Riera mares ee encores itary Mineo ee aes) agineering subsidiary—is in production on the largest tl eee oC Mee Ce eascen SON ODEN CRs ouca on og Ie pec tc ie ttm ae eh Oe eed aa eee cen ache Cea ee SPECIAL EFFECTS APPARATUS DESIGNERS An applicant for this position must be a self-starter, with good tool handling ability, and be an imaginative problem solver capable of generating and een ncn ee ee oR ete ke nen rot Preach eke gecer eestor tomo See coCu Meee cM eM ancl “ and electrical prototyping. A familiarity with optics, eee Cnet arco eee ances sction equipment and theatrical technology is desirable, plea OR ee Nee ee Nth aetcesn tet ie cos Mone a umelaalicceael tes B) Candidates will find our projects challenging, unique, Oe PRCN eck ence uRercl cache) stable organization which in itself is an industry leader— Walt Disney Productions. For immediate and confidential consideration, submit, eM eee MeN eo Oke PRS Rencine PREC TUS Me Mob auT Li Com ILLS Cony Crees Don Shay ened Gy ote orci Cee Sorts Cesta cc Pep ecILy CINEPEK 4 ~ April 1981. Published quarterly at P.0. Box 20027, Riverside, Califia 92516. Subscription Ons ae Tees Oe ae ene eee Pee ee ae Crea tee ote cnn ee gee feats a ee mea Pe M el Emo ego) reece coe ary Pe Soe te Outland eS ener er mae Ree whose management — formerly of 20th Century-Fox — inaugurated the ‘curtent science fiction boom by giving George Lucas a chance to launch his Star Wars saga. It also marks the fist major employment of tntrov- See net mene oe ety front-projected plates. Writer-drector Peter Hyams discusses hs concept Coco oe renee Tae id project to fruition. Providing added commentary ae director of photog Eee ONO ene eet ea cae aT ‘maker Bill Pearson, plate photographer Douglas Dawson, and introvision eee ae en ok ee Lots Er ey DR nc OR tte dos, two directors, two production designers, and two specal effects een ea eee who disowned the project — Allered States emerged from neatodlivion inremarkably healthy condition, Production designer Joe Alves and spe- CO eee os mee tes ani aborted Arthur Fenn production. Then, visual effects coordinator Bran Ferren, director of photography Jordan Cronenweth, production eer eee cee oe Nea ene ae erated ee ee ee eee Falleton, who rode out the production maelsirom from beginning to CC ae Oe ee ae ae) Dee ee ee eae Lees | ics OUTLAND“When you go and make film ke Outland, observed writer: ‘irector Peter yams, "you are entering very. very risky waters. ‘because you're following some really good and some really bad ‘movies. And you'r afllmmaker who's serious about his work, You don't want to be compared unfavorably tothe good ones Ith the highly successful Capriconm One on his ri listo ere- dts, flowed bythe equaly unsuccessful Hanover Street. Peter Hyams had spent time on both sides of the cial fence. Bent, upon rekindng the elusive spark of pubic affection, he began looking to the stars for his subsequent project. “I have two young sons, and they are wonderful itmus tests ofmovies, star as uhether they are going to be successful or unsuccessful. Not that they'e particulary special in that regard. 1s Just that they're realy so prototypical of Kids thet age S started look ing at their indo fin-and dnt have to ook Fa. fac I'm ‘thoroughly convinced tat about thirty to forty percent of George Leas personal worth has been fanced by my Sons But estruck ‘me that when you look at Star Warsand aa of those ther mov Jes you're looking ata very spectfieview ofthe future and avery spect emphasis. And began to realize that had very afer ent view of the future, and ultimately avery diferent emphasis.” Twas the end result ofthis elation that fund ts way onto the stages of Pinewood Sts last summer as Outland went before the cameras. n plywood, steel and paste afonter min ing colony of the not-toodistant future had been brought into belng — onthe inhospitable shifting surface othe Jovian moon to. "Islected lo primarily because atthe time wassiting down to write this thing, the fst photographs of Jupiter were just coming into JPL, and was absolutely awestruck by therm. Was ‘awestruck by the sizeof Jupiter, and by the violence of ft 1 ‘eau, really, but inte same way a volcano fs beaut ‘there's a majesty about i except its. formidable ana righten Ing one, Iwas very important to me that we stay close to earth. ‘know 450 million miles doesn’t sound very close, but t's reat: able to us because its within our solar system. I's not some dis tant galaxy where we'e talking