Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow! 232
ph43thon writes "The New York Times Magazine has a neat story about the sci-fi nerd, Kerry Conran, behind 'Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow.' It's an interesting look at his creative journey starting with a Macintosh IIci. It took him twelve hours just to render individual robot legs. Antisocial, shy people rejoice! Hide in your homes until you get discovered by a movie producer!!"
Obligatory (Score:4, Informative)
Oh, the regrets (Score:4, Funny)
huh ? (Score:5, Funny)
uh no, getting "discovered" is exactly what us antisocial folk want to avoid. Just for that I'm going to dig an even deeper borrow!
Re:huh ? (Score:3, Funny)
So now I know why many
Re:huh ? (Score:5, Funny)
Dude, getting yourself deeper in debt is NOT a way to stay unnoticed. Just trust me on this.
SB
Pizza producers? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Pizza producers? (Score:4, Funny)
The Trailer (Score:5, Informative)
Re:The Trailer (Score:4, Funny)
Re:The Trailer (Score:5, Informative)
Using music from older movies is a common practice for trailers. Sometimes, the real music hasn't been recorded yet. Often, however, existing music is used because it gives audiences a vague sense of familiarity with the film, even when they haven't seen it yet.
Re:The Trailer (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:The Trailer (Score:3, Informative)
Thank you (Score:2)
Conan the Barbarian theme used for the The Scorpion King trailer.
Miller's Crossing theme used in ??? (something fairly recent).
Terminator 2 theme used in the Universal Soldier trailer.
May (Score:5, Insightful)
When I saw the preview in the theater nearly everyone looked at each other in shock and amusement. Some things just don't make good movies.
Nah! Re:May (Score:5, Insightful)
"Magic rings? Little guys with hairy feet? Twisted little trolls with multiple personality disorder. Please! Nyahhhh, gimme a babe with guns and big tits, yeah, that's adventure, HAWWW!"
If it's good, Sky Captain might be a moderately succussful popcorn movie. If not, it will be out of theaters in a week. But not because it's for geeks.
Stefan
Re:Nah! Re:May (Score:5, Insightful)
There have been plenty of other geek movies: Spiderman, Batman, Star Trek, but they all had a franchise. Only thing I can think of that came out of nowhere was Star Wars...
It might make it, but I don't think the odds are that good. Too bad: it looks interesting.
Re:Nah! Re:May (Score:5, Insightful)
There have been plenty of other geek movies: Spiderman, Batman, Star Trek, but they all had a franchise. Only thing I can think of that came out of nowhere was Star Wars...
How about Indiana Jones -- that seems like it is the closest equivalent, considering that both Indy and Sky Captain are inspired from 1930's pulps and serials.
Re:Nah! Re:May (Score:4, Insightful)
If it showed up today with Lucas name on it I wonder how much "Hey that should be good" sentiment it could count on?
Re:Nah! Re:May (Score:2, Insightful)
Fizzled yes... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Nah! Re:May (Score:2)
Re:Nah! Re:May (Score:3)
How about... the Matrix?
Unless you predicted a sci-fi powerhouse coming out of the creators of Assassins and Bound...
Re:May (Score:3, Insightful)
For me, I saw the trailor a while ago linked from some strange place on the web. First thing I did was download this and save it to my usb flash drive.
I was happy with it and I want to see the movie. I like the premise and I don't care if its cheesy. It made me want to dig out crimson skies and pretend to be an ace pilot for 20 minutes.
However, I showed it to a few co-workers and my family. I didn't get quite the same reaction that I had experienced. Actually, it was a bit of a negative reac
Re:May (Score:2)
Something I noticed in the trailer were the flying robots. I distinctly remember them flying around, then robbing banks, then flying away. The only thing was that this was in a very early color Superman cartoo
Re:May (Score:2)
Re:May (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:May (Score:2)
Re:May (Score:2)
Must be tired... (Score:5, Funny)
Waitaminute (Score:5, Funny)
Not just hide and wait (Score:5, Insightful)
So the moral of the story is, if you really want to do something like that, make sure you don't just sit there and wait to be discovered, it will never happen until someone see your work.
