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Glen Robinson (visual Effects)
Thomas Glenn Robinson, better known as Glen Robinson (September 20, 1914 – March 27, 2002), was an American special and visual effects artist, winner of six Academy Awards: two Academy Awards for Technical Achievement and four Special Achievement Academy Awards. As a special effects artist, his career spans over six decades from the mid-1930s to the mid-1980s, having worked literally on dozens of films. Biography Glen Robinson was born Thomas Glenn Robinson in Idaho on September 20, 1914. When aged twelve his family moved to Los Angeles city and in 1932, at the age of 18, he graduated from Venice High School. In 1936 he was hired by the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer company, where he became the studio's top special effects coordinator. Alongside his special effects career, Robinson was an engineer of roller coaster and double Ferris wheel attractions at amusement and theme parks that included Magic Mountain (Golden, Colorado; Valencia, California), Pleasure Island (Wakefield, Massachuse ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Special Effect
Special effects (often abbreviated as SFX, F/X or simply FX) are illusions or visual tricks used in the theatre, film, television, video game, amusement park and simulator industries to simulate the imagined events in a story or virtual world. Special effects are traditionally divided into the categories of mechanical effects and optical effects. With the emergence of digital film-making a distinction between special effects and visual effects has grown, with the latter referring to digital post-production and optical effects, while "special effects" refers to mechanical effects. Mechanical effects (also called practical or physical effects) are usually accomplished during the live-action shooting. This includes the use of mechanized props, scenery, scale models, animatronics, pyrotechnics and atmospheric effects: creating physical wind, rain, fog, snow, clouds, making a car appear to drive by itself and blowing up a building, etc. Mechanical effects are also often inco ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Huntsville, Alabama
Huntsville is a city in Madison County, Limestone County, and Morgan County, Alabama, United States. It is the county seat of Madison County. Located in the Appalachian region of northern Alabama, Huntsville is the most populous city in the state. Huntsville was founded within the Mississippi Territory in 1805 and became an incorporated town in 1811. When Alabama was admitted as a state in 1819, Huntsville was designated for a year as the first capital, before that was moved to more central settlements. The city developed across nearby hills north of the Tennessee River, adding textile mills in the late nineteenth century. Its major growth has taken place since World War II. During the war, the Army established Redstone Arsenal near here with a chemical weapons plant, and nearby related facilities. After the war, additional research was conducted at Redstone Arsenal on rockets, followed by adaptations for space exploration. NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, the Unit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
King Kong (1976 Film)
''King Kong'' is a 1976 American monster adventure film produced by Dino De Laurentiis and directed by John Guillermin. It is a modernized remake of the 1933 film about a giant ape that is captured and taken to New York City for exhibition. It stars Jeff Bridges, Charles Grodin, and Jessica Lange in her first film role, and features mechanical effects by Carlo Rambaldi and makeup effects by Rick Baker. It is the 5th entry in the King Kong franchise. The idea to remake ''King Kong'' was conceived by Michael Eisner, who was then an ABC executive, in 1974. He separately proposed the idea to Universal Pictures CEO Sidney Sheinberg and Paramount Pictures CEO Barry Diller. Dino De Laurentiis quickly acquired the film rights from RKO-General and subsequently hired television writer Lorenzo Semple, Jr. to write the script. John Guillermin was hired as director and filming lasted from January to August 1976. Before the film's release, Universal Pictures sued De Laurentiis and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Logan's Run (film)
''Logan's Run'' is a 1976 American science fiction action film directed by Michael Anderson and starring Michael York, Jenny Agutter, Richard Jordan, Roscoe Lee Browne, Farrah Fawcett, and Peter Ustinov. The screenplay by David Zelag Goodman is based on the 1967 novel ''Logan's Run'' by William F. Nolan and George Clayton Johnson. It depicts a utopian future society on the surface, revealed as a dystopia where the population and the consumption of resources are maintained in equilibrium by killing everyone who reaches the age of 30. The story follows the actions of Logan 5, a "Sandman" who has terminated others who have attempted to escape death and is now faced with termination himself. Produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, the film uses only the novel's two basic premises: that everyone must die at a set age, and that Logan and his companion Jessica attempt to escape while being chased by another Sandman named Francis. After aborted attempts to adapt the novel, story changes were ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Hindenburg (film)
''The Hindenburg'' is a 1975 American Technicolor disaster film based on the Hindenburg disaster. The film stars George C. Scott. It was produced and directed by Robert Wise, and was written by Nelson Gidding, Richard Levinson and William Link, based on the 1972 book of the same name by Michael M. Mooney. A highly speculative thriller, the film and the book it is based on depict a conspiracy involving sabotage, which leads to the destruction of the German airship '' Hindenburg''. In reality, while the Zeppelins were certainly used as propaganda symbols by Nazi Germany, and anti-Nazi forces might have been motivated to sabotage them, the possibility of such an act was investigated at the time; ultimately, no firm evidence was uncovered to substantiate the theory. A. A. Hoehling, author of the 1962 book ''Who Destroyed the Hindenburg?'', also about the sabotage theory, sued Mooney along with the film developers for copyright infringement as well as unfair competition. However, Jud ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Earthquake (1974 Film)
''Earthquake'' is a 1974 American ensemble disaster drama film directed and produced by Mark Robson and starring Charlton Heston and Ava Gardner. The plot concerns the struggle for survival after a catastrophic earthquake destroys most of the city of Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California. Directed by Robson with a screenplay by George Fox and Mario Puzo, the film starred a large cast of well-known actors, including Heston, Gardner, George Kennedy, Lorne Greene, Geneviève Bujold, Richard Roundtree, Marjoe Gortner, Barry Sullivan (actor), Barry Sullivan, Lloyd Nolan, Victoria Principal, and (under an alias) Walter Matthau. It is notable for the use of an innovative sound effect called Sensurround, which created the sense of actually experiencing an earthquake in theatres. Plot On his way to work, former football star Stewart Graff, having just fought with his wife Remy, visits Denise Marshall, an actress who is the widow of one of his friends. He drops off an autographed football ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tora! Tora! Tora!