Hight yeas. Solis not exactly ‘lose t's at leat within our emotional sphere, and what wee ‘dealing with the real hard mechanics of how to get oan rm places. how you survive once you get there and what to do with Yourself in that kind of anenvironment Jupiter, tome, presents ‘kind of physical testimony to how insignificant and smal we really are na very graphic way. For one thing, t's twelve tines ‘the dlameter of earth, and yet It rotates in nine hours and fity ‘minutes. The red spot on Jupiter i storm. Thee planet earths oul disappear inside that red spot — andi’ storm So you're really dealing with forces that ae almest incomprehensible. And the whole idea of being situated on one of the moors of “Jupiter, where the sky overhead is absolutely dominated by this Outland photagraphs copyright © 1981 by The Lada Company. ‘Allright reserved. Production unit stil photography by George ‘imitear and Douglas Dawson, Special thanks to eff Walker. ‘maelstrom of colo and violence, struck me as initsel, a ight that les us hnow what we'e Infor “1 wanted to make a film about what | thought the future would really be lke ~ where you'd come away believing that You had seen something that was feasible, In attitude aswell 35. ‘execution. For me, | think the future wil be very much like the past — that ronler. And frontiers have always been places ‘Of great danger and enormous hardship. So Outland fs my we ofthat future the first step. And whet seems tome that most, exploration fs done by people of certain foresight an courage the bulk of tisdone for very pragmatic reasons You don realy, {get into a clipper ship and sll across the ocean, fearing al the mile you might al othe edge, Just because you want to ex andthe norlons ofthe species. Rather you do because you hope to find new places you can gt things fom. you buy that, thesis then lseemed to me that on a planet faced with terrible fuel problems and terrible resource shortages the natura thing, ‘ould be to ook at space as yet another place to exploit. So, shortof putting upastring of oliday Inns hink that what we ‘eally want out thee is what's inthe around — whatever wecan bring back alleviate our immediate concerns. Okay. you Duy ‘that thesis, then what are we really going tobe doing there and what ft going toe tke? And again i track me that rather than belng a series of lucite domes and people gllng across conveyor bells, t would instead be not that much diferent than the digging ofthe Suez Canal, or the building of the Alaska pipe line, oF day-to-day operations right now on offshore oll rigs. Historically, they Seem to be the ame kinds of operations, and Historically they seem to attrac the same kinds of people ~ op: portunsts mainly, some perhaps with suspect past, who are {thereto make as much money as they can, as ast as they can. To Io's sprauling Con-Amalgamate #27 mining complex ‘comes Federal District Marshal Willam T, O'Nel [Sean Connery) ‘aman of integrity f not tact, whose yeas of interpersonal strife ‘with company superiorshave earned him a tour of duty a one of ‘Con-Ams teas savory outposts, Although, as an administrator his wife and child are permitted to acompany him. Con-Am 27 ‘roves tobe the final indignity heaped upon his longsering Spouse, and after only two weeks on sation she qlves her hse ‘band an ultimatum to cast aside his thankless career and eave 4o at once, or remain behind without her. By then, honever, Oeil is already embroled ina situation he can neither leave nor ignore. A bizare epidemic of irationalsulldes has been plagtng the colony for months, and no one fn authority seems Inclined tobe concerned about it. Ol! traces the calse toa ‘synthetic narcotic belng peddled around the outpost surept- Housy, but withthe ful sanction ofthe on-scene company and apparently the corporate hierarchy, aswel. An ‘ype substance, the drugservesthe company'si ‘terest by increasing worker output More insidously,ittends to reduce long-term compensation, since by the time the user's ‘one year hitch is nearing completion the drug’ cumulative ef Feet nducesacute psychosis. Ignoring oficial recommendations arte by Don Shaydlrector Peer Hyams’ speculations on future exploitation form the ‘sis of Outland, an yenturesdrama set in a pace mining colony on ovian moon lo. / Sean nery Sars asa district man whase persistent tigation into a rash of ined suicides imperis job and his continued istence. / Hyams and lution designer Pillp ison employed a strict functional rationale