And as a side note, there are many similar productions with no initial sponsors and low budget, yet able to pull it through at a much faster pace than 10 years - like Blair Witch Project.
Re:Not just hide and wait (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Not just hide and wait (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Not just hide and wait (Score:2)
No, the real moral is: (Score:2)
if you promote your project enough, you may be able to work with a chick like Angolina Jolie and Gwyneth Paltrow 8-}
Re:Not just hide and wait (Score:2, Interesting)
p
a couple of good interviews.. (Score:5, Informative)
Does noone else see this movie as HILARIOUS? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Does noone else see this movie as HILARIOUS? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Does noone else see this movie as HILARIOUS? (Score:5, Informative)
I'll bet you've never even heard of Doc Savage.
Re:Does noone else see this movie as HILARIOUS? (Score:3, Interesting)
My gawd - I'd nearly forgotten about chewing through the stacks of Doc Savage [thepulp.net] rags I'd found in family storage when I was a kid. Entertaining, until I burned out on them; that era's pulp fiction was incredibly formulaic, although in all fairness I doubt that's changed much over the years. Great mindless stuff, lots of melodrama and action, good guys were really good and bad guys were just awful.
To attempt to get back on topic, I thought the same thing when
Doc Savage (Score:2)
But I was more of a "Grey Avenger" fan, in any case.
Chip H.
Re:Does noone else see this movie as HILARIOUS? (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't begrude someone for not knowing Sky King. I begrudge them seriously for not knowing ANYTHING about pulp.
Totenkopf? (Score:3, Informative)
Hmmm, I can see a lot of people out there might get a wee bit pissed off about the fact that his scientist is named after the infamous SS Totenkopf (Death's Head) Division [freewire.co.uk] that ran... concentration camps.
Yes, I know it sounds cool, I know a lot of people might think I'm being picky and overtly PC, but Totenkopf isn't a German surname (Dr. Deaths Head!?), and I kinda wonder - given it's background - if the guy actually knows the history behind it.
Re:Totenkopf? (Score:5, Insightful)
The villian is an evil genius, and who in the 1930's were the most evil techno types? The Germans. And who do we now know were not just militarily aggressive, but truly, wholly, cut-you-open-to see-how-you-tick insanely evil? The Nazis.
Re:Totenkopf? (Score:3, Interesting)
Why couldn't it be? I know people named Himmelreich (Heavenly kingdom) and Fleishman (Meat man). German surnames generally actually mean something and are derivable from German words.
Re:Totenkopf? (Score:2, Interesting)
According to your view, lots of people should be pissed about Rowling having an antagonist named Voldemort (Winged Death, I think is the translation) with a lot o
Re:Totenkopf? (Score:2)
Re:Totenkopf? (Score:2)
Mortis => death
"Winged Death" seems to work. Though "thief of life" might be the transliteration.
Re:Totenkopf? (Score:2)
Given that Rowling seems to have a penchant for giving her baddies French- or Norman-sounding names (Draco Malfoy, etc), the latter seems more likely to me.
Although having said that, all the spells and stuff are in Latin, so she's obviously capable of either. But she does seem to have a thing about the French.
Re:Totenkopf? (Score:2, Interesting)
I suspect that the French for "thief" is probably derivative of the Latin for "winged" or "flight." I mean, think about what a thief does. Perhaps the way they "sneak" about to steal could be similar to flying (hard to catch, maybe?), or consider the fact they "fly" as fast as possible once an item is stolen. That said, I'm fairly certain I heard/read her say that it means winged. Either translation has interesting conotations, though.
