and you can easily be drawn into the onscreen wonders. At any rate his depiction of a brontosaur rampaging through the streets of London remains a milestone in the development of the giant monster genre and shouldn’t be dismissed. Without it, there may not have been a King Kong — which was, of course, O’Brien’s next SFX masterpiece and an even-more influential film.

The thing is, there were many dinosauresque disappointments in O’Brien’s subsequent career. One was a script he wrote in the early 1960s, “King Kong vs Frankenstein”, intended as a second sequel to King Kong. Below is one of Obie’s conceptual sketches for his proposed film:

The script got caught up in studio politics and, via a series of (from O’Brien’s point of view) unfortunate, even treacherous circumstances, ended up being made by Japan’s Toho Studios as King Kong vs Godzilla. Originally he was promised stop-motion, but of course what eventuated was classic daikaiju eiga suitmation — hardly calculated to make O’Brien happy.

Yet before this he’d been disappointed by another version of The Lost World, one produced and directed by Irwin Allen in 1960. This one is as far from the classic stature of the 1925 film as the Brazilian jungle is from London. Moreover, where in the early film the dinosaurs had looked like dinosaurs, in this one they looked like lizards with frills and horns stuck on them. This, for example, may have been intended to be a Stegosaurus (with a touch of Triceratops around the head), or maybe some sort of Dimetrodon (which were, of course, pre-dinosaurian reptiles rather than dinosaurs). It could also be a Irwin Allen version of a Spinosaurus, though I don’t think that particular critter had been discovered in 1960:

But what they really were was indeed lizards (usually monitor lizards) with frills and horns stuck on them!

Allen’s The Lost World doesn’t have a good reputation among dinosaur fans, it being a little difficult to take the dinosaurs seriously when every school kid knows what a Brontosaurus or a T-Rex looks like — and they definitely do not look like the critters in the film. Sadly, Irwin Allen had at one time intended that the dinosaurs would be created using stop-motion techniques and Obie had been promised the job. But budgetary (and in all probability time) constraints put the kibosh on the idea — and once again Obie was to be disappointed. So were his many fans.

Still, there is a certain odd appeal to the monitor lizards with spikes stuck on them, especially in the conceptual drawings of production illustrator Maurice Zuberano.

And just for the sake of completeness, here is the protagonists approaching the lost plateau:

Maybe if the dialogue hadn’t referred to the creatures as Tyrannosaurus Rex, Brontosaurus, Stegasaurus etc., and had chosen to treat them as some sort of mutant form of dinosaur, Allen might have gotten away with the total lack of iconic familiarity. And after all, it would make sense. It is very unlikely that the ancient dinosaur species, albeit isolated from the rest of the world, would remain unchanged for millions of years…

Finally, here’s a comic version of the movie that came out at the time:

Thanks to Todd Tennant for all the visual material and for providing the impetus behind this article.

What is Gualagon, I hear you ask? Well it’s a German-made, Japanese style kaiju film done as a radio play — inspired by such Toho classics as Furankenshutain tai chitei kaiju Baragon [trans. Frankenstein vs the Subterranean Monster Baragon] (1965; dir. Ishiro Honda) [aka Frankenstein Conquers the World (US, 1966)]. The play includes characters such as “Dr Tamblyn” and even a “Serizawa Institute”. If these names don’t evoke any memories, you’d better get out your Toho classics and re-watch them, starting with Gojira!

Gualagon — Frankenstein’s Schreckengigant [lit. Gualagon — Frankenstein’s Fright Giant] (directed by Konrad Halver; concept bby Ralf Lorenz)

Kaiju Search-Robot Avery stumbled upon this — using some canny skills of uncovering clues — and was intrigued to find Ralf Lorenz’s name attached to it. Lorenz is the force behind the long-unfinished German King Kong knock-off, Kongula.

But wait! Though Gualagon is a radio play, the creators have been visualising it as well:

Avery comments: “The monster’s design appears to be a conglomerate of Hedorah and Guilala”.

The Story (rough translation)

In 1966, just off the Japanese coast, the freighter Asahi Maru fights its way through a heavy storm, when something incomprehensible happens: the ship is destroyed and the only survivor maintains that it was destroyed by a gigantic kraken-like monster! Professor Tamblyn, specialist at the Serizawa institute in those forms of gigantism caused by radiation, examines the wreck of the ship and is dismayed to realise that a tremendous danger threatens Japan! While the military mobilises and naval forces patrol the coastline, reporters Keisuke Kusano and Isao Ogawa come upon traces of the monster Gualagon — and thereby put themselves in deadly danger. Panic breaks out when the monster comes ashore one night and attacks Osaka… The race is on for scientists to develop new weapons to deal with the fright giant of Frankenstein! From the depths of the sea he comes! Inexorably, gigantically, all destroying!

A trailer will be going up on the Gualagon website (eventually), which also says that there will be more plays forthcoming and perhaps a comic. Let’s hope they decide to do a movie as well!

