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The Behind the Scenes Pic of the Day says the sun came out last night. He says it sang to him.
Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with today’s Behind the Scenes Pic!
Today’s pic is obviously scanned from a magazine, so apologies in advance to whichever magazine I’m ripping this off from (don’t sue me!), but damn is it a cool shot. And I kind of dig the out of a magazine feel. Seeing these awesome images with a big fold crease in the middle of 'em is what kicked off this BTS obsession with me in the first place.
Steven Spielberg’s Close Encounters is pure magic. There’s a melancholy ease to this movie that still has elements of the hungry Spielberg of Duel and Jaws, but with the added element of confidence; the kind only having the biggest film of all time can give you.
So confident he was that George Lucas was sure Close Encounters was going to out-gross Star Wars. As the story goes, Lucas bet a piece of Star Wars’ profits against a piece of Close Encounter’s profits that Star Wars would lose in the box office race of the two sci-fi films. We know how that turned out, but I bet you Spielberg was never happier to be out-performed before or since.
Anyway, happy Sunday and I hope you guy enjoy this magazine scan look at the climactic sequence of Close Encounters of the Third Kind.
Thanks to reader John Brown for sending the image along. Click for a nice big version! Enjoy!
Tomorrow’s Behind the Scenes Pic is great at creating difficult situations.
-Quint
quint@aintitcool.com
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Readers Talkback
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... Definitely kickstarted my love for this movie. I knew all about it before I'd even seen it on my 5 inch black and white TV I had in my bedroom. Also had the "graphic novelisation". Stills from the movie with comic captions. It was awesome back in the days before you could actually own the movie.
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David Koresh was on the set of CE3K?
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That's a first.
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April 10, 2011, 6:06 p.m. CST
I have an official 1977 "action figure" of the CE3K alien.
by ufoclub1977
I didn't know they even existed... ebay is great!
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April 10, 2011, 6:07 p.m. CST
As that photo slowly materialized on my slow computer, those five notes played in my head...
by CountryBoy
... then I scrolled down and braindrain had typed them. Funny.
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.. a few months ago... still an awesome movie.. :o)
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had a close encounter of the "first" kind
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Nice timing Quint! Still plays like gangbusters, large crowd turned out and sat engrossed through the whole thing. All those who think JJ Abrams is the new Spielberg need to wake up.
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I was at a local video retailer this weekend and they were playing JAWS on the store monitors. Some of the customers (well, the younger dudes) had hung around to watch. When Quint finally gets gobbled by Bruce, every single guy (except me) burst out in peels of laughter, and afterward commented to each other how even CGI couldn't save it. I suddenly realized that to today's audiences that moment is the equivalent of Bela Lugosi wrestling the rubber Octopus. So, I left, depressed, but with fond with memories of glorious rubber which once held audiences in sheer terror.
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April 10, 2011, 6:42 p.m. CST
justmyluck: No, it proves that today's audiences are fucking stupid, that's all.
by D Ropaela
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I still have that 'graphic novel', actually called a PHOTONOVEL, with the 400+ color frame enlargements (the spine is toast and all the pages are loose). Also have a CE3K adaption comic (and that one's cover is also toast). I had a 'making of' magazine, but it was mostly printed on newsprint and eventually got 'that smell', so I tossed it out. Though, I still have the 12-inch soundtrack vinyl with the 45 single of JW's main theme in a disco version..woo!
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...it's called the CE3K FOTONOVEL (no 'PH').
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I've actually still got both books somewhere at my parent's place, along with my Makings Of Superman: The Movie, the 70s remake of King Kong, Dune and many others. All pretty in-depth from the days before tie-ins were just marketing cash grabs. I actually think they're all still in pretty good condition so I'll have to dig them out. I'd heard rumors of other photo novels but never actually saw any of them. My 5 year old self had always dreamed of a Raiders of the Lost Ark one.
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Quite simply one of the Greatest Films Ever Made, and I mean that without any hyperbole. And possibly - if anyone could ever choose between it, Raiders, and E.T. - Spielberg's finest hour.
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Who needs Blu-ray when you can just grab your photo novels and a pristine viewmaster reel of Jaws 3D for a night on the couch.
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It, along with a couple of others, is on my yearly "sit down and watch again" cycle. It's just amazing and captures a time and place so well. I love the humor (Dreyfuss has never been better) and the slow build throughout. Just a wonderful, enjoyable movie. For some reason, I've never really delved into the backstory or making of this movie like I have all my other favorites. So I honestly know next-to-nothing about any behind-the-scenes stuff or "making of" tidbits surrounding this movie. Maybe I'll just keep it that way so it's always fresh and unspoiled for me, and I only know what I see on the screen. Novel concept, huh? If Spielberg only made this and "Jaws", he'd be forever known and admired. Lucky for us, he had a "few more" in him. ;) And still does, IMO.
