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Post by Commandingtripod on Jan 23, 2006 8:30:43 GMT
Does anyone know why the George Pal movie states that most things of the Martians (at the time later to be revealed that they are not Martians) come in 3s?  Eg: 3 Cylinders to a group/3 War Machines to a Cylinder/3 eyes on the Martians. Personally I found it odd at the time seeing as Mars is the 4th Planet from the sun. Still though, we find out in the TV series that they come from else where. But does anyone know why 3s? |
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Post by sunnyrabbiera on Jan 23, 2006 14:29:02 GMT
I personally think Pal was trying to make up for not having tripods, the three invisible leg thing was the first major step...
then you have three weapons
three machines, three lenses...
I think Pal was going for the alien factor, teaching us that aliens would not behave as we do...
as for the aliens themselves, well octopus aliens were out of the question as Pal thought that it might look too silly with the technology availible and with the studio's booting of Ray Harryhausen's project Pal felt it was wrong to infringe on Harryhausen's territory.
its a misconception today that Pal and Harryhausen had a rivalry, but its unfounded, Pal respected Harryhausen and actually appoached him, but the studio would not have it.
For me Pal did the best job he could, the studio was as much up his ass as they were Harryhausen.
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Post by Anim8tr on Jan 23, 2006 17:53:59 GMT
I agree. Both Pal and Harryhausen were pioneers in stop motion photography. Even if Pal had the resources and time to incorporate stop motion (which of course, he didn't), I have my doubts he would have done so. Not unless Harryhausen was in on the project. But a certain film company had already p*ssed on Harryhausen's shoes, and sadly that never happened. It could've made for one mind blowin' movie. As it was, the movie pushed special FX to a whole new level.
With the Tripods not to be, Pal knew he could at least incorporate the theme. "3". And did so most brilliantly. Three eyes, three digits, etc. There's a certain logic to it that plays into the way the martains think. I guess that's why it's my favorite of the films.
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Post by Lensman on Jan 23, 2006 19:08:38 GMT
Three fingers on their hands... did they have 3 arms? I forget. Their war machines swept out triangles of conquered area, which is most definitely *not* in Wells' novel.
I agree, the "threes" motif was Pal's attempt to show an alien way of thinking.
I have "The Puppetoon Movie" on DVD; it's a collection of Pal's puppetoon shorts, which used a different technique from what Harryhausen did. Harryhausen used puppets with armatures, that is internal metal skeletons which could be moved to different poses. Puppetoon models had fixed poses and expressions, so each character would have multiple heads, bodies, etc to show different expressions and different poses. This is known as "replacement" animation because the character, or perhaps just his head, would be replaced with another between shots.
Both techniques were very time-consuming. According to the behind-the-scenes DVD etras on the new "King Kong" DVD, Harryhausen-style animation averages about 10 frames per hour. With 24 frames for each second of film, that's only a bit over 3 seconds of film per workday!
Puppetoon animation went somewhat faster, but that was offset by the huge amount of labor needed to create the large number of heads and bodies needed for each character.
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Post by jeffwaynefan on Jan 23, 2006 19:14:39 GMT
I personally think Pal was trying to make up for not having tripods, the three invisible leg thing was the first major step... then you have three weapons three machines, three lenses... I think Pal was going for the alien factor, teaching us that aliens would not behave as we do... as for the aliens themselves, well octopus aliens were out of the question as Pal thought that it might look too silly with the technology availible and with the studio's booting of Ray Harryhausen's project Pal felt it was wrong to infringe on Harryhausen's territory. its a misconception today that Pal and Harryhausen had a rivalry, but its unfounded, Pal respected Harryhausen and actually appoached him, but the studio would not have it. For me Pal did the best job he could, the studio was as much up his ass as they were Harryhausen. I can only echoe what has already been said. This was Pals way of making up for the tripods he so much needed for the film but could not complete. The Martians in the 53 film are indeed what they are to be - Martians, they do come from Mars as the start of the film explains. The terrible TV series that followed in the late 80s was just a bad attempt at a spin off and due to recent landings on Mars, they decided to use the "not a Martian" techniques, it does not mean that the creatures in the film version are not Martian. |
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Post by sunnyrabbiera on Jan 23, 2006 21:12:19 GMT
The Martians in the 53 film are indeed what they are to be - Martians, they do come from Mars as the start of the film explains. The terrible TV series that followed in the late 80s was just a bad attempt at a spin off and due to recent landings on Mars, they decided to use the "not a Martian" techniques, it does not mean that the creatures in the film version are not Martian. actually the Spielburg studio makes the 80's TV series writing team look like brain surgions (well at least the seaon 1 staff), just look at the "designing the enemy: tripods and aliens" special on the SS WOTW DVD |
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Post by nervouspete on Jan 27, 2006 0:28:41 GMT
Tchaw, I like the Spielberg version! It was close to my ideal own, only mine was sans news-crew and with a tighter observance of EMP, and without the hero moment.
But have you seen 'Duel', sunnyrabbiera? That is an awesomely tense Spielberg film!
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Post by the Donal on Jan 31, 2006 18:07:26 GMT
It's lucky they weren't on the 3 network- otherwise they'd still be on Mars arguing with an operator (from a landline) because they can't get a signal and want to cancel their subscription (which, apparently, you can only do if hell freezes over and a blue moon rises over a herd of nocturnal flying pigs). In fact, they'd still probably be arguing about it for the duration of the cylinders' journey to Earth.
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Post by Luperis on Jan 31, 2006 18:57:28 GMT
It's lucky they weren't on the 3 network- otherwise they'd still be on Mars arguing with an operator (from a landline) because they can't get a signal and want to cancel their subscription (which, apparently, you can only do if hell freezes over and a blue moon rises over a herd of nocturnal flying pigs). In fact, they'd still probably be arguing about it for the duration of the cylinders' journey to Earth. lol. Maybe thats why they really invaded Earth... they hated the 3 network!  |
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