in ig Sets forthe Con-Am ing comptes, Jal cells signed as zero-gravity nbers where prisoners ree float harmlessy in suits Living quarters nade overcrowded and itentary-tike, And for jinment. the company e club was outfitted to pmmodate a variety of unsavory diversions. a 7 a reaction, the company manager sends for a team of hired assas sins to contain the problem before it escalates out of control Aware that the next inbound shuttle will deliver his intended killers, O'Nell tres to muster his forces, but in classi High Noon fashion, finds himself standing alone when the shutle'sfinal ap pearance turns Con-Am 27 into a virtual battlefield. “spent some time asa reporter with CBS during the Gemini and Apollo days,” Hyams continued, "and whatreally struck me about those missions was how really dangerous it all was. The ‘environment is totally hostile and you're totally dependent upon your life support systems. Well, living and working on fo would mean having to cope with that hostility on a day-to-day basis, and that situation alone becomes a principal player In all, this. The mining colony is a very tough place — a terrible, dangerous place. It's there fr a definite purpose, and t's not at all designed for creature comfort. Its crowded: i's ithy: it’s Claustrophobie, The ventilating system doesn’t work right — It's always too hot of too cold. It dehumanizing. And clustering that many people — ofthe temperament that situation would de ‘mand — in an area that size, tends to breed a kindof violence. ‘The situation itself makes people volatile, So to me, Outland deals with what | think are the realities of the time. It deals with vice: It deals with drugs; It deals with crime; it deals with greed — good old-fashioned values, right? But italso deals with courage, and it deals with honor — the kinds of divergent things that ex treme hardship and extraordinary situations seem to foster. But first, last and foremost, its a story about people—real people faced with a very serious situation. It’ a story that could take place in ther places — and fas taken place in other places. It nothing ese, Outland wil have a unique quality toitin thatit’sa film set inthe future that is not about hardware. In fact. it may well be the first attempt ever in this kind of genre to use the future as afocation rather than the sole subject ofthe movie.” Hyams spent three months on his first drat screenplay, called fo ~ a ttle which was to persist through the early days of preproduction until repeated confusion with the rather dissimt- lar 10 prompted him to change It. To Hyams’ surprise, the usual- ly laborious task of shopping a script around Hollywood proved Femarkably unfrustrating with Outland. Infact, several major studios expressed interest in the profect before iyams ultimate ly found a home for it with The Ladd Company, whose corporate executives had recently abdicated the top managerial postions at 20th Century-Fox to form an independent organization at The Burbank Studios. Outland was to be the frst production under their new corporate banner ~ a factor that weighed heavily in Hyam’s decision to go with them, since he was certain that mal ing the picture an unqualified suecess would be the company's primary and overriding concern. True to his supposition, The add Company became totally obsessive with the project — sending him back to his typeviltr for seven more drafts before they were ready to put his screenplay before the cameras. Meanwhile, the decision had been made to shoot entirely atPinewood Studios a Yong-standing haven for scence fiction pro ‘ducers eager to get every possible dollar onto the screen. Among the first to join the Outland unit was special effects supervisor ‘Jn Stears A veteran effects expert with two Academy Awards {ohis ced (for Thunderbal and Star Wars), Sears was charged with overseeing the complex miniature work and floor effectsre- ‘quired forthe production. Pledged to jin the team later on as ‘optical effects supervisor was Roy Fle, who had only recently ‘lied his own Oscar for Superman and was stil in the final ‘stages of postproduction on Superman IA third Oscar-winning talent Jon Mollo, was hired to design the near-futuriste costumes. “Another early team member was production designer Philip arson, with whom tyams had worked on Hanover Street, “The design concept for Outland was a very specific one,” sald Oe ee tr trae crc aes sign. and clearly the design of such an outer space mining com plex would be