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Kids today are the most vapid, empty-headed generation ever to walk the earth. ...Didn't you get that memo? I blame the various cushions against letting evoultion do its job....
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You had Close Encounters, Invasion of the Body Snatchers... and you had that deluxe large serious one for ALIEN. Was there one for Grease? video cassette players and rental movies becoming mainstream in the early 80's negated the need for photo-novels. But what about the little super-8 hand cranked viewers for kids!?? Those were so cool. They had ALIEN.
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was repeated reading for me back in 4th and 5th grade.
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... and the storage space at my parents place for all my old CE3K stuff. Sudden waves of nostalgia sweeping over me! And I'll save myself $12 on a movie ticket with my Captain America view master reels.
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<p>Just last night, Spielberg's "War of The Worlds" was on television. It was the first time I'd seen what I believe Spielberg described as his anti-Close Encounters since its theatrical run. I found myself absolutely engrossed in it, despite its being frequently and frustratingly broken by commercial breaks that seemed longer than the movie itself.</p> <p> I was so taken by how much better it was than than I'd remembered it being at first viewing that I looked up the Oscar nominees for 2006 (for movies released in 2005) to see whether Spielberg had garnered a Director's nomination. Interestingly, he had, but for "Munich." "War of The Worlds," however, has so many imaginative, stunning and virtuosic sequences, that the brilliance of that movie's direction can hardly be overstated.</p> <p>From the emergence of the tripods sequence - in which rumblings give way to cracks in the street and escalate to extreme earthquake convulsions in the very fabric of the city and group curiosity becomes unease and then awe and finally unbridled panic as wholesale death spew from above - to the escape-from-the-city sequence, where the camera follows the minivan from above, swooping all around, paralleling its movement from the side, settling in in front of the vehicle for a time and finally soaring off in one of the most giddily exhilarating camera movements in all of cinema - to the extended basement sequence where Spielberg reprises his raptor-in-the-kitchen scene from "Jurassic Park," but this time elevating the sense of dread, confining it to the claustrophobic dank rather than the gleaming antisepsis of a well-lit kitchen - to the holding-basket sequence where Tom Cruise's Ray, grenades in hand, is pulled into an alien sphincter, this movie is a non-stop demonstration of absolute mastery. Even the more minor sequences - the plane crash, the flaming train, the ferry attack - are accomplished with such consummate skill and apparent effortlessness that that perhaps we've simply taken them for granted.</p> <p>In addition to "Munich," the other Director nominees for that year were Bennett Miller for "Capote," Paul Haggis for"Crash," George Clooney (!) for "Good Night, and Good Luck" and the winner, Ang Lee for "Brokeback Mountain." Is there anyone in the AICN audience who, with the benefit of six-years' hindsight, would defend the superiority of all these directorial efforts above that of Spielberg for "War of The Worlds?" Of <i>any</i> of them?
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but ended up in this movie. True Fact.
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April 10, 2011, 9:44 p.m. CST
justmyluck...you were actually in a VIDEO STORE last weekend?!
by Nasty In The Pasty
I can't remember the last time I set foot inside a video store...2005? Sadly, Netflix and Redbox kiosks in every grocery store has made going out to the video store and renting a few movies as obsolete as photonovels.
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Before his first line of the movie, he mouths the line delivered by the other actor talking to him. It's kind of funny.
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I love your video store story. Well done!
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Not a video-only store, a retailer: DVD/Blu/CDs/iPods/books/merch/swag, etc. And, yes, the online merchants with the clearinghouse prices will sadly kill many of these niche video outlets, but I'm also hopeful the better ones will make it through.
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Behind the Scenes pic, please. Now. Or since you're name is Quint, I'll settle for "From Russia with Love" or "Robin and Marian." Anyway, great column, man.
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behind the scenes pic too. It's time.
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How many times does one get to discuss FOTONOVELS - the geeky sugar rush before home video?? :) I have mine all stored together, so this is easy to list: FOTONOVELS (4x7"): - CE3K/THE LORD OF THE RINGS/INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS/NIGHTWING/BUCK ROGERS (1979) BUCK ROGERS is unique because it is the only one with an order form for more FOTONOVELS (buy 3, get 1 free!): - GREASE/HEAVEN CAN WAIT/REVENGE OF THE PINK PANTHER/LOVE AT FIRST BITE/HAIR/THE CHAMP/ICE CASTLES/ROCKY I &II NIGHTWING is only interesting because there is a sticker to credit three screenwriters, when they had only credited one (lucky them). PHOTOSTORY (4x7"): These, like the MOVIE NOVEL, seem to have been shepherded by Richard J. Anobile: - BATTLESTAR GALACTICA/STAR TREK:TMP/STAR TREK II ST:TMP is probably the best-looking off all, and I must have thought so then, because there's two copies. The flip-side is STII, which seems to be the end of the line with no color, horrible exposure and a few images upside down. THE MOVIE NOVEL (8.5x11"): These are Anobile's over-sized versions: ALIEN OUTLAND Home video killed these frame-enlargement books swiftly. I think the only other type of frame capture books I picked-up in later years were for AKIRA and BATTLESHIP POTEMKIN. Happy hunting! --- ufoclub1977, I also loved those 8mm endless-loop cartridges that went in the crank-able viewers. I remember I had a STAR WARS, STAR TREK and Disney's LONESOME GHOSTS. For me, those loops broke very quickly - but at least they were designed to be cheap enough for kids to blow their allowance on.