Website

The story goes that Steven Spielberg and Kathleen Kennedy were keen to make a miniseries of it, but cost and backroom politics seem to have killed that. We’re talking about Stephen King and Peter Straub’s fantasy The Talisman here, the epic scope of which is apparently hindering the book’s translation to cinema.

But the prospect that it might get made inspired director Matthieu Ratthi to make a demo scene, hoping to encourage the Powers That Be to consider him for the job of directing a Talisman movie, should such a beast ever be unleashed. The result is called “The Hotel Room”, and in my opinion it works remarkably effectively as a stand-alone piece of cinematic “flash fiction”.

• Source: Arrow in the Head via Avery

More Details on Godzilla Zero Hour

Franz Vorenkamp reveals more about his GZH project in the lead-up to its 5 July G-Fest premiere.

What’s the deal with the soundtrack?

It’s all original stuff composed by Bob Harrington. Some of it is based on the classic themes from Toho.

Will GZH be sold on DVD?

No. That would be illegal. They’re going to offer it for free download.

What about the soundtrack?

The all-original tracks will be available on a CD we’ll put out sometime called “Zero Media: Original Soundtracks One”. Proceeds will go to Bob and Apollo.

What kind of equipment is being used?

The team shoots with a Canon XL-2 using professional-grade audio equipment. The editing is done on an Alienware Area 51-M computer. Franz has been quoted as saying: “It’s insane … Just … insane”.

We’ve been recording after dialog with condenser mics, which give voice-overs and such professional clarity, but also a bass channel that’s a bit overpowering at times … So, I’m having to manually go into each track and bump the treble which takes double the time. Even as it stands, everything film-wise is edited and needs a couple sound effects dropped in, music, and color correction. (yawn) Additional CG and special effects will be rendering in the lead-up — we’re going to have a little more than I thought in the G-Fest cut (yay!)

I still want to stress how superior the online cut will be, however.

The State of Play

Here’s a comparison list Franz prepared for himself and everyone else on the differences between the two “versions”:

G-Fest Cut:

Editing: Mostly great with some minor hiccups here and there. Solid, but lacks finesse. Color is great in some areas … a little odd in others. A Don Frye scene (if it works out) will hopefully be edited in.

Sound: Decent — some scenes make use of advanced Dolby techniques. In spots, the atmosphere and foley work is just incredible. The audio for the characters speaking has been bumped WAY up to the point of being almost overpowering just to make sure that they’re able to be heard — foolproofing it, hopefully. We’re trying hard to avoid a “what’d he say?” situation.

Length: 35-40 minutes

Music: Lots of filler stuff — only one song from Bob Harrington. Everything else is either stuff from bands, existing movies, or “it’ll do” material written by me. there are some VERY inspired choices in some situations that might end up in the final cut.

CG/Action: Not a lot (think Gamera 3 in a more concentrated form), but cool none the less. A little more visceral than I think people expect. Everything blends nicely, and there are some great shots. Nothing terribly fancy, but some good “ooh and ahh” moments.

Extras: A title menu with a song I picked out.

Online Cut:

Editing: Fine tuned and stylized. Colors should be bold, full ranges of high and low values in each scene, post camera alterations and panning, advanced transition techniques. If we film Don Frye, he will be in, and it will rock. He’s going to have a better catch phrase in this scene than “Go Right Into It”. Bet on it.

Sound: Everything rendered in true-space Dolby 5.1. If a chracter walks around the room while talking, you’ll hear the sound follow him. Additional tracks containing director (that’s me!) and cast commentaries. Minimum of two, maximum of four. Also, a stereo down mix for regular TVs, and headphones that will sound fantastic. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: the sound work will be this movie’s finest achievement. Our textures and atmosphere cannot be beat without a budget (mainly because I’m cheating and using studio equipment/software from more hi-tech sources).

Length: 45 minutes+ not including the deleted scenes menu.

Music: As much Bob Harrington-produced tracks as he is willing to provide; some of the stuff from commercial bands may be retained. Probably nothing by me.

CG/Action: I’m shooting for triple. I’d like to shut up the people who have been asking “why CG?” for three years. The answer? I can do things that are impossible to do with suits on no budget. Monster A takes a swing at Monster B; Monster B ducks, catches the punch on the pass, and slams their opponent through a hillside with real IMPACT. Fancy, complex stuff, possibly gratuitous, but who cares?

Extras: All production diaries. Behind the scenes videos, montages. Making of special-effects featurette, as many as two new trailers. All on meticulously animated and planned out interactive menus. Soundtrack included on disk.

Release: We’re shooting for August, but possibly well after. I’m definitely taking a break after G-Fest. Literally, I’ve been up until 6 am every night for the past month (and I go to work at 9 am).

Wait! here’s a Polaroid picture someone took of Gamera when he visited the set!

(Not in the film, but cool, eh?)

The Cast in Action

The above picture is of Professor James Rexius, who was keen to be in the film — as was this chap!

• Godzilla Zero Hour: Introduction Part 1
• Coming soon: GZH: The History Part 1

I don’t know what this is, or who directed it — but in the fashion of the time it seems to have the code-like title [G], which — when applied to a giant monster movie — automatically evokes the spectre of the Big G himself, Gojira (Godzilla).