''Tora! Tora! Tora!'' ( ja, トラ・トラ・トラ！) is a 1970 epic war film that dramatizes the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. The film was produced by Elmo Williams and directed by Richard Fleischer, Toshio Masuda and Kinji Fukasaku, and stars an ensemble cast including Martin Balsam, Joseph Cotten, So Yamamura, E.G. Marshall, James Whitmore, Tatsuya Mihashi, Takahiro Tamura, Wesley Addy, and Jason Robards. It was Masuda and Fukasaku's first English-language film, and first international co-production. The ''tora'' of the title is the two-syllable Japanese codeword used to indicate that complete surprise had been achieved. The film was released in the United States by Twentieth Century Fox on September 23, 1970, and in Japan by the Toei Company on September 25. It received mixed reviews from American critics, but was praised for its historical accuracy and attention to detail, its visual effects, and its action sequences. A 1994 survey at the USS ''Arizon ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Battle Of Britain (film)
''Battle of Britain'' is a 1969 British war film directed by Guy Hamilton, and produced by Harry Saltzman and S. Benjamin Fisz. The film documents the events of the Battle of Britain. The film drew many respected British actors to accept roles as key figures of the battle, including Laurence Olivier as Air Chief Marshal Hugh Dowding, 1st Baron Dowding, Sir Hugh Dowding, Trevor Howard as Air Vice-Marshal Keith Park, and Patrick Wymark as Air Vice-Marshal Trafford Leigh-Mallory. It also starred Michael Caine, Christopher Plummer, and Robert Shaw (actor), Robert Shaw as Squadron Leaders. The script by James Kennaway and Wilfred Greatorex was based on the book ''The Narrow Margin'' by Derek Wood (author), Derek Wood and Derek Dempster. The film endeavoured to be an accurate account of the Battle of Britain, when in the summer and autumn of 1940 the British RAF inflicted a strategic defeat on the ''Luftwaffe'' and so ensured the cancellation of Operation Sea Lion, Adolf Hitler's plan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Bamboo Saucer
''The Bamboo Saucer'' is a independently made 1968 Cold War science fiction film drama about competing American and Russian teams that discover a flying saucer in Communist China. The film was re-released in 1969 under the title ''Collision Course'' with an edited down runtime of 90 minutes. This was the final film for both actors Dan Duryea and Nan Leslie. Plot Test pilot Fred Norwood is flying the experimental X-109 jet aircraft accompanied by a chase plane. During the flight testing, Norwood finds himself pursued by a flying saucer and has to engage in a series of tricky aerobatics to protect his aircraft. Once on the ground, Norwood is informed that the radar tracking his jet picked up no other aircraft near him except the chase plane. Though Norwood insists on what he saw, his superiors, who were monitoring his vital signs, think he has had a series of hallucinations and order him off the project. Blanchard, the USAF pilot of the chase plane, exits a room in an unusuall ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Rat Patrol
''The Rat Patrol'' is an American action and adventure television series that aired on ABC between 1966 and 1968. The show follows the exploits of four Allied soldiers — three Americans and one British — who are part of a long-range desert patrol group in the North African campaign during World War II. Their mission: "to attack, harass and wreak havoc on Field Marshal Rommel's vaunted Afrika Korps". Background The show was inspired by and loosely modeled on David Stirling's British Special Air Service (SAS), which used modified Jeeps armed with machine guns as their transport through the treacherous desert terrain, and Popski's Private Army. Such units did not exist as part of the American military until after the Second World War. The title of the program refers to the nicknames given to some of the British Commonwealth forces in the North African campaign (Rats of Tobruk, the primarily Australian defenders of the city of Tobruk or the British Desert Rats). At the ti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Forbidden Planet
''Forbidden Planet'' is a 1956 American science fiction film from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, produced by Nicholas Nayfack, and directed by Fred M. Wilcox from a script by Cyril Hume that was based on an original film story by Allen Adler and Irving Block. It stars Walter Pidgeon, Anne Francis, and Leslie Nielsen. Shot in Eastmancolor and CinemaScope, it is considered one of the great science fiction films of the 1950s, a precursor of contemporary science fiction cinema. The characters and isolated setting have been compared to those in William Shakespeare's '' The Tempest'', and the plot contains certain analogues to the play, leading many to consider it a loose adaptation. ''Forbidden Planet'' pioneered several aspects of science fiction cinema. It was the first science fiction film to depict humans traveling in a faster-than-light starship of their own creation. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Wizard Of Oz (1939 Film)
''The Wizard of Oz'' is a 1939 American Musical film, musical fantasy film produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). An adaptation of L. Frank Baum's 1900 children's fantasy novel ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'', the film was primarily directed by Victor Fleming (who left the production to take over the troubled ''Gone with the Wind (film), Gone with the Wind''), and stars Judy Garland, Frank Morgan, Ray Bolger, Bert Lahr, Jack Haley, Billie Burke and Margaret Hamilton (actress), Margaret Hamilton. Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson, and Edgar Allan Woolf received credit for the screenplay, but others made uncredited contributions. The music was composed by Harold Arlen and adapted by Herbert Stothart, with the lyrics written by Yip Harburg, Edgar "Yip" Harburg. Characterized by its use of Technicolor, fantasy storytelling, musical score, and memorable characters, the film was considered a critical success and was nominated for six Academy Awards, including Academy Award for Best Pictur ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
