''Creation'' is an unfinished

feature film A feature film or feature-length film (often abbreviated to feature), also called a theatrical film, is a film (Film, motion picture, "movie" or simply “picture”) with a running time long enough to be considered the principal or sole present ...

, and a project of

stop motion Stop-motion (also known as stop frame animation) is an animated filmmaking and special effects technique in which objects are physically manipulated in small increments between individually photographed frames so that they will appear to exh ...

animator An animator is an artist who creates images, known as frames, which give an illusion of movement called animation when displayed in rapid sequence. Animators can work in a variety of fields including film, television, and video games. Animat ...

Willis O'Brien Willis Harold O'Brien (March 2, 1886 – November 8, 1962), known as Obie O'Brien, was an American motion picture special effects and stop-motion animation pioneer, who according to ASIFA-Hollywood "was responsible for some of the best-known im ...

. It was about modern men encountering

dinosaur Dinosaurs are a diverse group of reptiles of the clade Dinosauria. They first appeared during the Triassic Geological period, period, between 243 and 233.23 million years ago (mya), although the exact origin and timing of the #Evolutio ...

s and other

prehistoric Prehistory, also called pre-literary history, is the period of human history between the first known use of stone tools by hominins million years ago and the beginning of recorded history with the invention of writing systems. The use o ...

animals on an island. The picture was scrapped by

RKO RKO Radio Pictures Inc., commonly known as RKO Pictures or simply RKO, is an American film production and distribution company, historically one of the "Big Five" film studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Kei ...

studio head

David O. Selznick David O. Selznick (born David Selznick; May 10, 1902June 22, 1965) was an American film producer, screenwriter and film studio executive who produced ''Gone with the Wind (film), Gone with the Wind'' (1939) and ''Rebecca (1940 film), Rebecca'' (1 ...

on the grounds of expense, and

Merian C. Cooper Merian Caldwell Cooper (October 24, 1893 – April 21, 1973) was an American filmmaker, actor, producer and air officer. In film, his most famous work was the 1933 movie ''King Kong (1933 film), King Kong'', and he is credited as co-inventor of ...

, the studio producer who recommended the film's cancellation, considered the storyline to be boring, due to lack of action. The completed footage ran 20 minutes in length, although approximately five minutes (or 500 ft in 35mm) is all that survives today. The surviving footage shows a stop motion dinosaur watching a live action boy hunting a live action animal. Cooper later used some of the miniatures and dinosaur armatures and O'Brien's

stop-motion animation Stop-motion (also known as stop frame animation) is an animated filmmaking and special effects technique in which objects are physically manipulated in small increments between individually photographed frames so that they will appear to exh ...

techniques for ''

King Kong King Kong, also referred to simply as Kong, is a fictional giant monster resembling a gorilla, who has appeared in various media since 1933. The character has since become an international pop culture icon,Erb, Cynthia, 1998, ''Tracking Kin ...

''.

Plot

The friends and family of American tycoon Thorton Armitage are enjoying a luxury cruise about the yacht ''The Titan''. Steve, the personal tutor and mentor of Thorton Armitage's son Billy, teaches Billy about the theory of evolution. Billy's older sister Elaine flirts with Steve, who mistakenly believes that she is in love with him. Elaine's fiancée watches from a distance as the two kiss. When Steve looks to confess his love for Elaine, she explains that the kiss meant nothing. Embarrassed and enraged, Steve threatens to quit the crew. A tempest forms, threatening to destroy the ship. Luckily, a Chilean submarine surfaces and encourage the crew of the ''Titan'' to board. The yacht is destroyed just as the submarine dives. The submarines' crew see strange underwater creatures, then surface on a tropical island. The crew soon discover that dinosaurs exist on the island and promptly escape from a stampede. Later, Steve and the Chilean Navy are attacked by a prehistoric

rhinoceros A rhinoceros ( ; ; ; : rhinoceros or rhinoceroses), commonly abbreviated to rhino, is a member of any of the five extant taxon, extant species (or numerous extinct species) of odd-toed ungulates (perissodactyls) in the family (biology), famil ...

-like mammal known as an ''

Arsinoitherium ''Arsinoitherium'' is an extinct genus of paenungulate mammals belonging to the extinct Order (biology), order Embrithopoda. It is related to elephants, sirenians, and hyraxes. Arsinoitheres were superficially rhinoceros-like herbivores that live ...