One of us *could* po
Re:Totenkopf? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm sure that he does. Nazis were staple villains of 40s pulp fiction, which is the reason that they're recurring bad guys in the Indiana Jones movies, the Rocketeer, and the classic Doc Savage serials. Mad Nazi scientists, the Nazi quest for religious relics, and the Nazis invading Anarctica, the Hollow Earth, and other cryptogeographical locations are all staples of the pulp fiction era.
Re:Totenkopf? (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.feldgrau.com/3ss.html
They were a combat Armor division on the Western and Eastern front.
"Although after a shaky start they gained a fearsome fighting reputation they will always be associated with the concentration camp system and the running of the camps. This is due to the fact that the origins for this division can be traced back to the Totenkopfverbande which consisted of five pre-war standarten (regiments) who along with a few members of the SS-VT were responsible for guarding the concentration camps in Germany such as Dachau. This situation still persisted when the war started with guards being interchanged from frontline to concentration camp guard duties, however this practice was stopped when the invasion of Russia took place and manpower was needed at the front. Then the practice of interchanging men was almost identical as with any other Waffen SS unit."
At the time they were guarding the Camps, they were Concentration Camps in the role of, Concentration peoples togeather, the murder for which the camps will be famous for wasn't spelled out until 1942.
I'm not defending the Waffen-SS or anyother SS, but the 3.SS-Panzer was a combat Panzer unit and not a bunch of thugs shooting or gasing folks in a camp. They were a bunch of thugs shooting folks and burning villiages with tanks.
Darn (Score:3, Funny)
ah the Mac IIci... (Score:3, Interesting)
of course those days are over, but i don't think that I could ever remove the IIci from its place in the corner of my room.
What is the implication? (Score:2)
The Apple conspiracy continues...
Re:What is the implication? (Score:2)
And after all, this is Slashdot. You should expect to be modded down for questioning the Apple Gods, just as I expect to be modded down for explaining these obvious facts. There are many an Apple zealot lurking with mod points, and ra
Re:What is the implication? (Score:2)
The point was that he used a machine introduced in 1989. A machine that (as a poster points out below) runs at 25MHz using '030 processor. An old, old, old machine. Reading the article, I didn't see any mention of the new machines he is using.
But congrats on extrapolating a line in an article to an entire cultural rant.
Re:What is the implication? (Score:2)
Could it be that it is mentioned because the IIci is a really old, slow relic and that mentioning it's use underlines the fact that this guy was A) ahead of his time and B) doing amazing things with limited resources. I had always understood those two things to be almost the definition of Geekiness and part of the whole point of site devoted to "news for nerds".
Come on, don't you think it is cool, or at least
No use. (Score:5, Funny)
Take the film in context (Score:5, Insightful)
I've seen bare stage interpretations of Shakespeare. This isn't that type of flick. However, seeing as how the last movie I've seen is the Segal-like Payback (sorry, Afflick's bravado reminds me of Under Siege), I don't know if this will be so bad. Yes, I know that we get caught up in CGI valhalla. However, this does speak a lot for effort.
Plus, remember the goal is to make money. Not necessarily rake in $300 million at the US box office.
Re:Payback? Mel Gibson? (Score:2, Funny)
You work at Blockbuster don't you.
Stolen Music? (Score:3, Insightful)
I even went to my TiVo to confirm this, and yes they're the same. I can't believe that they would rip it so shamelessly.
Re:Stolen Music? (Score:2)
Somehow I doubt it's stolen--I suspect they've paid the applicable parties for the rights, unless for some reason you know differently.
Re:Stolen Music? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Stolen Music? (Score:2)
The definitive example, of course, being 2001.
Re:Stolen Music? (Score:2)
The problem with this reuse is that people will notice it afte
Re:Stolen Music? (Score:2)
Re:Stolen Music? (Score:2)
Although anyone who's watched Requiem for a Dream will find its use in LOTR
Re:Stolen Music? (Score:2)
Crimson Skies? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Crimson Skies? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Crimson Skies? (Score:2)
Crimson Skies with giant robots is... Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge.