economically driven ~ cram in as many workers as humanly possible, give them air to breathe, food to eat. and that’s it So when Philip and! began thrashing ideas around that asthe onl criterion We considered, How do you get the largest amount of people inthe smallest amount of space?” Predominant among the resulting set designs were the vast, penltentanyke living quarters comprised of metalic sleeping ubicles layered from floor to celing ~ harshly litand devoid ot privacy, with communal showers and locker rooms nearby. Row "upon row of protective helmets and pressure suit lined an ad joining accesswray to a massive allock which opened onto the levator platform leading down into the mine. The mining area Itself, dar and claustrophobic, crisscrossed with scaffolding and catwalks, extended more thana mile beneath the surface of ‘themoon. In ation to other futuristic, but more conventional settings such asthe squad room and medical bay the complex also featured a unique jail consisting of zeo-gravity cells in whieh prisoners free float In pressure sults connected to um Dilical tethers. And for off duty recreation, workers swarmed to the company leisure club where drinks flowed feel. pickups ‘were plentifl, and nude dancers coupled erotically in glimmer- Ing shafts of laser light Whatever thelr purpose, rom the com- rmonplace to the extraordinary, the Outland sets seem imbued ‘with a grity realism and functional utility that only a few futuristic predecessors like Silent Running and Alien had ever been able to capture. When it came to designing the outside ofthe complex yams and Harison endeavored to apply the same sort of functional a- tlonale, Hyams had fist envisioned Con-Am 27 asa cluster of| ‘geodesic domes. but as preproduction progressed, he became Infatuated withthe idea of transforming it into something re- semmbling a vast offshore orig. Since fos surface isknown to be wracked by severe seismic activity itwas reasoned — pethapsi Inga tat by concn the bore rou cities on iike legs, each mounted on bearings which shifted in re- sponse to signals from laser sensors, the complex could be sta- bilized at al times. With a basic design concept for the refinery in hand, Peter yams contacted Brian Johnson and Nick Allder about possibly building Johnson and Aller, who had most recently fleet fects supervisory positions on Allen and The Empire Strikes Back, recommended Nartin Bower and Bll Pearson forthe ob. Bower and Pearson had only recently formed a partnership Lunde the name Bowerhouse Model Associates, As independents, the two had worked side-by-side on major productions such as ‘Alien ‘and Pash Gordon, but more often than not found them selves bidding against each other for modehmaking assign. ‘ments, The partnership seemed an ideal way to effectively elim ‘ate the competition, “We went along tothe studlos.” Bill Pearson recalled, “and Peter showed is to artist's impressions ofthe refinery. There were stil alot of unsolved problems at that time, Tebiggestone tras actually how large the miniature was going to be. Estimates Fanged between ten feet long and forty feet long, Peter wanted to tenow what sort of detail we could get into a minature, so we took one ofthe color impressions and decided the best way we could show him how much detall we could get would bet build him one, Well obviously, we didn’t go for the forty foot one. In ‘stead, we bull a section about two-and-a-half foot square — basally a platform with legson it~ and took it into him, was really quite anice model. We even puta motorized radar scanner ton it Peter couldnt heleve it. He didn’t know we were actualy {going to build one, and loved tie did quite afew flim tests fn it and then he told us, ‘kay, we need a miniature, twenty foot ong, with the detal that you have ther.’ And that'show we got into ft.” ‘Getting into it was only the start, however. “We had only three ‘monthsto complete the ob, and even at that twas going to bea ‘eal push, So we had to malke some compromises with the at de- partment. Art departments, in general, Just aten’t used to ‘model makers actually designing things. They're used to hand- Inga design toa pattern maker and he does It precisely as they have It drawn. Wel, we've worked on enough movies now to ‘now what aspects of a drawing are Important to fllow and Which bits to disregard, Ifyou can get the same aesthetic feeling About a certain section that you're bullding that’s it. So we doa Tot of designing as we go along We