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....back in the 90's I picked up a series of graphic novels of Star Blazers which consisted of blow ups of actual cels from the animated series with added word balloons.
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I dare say I'd never thought I'd be having any kind of conversation about the beloved Fotobook (mind you, I did start it). Good list - definitely a flood of 70's nostalgia there. If I could find the Alien one I'd be a happy film nerd.
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http://cgi.ebay.com/ALIEN-the-ORIGINAL-copywrite-1979-MOVIE-NOVEL-rare_W0QQitemZ130506362196QQcategoryZ153QQcmdZViewItemQQ_trksidZp4340.m263QQ_trkparmsZalgo%3DSIC%26its%3DI%252BC%26itu%3DUCI%252BIA%252BUA%252BFICS%252BUFI%26otn%3D10%26pmod%3D290538414154%26ps%3D63%26clkid%3D8371620161899320400#ht_740wt_1141
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It's currently eBay for an inflated 'buy' price and Amazon's marketplace has one for less, but I'd just Google around. Mine, like the CE3K, has a disintegrated spine...so I may look around myself to replace those. I'd also suggest ALIEN:THE ILLUSTRATED STORY (the one published in HEAVY METAL) & THE BOOK OF ALIEN.
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Ta... Although I might have to settle for the thrill of the hunt and look in the local "antique" stores... My disposable income is no so disposable these days and after some of my recent cheap finds I have some high hopes!
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April 11, 2011, 12:20 a.m. CST
Bradley Cooper cast as young Beloq in Indiana Jones V
by MuhammadAmidala
It'll be in Variety this tuesday.
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had to chime in here to say that i STILL have the Alien photobook.. have had it since it about 1983 or so.... it is well worn and well loved....i still look through it to this day.... thought i was the only one in the world that new about that book...never heard of anyone else that either had it or new about it... also had the wrath of khan photobook (actually, more like a novel) and you're right...it was in black and white..
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though tentative news whether or not Bradley will be playing Beloq himself or son of Beloq.
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having an interest in seeing deleted scenes reinserted does not make me a moron. I am a telecoms engineer with many qualifications - seems u are the arsehole u moronic troll.
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My kids are 11 and 2 or 3 years ago I began introducing them to the movies of my childhood. We started with Ghostbusters and moved on to Jaws. Now whenever they have a sleep-over party, Jaws is the first movie they and their mates put on. They don't care about the effects, they just love the movie and get the same chills I did when I first saw it. Not all kids are the same.
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I totally agree. The movie got unfair bashing, must've been something I lack knowledge of, politics?
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Theres just something about it that feels off, hollow, an inability to make you care perhaps. It's such a small movie and follows a set of the least likeable characters along their path to survival and manages to not have a single one of them killed off (kid runs off over the hill into battle cause he has ADD and somehow appears alive at the end all safe and sound). The set pieces are stunning, they are the saving grace of the movie, and the direction is unquestioned. The sound design is very well done aswell, but it is a purely technical movie, anything else is missing. It really feels like the thing was put together in a matter of weeks with the first script they found. It really needed to be a much grander experience, the characters needed to suffer and they needed to find a better ending, sure keep the "sick" angle, but don't have it happen in 3 seconds with no warning.
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Wow..that brings back memories. I remember when the first ST photnovel was released; I thought that was the coolest thing ever. Pocket Books released 12 books from the TV series all in full color. By the time they got to TWOK, they were just trying to cash in on the ST name. If I remember correctly, the official reason for TWOK being in b&w was that Pocket didn't want to spend the extra money for color. One of my favorite photonovels: the pilot for "The Incredible Hulk" TV show. I had always hoped they would release more episodes from the show, but they didn't.
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He and his wife were bisexual swingers.
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Must have seen it 100 times. Still love it. Just great.
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http://tinyurl.com/2vkxbc Long live the Rolling Roadshow!