[Minor Spoiler] A couple of times in the game you take on a giant 8-legged robot: once among the canyons of Atrixo, and once in stormy Chicago.
A Film Made for Howard Waldrop (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:A Film Made for Howard Waldrop (Score:3, Interesting)
Alas, not so. But I'll be cheering for Jetboy all the same
$70 Million for and Indie? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:$70 Million for and Indie? (Score:2)
Re:$70 Million for and Indie? (Score:2, Insightful)
the short (Score:3, Interesting)
3D on a Mac IIci... (Score:5, Interesting)
There's no mention of which software he used, but I recall that in '94 the big Mac 3D package was ElectricImage, with Strata 3D and Infini-D at the low end of the scale (~$500 or so). Photoshop was at around version 2 or 2.5; it wasn't until 3.0 when layers were implemented.
I remember trying to model and animate on an Amiga 500 with Turbo Silver back in 1989: anything with reflection or refraction would take about 24 hours per frame. Five years later, I was using Autodesk 3D Studio (R3 for DOS) on a 486 and had a room full of PCs for doing network rendering. Watching that red "Rendering" bar creep across the screen became a thing of the past (well, except for previews and such). Those five years were an interesting time, seeing the price point for a computer powerful enough for doing productive animation work (and digital video and audio) fall to where an independent artist could afford one.
Gotta hand it to Kerry Conran: if he had the patience to model and animate on a IIci, he surely paid his dues.
k.
Re:3D on a Mac IIci... (Score:2)
Oh yeah. I did some POVRAY command-line 3D on a Mac LC with a math coprocessor card, and it was a dog. The tiny animation I set up (stupidly complex - a transparent bubble rising in front of two mirrors that reflected into one another) was about 200px square and took about 10 minutes to render a frame. I remember one Friday horror film where I used to head back upstairs in each ad break, comment back the last line of code, uncomment the next line,
Re:3D on a Mac IIci... (Score:2)
Bravo (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Blade Runner (Score:5, Interesting)
For instance, can you believe that Tron did not win any special effects academy awards because their 'overuse' of computer generated effects disqualified them??!
If you get a copy of this, check out how painstakingly the movie was done and then realize how badly the Tron artists were ripped off!
Considering how many special effects there are in even non-science fiction movies nowadays, I don't think this will be too much of a stretch for people who get the concept of this kind of pulp fiction.
Re:Blade Runner (Score:2)
Uh, yes. That movie was horrible, special effects or no.
What goes around... (Re:Blade Runner) (Score:2)
Arrgh, that stinks. Fortunately, at least one animator who worked on Tron (Chris Wedge) went on to win an Academy Award for his computer animation work (Best Animated Short for "Bunny") :)
Retro adventures. . . Fail hard or Big Success. (Score:5, Insightful)
But the failures to quite ring the bell can be listed endlessly. .
Many, many have tried, but somehow. . . Even those black & white episodes of 'Voyager' were kinda dull despite all the clever and hard work put into them.
If "Sky Captain" can make the grade, it'll be interesting to see how.
I think it has something to do with replicating an old, albeit loved idea, versus taking a timeless formula and doing something with it which makes it vital to contemporary culture. Luke, Leia, Han and Indiana Jones and their worlds were all honest, first generation approaches to old and tired carbon copy ideas.
The difference will be if "Sky Captain's" director is a fan or a visionary.
Fans are stuck in idolizing yesterday. Visionaries are into the creation of the moment. Their beginnings may be the same, but their directions on the path of life are diametrically opposed.
Never work backwards. It's the same as falling asleep.
-FL
Voyager. . . (Score:2)
Man, I forgot about that show. I really enjoyed that one, actually. Too bad it ended prematurely. The main actor died on set in an accident, apparently. I bet it could have gone on to become a big cultural phenomenon if things had been different.