This dude doesn’t look much like the Big G though…

From the two trailers and two scene segments below — unearthed by a chap on the kaiju forums tagged “Cookson”, via Kaiju Search-Robot Avery — the independent (perhaps even fan-based) film uses a combination of traditional kaiju suitmation and CGI to create a giant monster flick that is ground-level, violent and bloody, potentially having lots of emotional intensity, while retaining all those elements of absurdity that make the genre so appealing.

It even has a Robo-like giant robot to face up to the monster in true mecha style.

Anyway, take a look at these trailers and clips and hopefully we’ll find out some concrete information on the film soon.

Having just read G-Fan #83, I’m suitably impressed by the new King Komodo graphic serial, Tales of King Komodo, which Todd Tennant (with Mike Bogue) has started in that issue. For one thing there’s a killer scene of a giant octopus attacking a ship! (I admit I have a weakness for giant cephalopods.)

Though I know that Todd has coloured versions of the panels, the ominous, black-ink rendition that appears in G-Fan gives the whole thing an impressive retro-look that more than suits the storyline.

Seeing King Komodo in action again (well, he will be in action in subsequent episodes) reminded me of a project of Todd’s that I’ve meant to detail here — the making of a trailer for a non-existent King Komodo movie. I’d seen some material relating to it and so asked Todd what it was all about.

Brief Description of the Project

In 2004, filmmaker Dan Tapia, SPFX artist Vince Akira Yoshida, and artist Todd Tennant set out to make a “trailer” that would hopefully introduce the world to the daikaiju KING KOMODO, a graphic novel story idea created by writer Mike Bogue and Todd Tennant.

Pre-production illustrations and plans were made. Dan Tapia shot the live footage on location at a farmhouse in Canada, but due to a lack of funding the project was put on hold. Vince, Dan, and Todd hope to re-activate this project and finish this trailer sometime soon, but for now and for the record, here is the basic story-line and photo records of what did take place back then.

The KING KOMODO “Trailer” Concept (as of 1 July 2004)

The Plot: A young girl waking up early in her 2nd storey farmhouse room and looks out her window. She sees something that makes her very happy and wakes her parents, shouting,”They came …. they were HERE! Come see!”

The farmers are then seen walking our of their house onto the front porch (set on a small hill), and look out onto their adjacent cornfield, where there are large “circular impressions” in the cornfield. They walk out into the field and stand in the “impression”.

“See, Daddy! I told you they would come and visit us!!” (implying these are “crop circles” caused by aliens, as in the film Signs).

There is a booming sound heard in the distance….it grows louder and the earth shakes progressively more with each “boom”, as whatever is causing this seems to be approaching. Suddenly a large shadow overcomes the farmers and most of the cornfield. Instinctively, they turn in the direction of whatever is making this shadow.

The final “shot” is from behind the couple looking back at their house, only to see it being smashed flat by a the gigantic foot of King Komodo.

The screen goes black and there is a terribly loud and long ROOOOAAARRRR! … then the words “KING KOMODO IS KOMING!” appear in white.

The Monster

[Click on images to see them at a larger size.]

The Family

The actors who auditioned for the “farmer” and “farmer’s wife” roles seen here were not used in the final shoot. The “little girl” seen here was included in Dan Tapia’s final shoot.

The Footprint

The Barn

The Storyboard

• For more on King Komodo, visit Todd’s website

Correspondent Richard Duran asks:

“For the longest time, I thought that the ‘Amelia’ chapter of Trilogy of Terror gave more background on the Zuni fetish. I have a distinct memory of seeing a movie/show on TV as a child where in one scene there was a doll on the ground as soldiers on horseback charge past. The scene eventually shows the doll sitting upright (or moving in some similar fashion). I was rather disappointed not to see this scene in Trilogy of Terror, which now makes me wonder: Did I imagine that scene, or was is some other movie.”

It has the quality of a Twilight Zone moment, but I must admit I have no recollection of the scene.

Can anyone out there identify it?

For a long time now, a project called Tuatara has been cooking away somewhere in an alternative universe known as Oregon. Kaiju Search-Robot Avery spotted it and the Backbrain wondered what it was and if the project still has life in it or not.

Avery commented: “Tuatara is an ambitious stop-motion / claymation kaiju film from a company named Space Monster Pictures. The company has been around since 2004 and the project itself has apparently been around in some form or other for the past 15 years. Now though it may be starting to see the light of day.”

“Apparently the design of the kaiju Tuatara is based on a real-life prehistoric lizard of the same name — one that is still alive today in New Zealand.”

• The real Tuatara!

The film, with its intricate street-scapes and other paraphenalia, also features a giant robot called Gunzai and a giant man-like critter called Manster.

Tuatara faces the latest iteration of Gunzai
(the one above is a prototype):

Manster!

This could be a very interesting project indeed — and hopefully the publicity it’s getting will bring the creators out into the open to take credit for the work so far and to tell us all the state-of-play in regards to the film!

• MySpace site
• Lots of pictures

Via Kaiju Search-Robot Avery