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Ok as a kid there was a brief period of time in which I thought this movie was a sequel. Lemme explain. Close Encounters of the THIRD Kind? I was like, what happened to the SECOND kind? Did I miss that one? Seriously. I was a kid. Sue me. Anyway I bought all the making of books(still have'em) and the original album with the additional 45inch disco version of the theme by John Williams. This movie is magic. Although I will bring up: HOW MANY VERSIONS OF THIS MOVIE EXIST? Seems like at least 27. Original, Special Edition, ABC TV cut, videotape, DVD, Directors and so on. I think I've seen practically every version.
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Who? Why? When?
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I've done a alittle bit of retouch there. But there are certain parts of the picture sharper than others. I'm afraid you can't get rid of these flaws. Anyway, herses the link: http://tinyurl.com/5wptm7q
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I had the 8-track tape to Star Wars. That's right... 8-track. Full sound, fury and dialog from the movie, pre-80's. Sure, I may have seen it in the theater dozens of times(3 or 4 a Saturday), but I've listened to it HUNDREDS of times.
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I must read and re-read Balaban's diary of the making of CE3K about 100 times. Amazing!
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April 11, 2011, 12:03 p.m. CST
Need - NEED - to see this movie in a theater again.
by WriteForTheEdit
One of the all-time greats, and fuck any version with the "special edition" add-on stuff. Why Spielberg himself didn't realize that anything he could show us inside the mothership would NEVER live up to what we imagined is beyond me.
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SS did NOT want to shoot footage inside the mothership for the Special Edition. He wanted to go back and re-edit the film for a S.E. release. Columbia Pictures agreed to pay for it if and only if he would shoot new footage of the inside of the mothership. The studio execs were convinced that that was what audiences wanted to see.
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I just wish SS would have stood his ground. Ah, well, whatever.
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April 11, 2011, 12:39 p.m. CST
WOTW - I too love the set pieces and the references to 9/11
by openthepodbaydoorshal
(the death ray victims turning to dust, that covers Cruise, the bulletin board filled with requests to help find victims, etc.), it's too bad that the gist of the movie is that thousands had to die and the end of the world was approaching just to push Tom Cruise to being a better daddy.
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Do you mean the story of Star Wars? Cool. Hearing those sound effects and music cues at home was so cool. And it also showed how bad tv shows at the time compared in creative quality. Movies were so exclusive and special back then, because you could not get to that material outside of going to the theater. Those were the days when it took years before the movies were shown on tv. Seeing that HD resolution of a 35mm print (or 70mm) with film grain, and hearing stereo sound with bass rumble was really a magical thing to children in the 70's!
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It scared the hell out of me. I had the alien bendy figure.
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April 11, 2011, 1:31 p.m. CST
double feature screening in SF on 4/31 - Jaws and Close Encounters
by Squinty CGI Flynn
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April 11, 2011, 1:51 p.m. CST
I saw the original and special editions in theater and ever since the special
by UltraTron
edition I feel like something's missing if I don't see inside the ship. I don't feel this way about any starwars changes. Whatever. Deadbeat would rather abandon sanity and his family to chase his obsession. I want to go fuck Olivia Cockburn but I don't.. Oh yeah I don't have a family- there is absolutely no excuse for me not to make it a life's obsession to fuck Olivia Cockburn. Well I'm off!
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Mas dispacho, por favor!
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I'll be in The City that week....where & when???
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in a small local toy store (back when they still had those) as a kid.
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Richard Anobile, the photobook club guy also was an exponent of open marriage. http://www.amazon.com/Beyond-open-marriage-Richard-Anobile/dp/0894790293 Anobile also edited some very nice B & W photobooks for FRANKENSTEIN, the '31 DR. JEKYLL & MR. HYDE, PSYCHO, NINOTCHKA, THE MALTESE FALCON, THE GERERAL, STAGECOACH, CASABLANCA etc.
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Richard Anobile edited several photo novels. One day back in the early 80's I was flipping through the 3 or 4 tv channels we had back then, and stumbled on the Phil Donahue show. It was at the part where he was introducing the guests and the guy said his occupation was editing photo novels of movies. I had the ALIEN book and recognized the name. The topic was alternative marriages or swinging. Donahue was moving away from issue and political oriented shows to the more sensational. For those to young to remember Phil, he was the Oprah/Maury of his day, and really started that whole genre of talk show. Anyway, Anobile and his wife were/(are?) swingers and he said he was bisexual.
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My favorite elements of the movie are those featuring the scientists investigating the close encounters. There is so much mystery to the scenes. Nothing is explained leaving you wondering about how all this research could be going on without the general public knowing about it. It make you want to go work with them.
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Orcus is trying to track it down at Amazon Marketplace. There is another Making of book, but not Balabans
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http://www.amazon.com/Spielberg-Truffaut-Me-Actors-Diary/dp/184023430X
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