like to add our own creative Input and Ie really helps us cut comers Especially on a limited schedule, you've got to cut corners. You can't start milling things and turning stuf ona ate to thousandths of an inch. W's Just never noticed on the screen, The problem on Outland was that the art department was ot only trying to get together draw: ings for Ue miniature, but they were also doing the sets, aswel, And f cours, tothe art department the sets are really more im portant. So we decided we couldn tsit around and wait to get our Grawings — we'd have never finished in time. As it turned out, \wehad the first section built before they gave usthe drawings for 1 Finally, we came toa compromise. They slarted producing actualsize silhouettes or outlines ofthe shapes that were re- ‘Studio technicians make final positioning adjustments on the two greenhouses. In al, ‘the miniature Con ‘Amalgamate *27 mining ‘complex and is accompany ing landscape occupied most of an entre siage ¢ Phnewood. The twin spires, ‘containing mechanized ‘elevator shafts which ran ‘down into the subsurface mining area, were signi ‘cantly shortened prior to ‘actual photography. in ‘eeping with Myams’ desire fora single ight source effet a batery of searchlights and ‘brute acs flooded the miniature with harsh unt ‘directional ighting. caverexa > 9huttle landing pad — tof final detaling — the Bowerhouse Model fates workshop. Behind ‘the completed refinery ving quarters. Although J the Con-Am structures ¢ bull by Martin Bower ill Pearson, the landing Worm was fabricated at ewood by effects super: r John Stears’ crew and ‘sent to Bowerhouse for detailing. / Bil earson urpaints the backside of ¥ the greenhouses. The ‘olor scheme was ater inged to an offwhite, / Chloroform as an adhe ‘because of its bonding ‘ies and tack of residue, Bower carefully affixes inhouse side panel. 1A of the unused twefoot spe. 1 Once completed, ales were delivered t0 ‘dio where John Stears his crew made the final 5. added all the mecha: elements. and installed Der optic light sources. 4uired, and we filed in all the detalls. Some ofthe sections we hhad to bulld exactly as specified so they would match other things being bull elsewhere. They'd say, "You can do whatever the hell you want around it, but we must have these units as drawn.’ So that’s pretty much the way we worked. Somebody from the art department would come out every couple of days, and make sure we weren't going too far astray. Fortunately we ‘were about forty minutes from the studio oF it probably would hhave been more often.” CCon-Amalgamate #27 was comprised of seven interconnected ‘modules, each serving a specified function. The largest was the refinery itself, a spider's web of beams and cables, nicknamed Pompidou Center” because ofits architectural similarity tothe ‘controversial French museum ofthe same name, whose struc- tural supports are positioned outside the buildingrather than in- side, Unlike the other sectlons of the complex which were >otnted fat on elevated platforms, the giant Pompidou module actually passed through its platform — which in appearance and function was more like a picture frame — and was suspended by a dozen strategically-placed brass pins. Adjoining the refinery were living quarters for the more than two thousand laborers and administrative personnel required to support the mining ‘operation. Other sections Included the mine ise, solar power generating station, a space shuttle landing pad, and two gigan- LUcgreenhouses, Pearson and Bower were tasked with producing allthe above-ground structures except forthe landing pad. That, ‘and the actual solar panel area ofthe generating station, were to be built at Pinewood by John Stears and his crew. n fac, the en tire mode-bullding operation demanded close cooperation be ‘ween the two units, "Because we were under uch a tight dead- line,” Pearson revealed, "there werestil alot of question marks by the time we got underway, particularly over the illumination the type offer optics to be used. Asa result, Johnny Stears ‘ald, "Well look, if you can build the miniature in sections and then make the sections all come away as much as possible so my boys can get into the back of them, we can fi the fiber optics in when Itgets tothe studio.” That meant that every section on the refinery had to be detachable, more oles, which did slightly complicate matters, but me managed it okay.” After first measuring their workshop door to be certain they 25