''. The ''Arsinoitherium'' gores many of the sailors to death, before knocking the fleeing sailors from a log bridge, with Steve narrowly managing to escape. The survivors, assuming that they will never see civilization again, build a shelter to live in. After Ned Hallet shoots a ''

Brontosaurus ''Brontosaurus'' (; meaning "thunder lizard" from the Ancient Greek, Greek words , "thunder" and , "lizard") is a genus of herbivorous sauropod dinosaur that lived in present-day United States during the Late Jurassic period. It was describe ...

'' (''

''), the

sauropod Sauropoda (), whose members are known as sauropods (; from '' sauro-'' + '' -pod'', 'lizard-footed'), is a clade of saurischian ('lizard-hipped') dinosaurs. Sauropods had very long necks, long tails, small heads (relative to the rest of their b ...

retaliates by destroying the shelter. Ned Hallet leaves the camp in anger after being scolded and takes his frustration out on a baby ''

Triceratops ''Triceratops'' ( ; ) is a genus of Chasmosaurinae, chasmosaurine Ceratopsia, ceratopsian dinosaur that lived during the late Maastrichtian age of the Late Cretaceous Period (geology), period, about 68 to 66 million years ago on the island ...

''. The mother rushes to the aid of the infant and kills Hallet. While the camp are exploring ancient ruins, a block gives way, causing Elaine to fall. Elaine is attacked by a ''

Pteranodon ''Pteranodon'' (; from and ) is a genus of pterosaur that included some of the largest known flying reptiles, with ''P. longiceps'' having a wingspan of over . They lived during the late Cretaceous geological period of North America in presen ...

'' which is driven off by Steve. Shortly afterwards, the crew are chased into a temple by an aggressive ''

Stegosaurus ''Stegosaurus'' (; ) is a genus of herbivorous, four-legged, armored dinosaur from the Late Jurassic, characterized by the distinctive kite-shaped upright plates along their backs and spikes on their tails. Fossils of the genus have been fo ...

''. The crew is trapped between the ''Stegosaurus'' and a ''

Tyrannosaurus ''Tyrannosaurus'' () is a genus of large theropod dinosaur. The type species ''Tyrannosaurus rex'' ( meaning 'king' in Latin), often shortened to ''T. rex'' or colloquially t-rex, is one of the best represented theropods. It lived througho ...

''. Rather than kill the crew, the two dinosaurs fight one another. In the end, the ''Tyrannosaurus'' kills the ''Stegosaurus'' and feeds it to its infant as the crew escapes. After searching the temple, the crew discover a type of metal needed to get their radio to work. The crew try to send out an S.O.S., but the volcano begins to erupt, causing mass hysteria among the dinosaurs. A ''Pteranodon'' destroys the tower used to conduct the signal, leaving the crew stranded to be killed by the volcano. Facing death, Elaine and Steve finally confess their love for one another. As Billy faints from heat exhaustion, a rescue plane arrives and saves the crew from certain doom. Aboard a rescue ship, Thorton Armitage boasts of his adventures. He is mocked, when suddenly a ''Pteranodon'' flies aboard the ship, proving his story to be true. The film ends with Steve and Elaine sharing a laugh as they look forward to their new life together.

Characters

* Steve; Billy Armitage's tutor (who would have been played by

Joel McCrea Joel Albert McCrea (November 5, 1905 – October 20, 1990) was an American actor whose career spanned a wide variety of genres over almost five decades, including comedy, drama, romance, thrillers, adventures, and Westerns, for which he bec ...

) the story's main protagonist * Thorton Armitage; an American tycoon * Elaine Armitage; Thorton Armitage's socialite daughter * Billy Armitage; Thorton Armitage's youngest child * Ned Hallet; Elaine's fiancée (played by

Ralf Harolde Ralf Harolde (born Ralph Harold Wigger, May 17, 1899 – November 11, 1974) was an American character actor who often played gangsters. Between 1920 and 1963, he appeared in 99 films, including ''Smart Money (1931 film), Smart Money'' with ...

, the only confirmed cast member) * Louise Armitage; Billy and Elaine's friendly and overweight aunt * Benny; a Jewish chef * Chico; Elaine's pet

monkey Monkey is a common name that may refer to most mammals of the infraorder Simiiformes, also known as simians. Traditionally, all animals in the group now known as simians are counted as monkeys except the apes. Thus monkeys, in that sense, co ...

Production

O'Brien worked alongside

Marcel Delgado Marcel Delgado (January 16, 1901, in Coahuila, Mexico – November 26, 1976, in Los Angeles, California) was a sculptor and model-maker. His technique revolutionized the stop motion film industry. He is best known for his work on the 1933 film ''Ki ...

on the project for almost a year.