-FL
Setting (Score:2)
Re:Setting (Score:2)
I guess the most appropriate genre/setting would be either "Vacuumpunk", "Electrodepunk", "Cathodepunk", "Streampunk" (eg; the streamline trend of the 20's-40's), or as the tendacy with retrotech was heavy use of neon (almost 50 years before Miami Vice even), how about "Neonpunk"?
Heh, or one could combine all of the above and call it "Frankenp
Re:Setting (Score:5, Informative)
Slow learners in Hollywood (Score:4, Insightful)
Kinda like Attack of the Clones or (don't blame me, I didn't ask to watch this) Spy Kids 3-D were? Yeah, I remember those monuments to modern filmmaking -- bluescreens and greenscreens! Practically no sets! Let your actors imagine everything they're supposed to be interacting with and they'll be much more compelling that way!
Didn't anybody listen when we complained that the acting in the new Star Wars films was painfully wooden, and the actors complained that it was because they were working on virtual sets and couldn't place themselves in the roles?
Look, would-be blockbuster-makers: this isn't the way to make a compelling movie. It may be pretty, but it doesn't work well. Go watch the behind-the-scenes stuff for The Lord of the Rings and look at how much trouble they went through to build sets and miniatures whenever possible, and then count the Oscar nominations and wins they got for their trouble. Spend the money on at least some kind of physical set and your actors will thank you for it.
See the trailer yet? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:For those who dont like soul-sucking registrati (Score:2, Funny)
Well, that's better than a lot of movies which have big enough holes in the plot that you could drive a truck through them.
Re:Rip off of Laupta?? (Score:5, Interesting)
All the works of Miyazaki have a much more European feel to them. At nausicaa.net [nausicaa.net] there is an oft-cited FAQ that directly addresses the question of when and where Laputa takes place: "It is believed to have taken place at the end of the 19th Century or the beginning of the 20th Century, in an alternate universe where flying technology was more advanced (a la Verne). According to Miyazaki, he wrote "Laputa" as a "science fiction novel which was written in the end of the 19th century". The events of Laputa takes place "In an imaginary country. The Slug Ravine, where Pazu lived was modeled after a mining town in Wales. Miyazaki went to Wales for location hunting, and learned that the town had had a huge labor dispute the year before. This story and the scenery of the depressed mining town (he being a former chairman of a union) affected him, and made him put the scene of the townfolk fighting with the pirates in the movie. You can also see a socialist-looking poster in the house of Pazu's boss." It seems thus Laputa has more of a Jules Verne/Johnathan Swift 18th/19th century flavor to it. In contrast, "Sky Captain", from the looks of the trailer, takes it visual cues more from mid 20th century WWII era cultural icons. I'd go so far as to say "Sky Captain" also feels more American than anything Miyazaki has done.
Re:Rip off of Laupta?? (Score:4, Interesting)
Still, even with all those elements, I wouldn't call the movie a rip off of Miyazaki. Certainly the creators were inspired by Miyazaki's works, which is not necessarily a bad thing. Miyazaki, too, was influenced by many other creators himself--Nausikaa was a Dune rip-off. etc.
Re:Rip off of Laupta?? (Score:2)
The idea is not merely to copy, but to expand the scope - to look at old ideas from new perspectives. This is invention at its best.
Re:Rip off of Laupta?? (Score:2)
Heck, if you want to claim rip-off, then everyone has ripped off Fritz Lang's "Metropolis" back in, what, 1929?
Re:Countdown... (Score:2)
If anything, the "Slashbot" (by which I assume you're trying to imply majority opinion here) would be bemoaning CG in movies. Lucas killed Star Wars by making it all CG, after all! Go back to how movies were done with model kits and silly putty, damnit!
Read any story here about a movie other than Jackson's LOTR, and more often than not the comments will overwelmingly be critical about CG.
Re:Countdown... (Score:2)