Cool News
One of my all time favorite producers has passed away... Charles H Schneer, producer behind Ray Harryhausen, is gone...
Hey folks, Harry here... Charles H. Schneer wasn't a household name. He wasn't one of the biggest names in Hollywood, but for a class of film geek that I am a devoted member of... His name meant that something fantastic was to follow.
There's only one pure Ray Harryhausen film that doesn't carry his name, BEAST FROM 20,000 FATHOMS (Ray's first solo effects feature), but beginning with IT CAME FROM BENEATH THE SEA all the way through CLASH OF THE TITANS - Charles H Schneer paved the way for Ray Harryhausen to do his magic. He was known to have convinced Ray to go to color for 7TH VOYAGE OF SINBAD and helped to bring all those wonderful films into being. He did do other work, most notably - he produced HELLCATS OF THE NAVY, which was the film on which a young lady named Nancy Davis and a young dorky actor by the name of Ronald Reagan were introduced via the movie screen to America, thus leading the seeds of a dynamic duo of Conservative America, which... well... who knows where the world would be had that not happened.
But like I said, the big deal was his helping to line up the financing and help with Ray Harryhausen's creations.
Not an awful lot is seen of Charles Schneer... You'd have to read all about him Ray's books or books on Ray Harryhausen. In every story of every film you see just how instrumental Charles was to the project. In finding the director, the other talent that went into the films and even the fantastic locations. It is hard to imagine that we'll ever see a partnership like the one that Harryhausen and Schneer had.
Below is a fairly inept interview by a complete filmtard, but it actually provides a good stage for Charles to make his point about working with Ray and their films. I never had the honor of meeting Charles, I've only heard stories about him from Ray, who speaks incredibly fondly about him. My thoughts go out to his family and friends and especially to Ray Harryhausen, who lost a dear friend today.
Now - Here's the trailers for some of his work...
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enough with the RIPs already, can't death take a vacation? Oh, OK. I can't take it if we lost Ray anytime soon. Too many icons gone too fast lately, it seems.
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...I'm a huge Harryhausen fan, and as a kid I always enjoyed saying "Schneer" whenever I'd see his credit onscreen.
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at the start of a film when I was young, I knew it was going to be good.
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Growing up in New York and New England, one station had a thing every Saturday called "The Creature Double Feature," of which the Harryhausen and Schneer films were a major part. They helped spark my interest in film and writing as much as anyone.
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..same here!! and also if it was American International(AI) and the names Samuel Z.Arkoff / James H.Nicholson followed..i pictured them as old Uncles who made cool movies for us geeks..
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They should film a stop-motion funeral with little dinosaurs and space monsters acting as pall bearers. That would be sweet. Hell, I'd want that for ME
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They were as cheesy as if they were filmed in the late '50s. Schneer kept the fantasy genre alive through the spy crazed '60s and sci-fi '70s. Kudos, sir and rest in peace.
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granted this guy probably was a cool guy, who after all, made it possible for some cool old sci-fi and action stuff to get made. he had taste and understood visionary artists. Producing back then was a respectable trade.
but face it...producers in general are usually just the rich fucks that start with money and make more money by selling and trading, greenlighting or burying scripts and concepts based on the sole chance that it will make them MORE money. countlessamazing movies never get made or distributed because some producer didnt have faith in the material.even though in most cases a movie cannot get made without the help of a producer...i still but producers on the absolute bottom of the movie totem pole, artistically. -
Charles Schneer will be missed. Him and Harryhausen have provided us all with some really amazing, awesome and fun films.
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Harryhausen and Bradbury. If theres a knock on the door and a guy with a sickle is standing outside, DON'T ANSWER!! Both gentlemen turn 89 this year!! And Harryhausen has a producer credit for "War Eagles" listed. Pray both remain in good health.
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sad to see him go, i loved all of his movies
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Hey Harry, Remember you promised to do an online tribute/image museum like thing for 4E.
Well... It's the year of "DO IT! What are you waiting for!?!?! I'm Right Here, DO IT NOW!!!"
Not "Listen to me now, and believe it later" -
He made all of Ray Harryhausen fantasy dreams a reality, and the two worked very well together. You can see lots of interview footage with Schneer in "Aliens, Dragons, Monsters and Me"and "The Ray Harryhausen Chronicles" available on many of the Harryhausen dvds. I often agree with zom-bot.com about producers, but I think Schneer was one of the rare exceptions. I also agree with Righteous Brother and Nolan Bautistia about seeing those "names" in front of films in our youth that gave you a warm and fuzzy feeling even if you knew next to nothing about the actual people behind the names. For some reason, just seeing the name "Moustapha Akkad" before the Halloween movies always got me excited, and I'm still angry that terrorists took him away from us.
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Pilgram, I'm still waiting the for weekly dvd release piece Harry was "working" on while watching the Presidential inaugaration. The one thing about huge success is that it doesn't breed a hungry work ethic. And that's true of all of us. Except Gene Simmons.
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Those were some of my favorite films growing up. I was lucky enough to meet Ray Harryhausen a few times since moving out to LA; he's a class act, and these guys made a great team.
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Jan 22, 2009 8:41:29 PM CST
Will people who have done cool work please stop passing away?
by goldmagus
Can you give us all a break and stop for a month or two? It's getting depressing...I met Charlie Schneer when I was a young film journalist and he was making CLASH OF THE TITANS. I was kind of in awe because my favorite film as a kid was JASON - that was the movie that had turned me on to cinema. He'll never be remembered as a fancy name like a Bob Evans, but he was one of those unsung heroes who stuck with his creative genius and helped make all his work possible. Now THAT is cool...RIP, Charles.
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great b-movie director.
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--and its international news. Where's the love for a man of serious accomplishment? Certainly nowhere on ET or other braindead "fanboy" tabloids. And Harry, please forfeit your political editorials. Personally, I don't think you have any political convictions; but you parrot the Hollywood platitudes, completely forgetting this site is but a ham radio station to the sacred "brass". At any rate, Schneer was certainly a catalyst in regard to an expansion of the Harryhausen legacy; his contribution should certainly not be trivialized.
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