Legacy

Despite his dislike for the film's story, the special effects in the completed footage impressed Cooper and inspired him to hire O'Brien to create the effects in Cooper's film ''

'' (1933). Some of the dinosaur scenes planned for ''Creation'' were even rewritten and inserted into the ''King Kong'' script and most of the dinosaur models O'Brien used in ''Kong'' had originally been made for ''Creation''. The shipwreck sequence in ''Kong''s companion production, ''

The Most Dangerous Game "The Most Dangerous Game", also published as "The Hounds of Zaroff", is a short story by Richard Connell, first published in ''Collier's'' on January 19, 1924, with illustrations by Wilmot Emerton Heitland. The story features a big-game hunter ...

'', was reportedly salvaged from this film.Pettigrew, Neil, ''The Stop-Motion Filmography'', McFarland and Co., Inc., 1999, p. 161 and again p. 470 In the two-disc 2005 DVD release of ''King Kong'', the surviving footage from ''Creation'' is shown, as well as a dramatization of how the entire film might have been like if completed, using a combination of the existing footage, along with production sketches, test stills and a voiceover narrator. In the remaining footage, two infant ''

'' play tug of war with a vine before their mother separates the two. The loser of the conflict wanders off into the jungle where it views a

chimpanzee The chimpanzee (; ''Pan troglodytes''), also simply known as the chimp, is a species of Hominidae, great ape native to the forests and savannahs of tropical Africa. It has four confirmed subspecies and a fifth proposed one. When its close rel ...

, a jaguar, and eventually an armed sailor identified by the script as Ned Hallet. Hallet stumbles upon the infant ''Triceratops'' and shoots it through the eye. The dying infant screams out to its mother who charges to the rescue, chasing Hallet through the jungle. The final scene in which Ned Hallet is gored to death by the vengeful mother is lost.

intended to use the footage in ''King Kong'', but felt that it did not fit in with the rest. An altered scene involving three adult ''Triceratops'', two of which are killed by Kong, while the third one shows up at one side of the log bridge over the chasm into which Kong (on the other side) kills some of the men on the bridge by rolling it back and forth, causing them to fall to their deaths below, does appear in the 1932 ''Kong'' screenplay and the film's novelization. Parts of the remaining footage can also be seen in the computer game ''Dinosaur Museum'' by Perspective Visuals and the educational video ''More Dinosaurs''. Some of the other creatures planned for the film were an ''

Agathaumas ''Agathaumas'' (; "great wonder") is a dubious genus of a large ceratopsid dinosaur that lived in Wyoming during the Late Cretaceous (late Maastrichtian stage, 66 million years ago). The name comes from - 'much' and - 'wonder'. It was seen a ...

'', a ''

Styracosaurus ''Styracosaurus'' ( ; meaning "spiked lizard" from the Ancient Greek / "spike at the butt-end of a spear-shaft" and / "lizard") is an extinct genus of herbivorous ceratopsian dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous (Campanian stage) of North America. ...

'' and an ''

Ankylosaurus ''Ankylosaurus'' is a genus of Thyreophora, armored dinosaur. Its fossils have been found in geological formations dating to the very end of the Cretaceous Period (geology), Period, about 68–66 million years ago, in western North America, m ...

'', according to concept art.

Influence on ''Kong''

* The scene in ''King Kong'' in which Kong shakes sailors off a log bridge was inspired by the scene in ''Creation'' in which the ''

'' knocks sailors from a log. * Ann Darrow's abduction by the ''

'' was heavily inspired by a scene in ''Creation'' in which a ''Pteranodon'' attempted to abduct Elaine, Steve's love interest. * Kong's battle with the ''

'' was taken from a scene in ''Creation'' where the ''Tyrannosaurus'' battles a ''

'' in an ancient golden temple. * The ''

'' swamp chase scene was taken from the scene in ''Creation'' were Steve and the sailors get chased by a stampede of Brontosaurus.

References

Sources

* contains information about, and stills from, this unfinished film *

External links

* * * Rick Klaw (November 11, 2004
On the origins of the original 1933 ''King Kong''
{{King Kong 1932 films 1932 animated films 1932 horror films 1932 lost films 1930s American animated films 1930s English-language films 1930s fantasy films 1930s monster movies 1930s stop-motion animated films 1930s unfinished films American fantasy films Films about dinosaurs Films set in Chile Films set in prehistory Films set on islands Films set in the Pacific Ocean King Kong (franchise) Lost American films Lost animated films Lost fantasy films Lost horror films Unfinished animated films English-language science fiction horror films American animated black-and-white films English-language fantasy films