Hey there everybody! Remember Phil Tippett's 10 minute experimental stop motion short which he made from 1983 to 1985 after VFX work on Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi (1983), Prehistoric Beast, or the dinosaur animation from the 1985 Christopher Reeve-hosted TV Documentary, Dinosaur! that deserves him an Emmy? Well, anyone?
Well everyone, I'll tell ya all about it.
You are in Alberta, Canada, 65 million years ago. Well, that's way before Terrence and Phillip from South Park. In a Late Cretaceous moonlit night, strange animal sounds reverberate through the forest of conifer trees. A cunning, carnivorous Tyrannosaurus Rex, aka T-Rex, tears the last shred from a recent duckbill kill, meaning, she gotta hunt again and again and again.
When dawn broke, a small herd of horned ceratopsian dinosaurs, called Monoclonius grazes near T-Rex's territory, and an incautious member, searchin' for more of his favorite flower food, wanders into the woods anyway. He was focusing too intently on his flower treat and isn't aware that T-rex's approaching. When he senses danger at last, it's too late for Mr. Monoclonius. He tried and tried and tried to keep his single horn and protective frill towards T-rex, but she's too agile and determined for him.
Despite a valiant struggle and a single on-target thrust by Monoclonius' horn, it's inevitable for the outcome, and unaware of the violent drama that has now claimed one of their own, the rest of Monoclonius' herd munches idly away, while T-Rex prepares for next time.
You are in Alberta, Canada, 65 million years ago. Well, that's way before Terrence and Phillip from South Park. In a Late Cretaceous moonlit night, strange animal sounds reverberate through the forest of conifer trees. A cunning, carnivorous Tyrannosaurus Rex, aka T-Rex, tears the last shred from a recent duckbill kill, meaning, she gotta hunt again and again and again.
When dawn broke, a small herd of horned ceratopsian dinosaurs, called Monoclonius grazes near T-Rex's territory, and an incautious member, searchin' for more of his favorite flower food, wanders into the woods anyway. He was focusing too intently on his flower treat and isn't aware that T-rex's approaching. When he senses danger at last, it's too late for Mr. Monoclonius. He tried and tried and tried to keep his single horn and protective frill towards T-rex, but she's too agile and determined for him.
Despite a valiant struggle and a single on-target thrust by Monoclonius' horn, it's inevitable for the outcome, and unaware of the violent drama that has now claimed one of their own, the rest of Monoclonius' herd munches idly away, while T-Rex prepares for next time.
Here's my commentary on Prehistoric Beast:
It's very hard to discuss Phil Tippett's Prehistoric Beast without you being carried away by it, for it's ten minutes of dinosaur bliss for you guys. In addition, Phil Tippett's Prehistoric Beast is retro, for it's made between 1983 and 1985.
Well you guys, it's virtually flawless, technically speakin', and it's nothin' short of beautiful, artistically speakin'. From the incredible skies full of pinks and purples, to the humid richness of the forests, Prehistoric Beast by Phil Tippett unfolds in a new world that looks totally real and epic and yet totally better than real and epic.
It's some kind of enhanced reality, like some gret painter might achieve, and even the lighting effects would totally do a Renaissance master proud of. In daytime, the shafts of light from the sun, could filter through the forest canopy and cast dappled patterns on the skins of dinosaurs.
At nighttime, the cold silver moonlight reveals their nocturnal activities with an eerie sheen. The very near-perfect music may be ominous and anticipatory but ain't obtrusive, and the camerawork is consistantly and totally epic, inventive and full of energy. Dinosaur's-eye point of view scenes from both predator and prey, may have heighten the life or death scenario.
T-rex's vision is sure and steady, always fixed confidently ahead, while Monoclonius' eyes dart back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, as he desperately tried to find a way out of the forest. During the fight, the "Cameraman" may seem to struggle to keep the thrashing dinos in frame, just like a real wildlife photographer would while shootin' some kind of lion p'wning a gazelle on the Serengeti plains of Africa.
And then, there are the dinosaurs. The Stop-Mo Animation Puppets are totally amazing and epic, especially Mr. Monoclonius. In its painstaking detail, its wrinkles and scars and warts and patterns---the horned dinosaur can hold its own against anything in Jurassic Park.
It's gotta be one of the all-time best stop-mo puppets, and T-Rex is very nearly his match. All those great qualities could be wasted, however, if the animation is not also of the highest caliber, but of course it is, you guys. T-Rex is simultaeously stealthy and powerful, and Monoclonius' gait is perhaps the best stop-mo ceratopsian walk cycle ever done in a stop-mo dino movie.
Yeah, Prehistoric Beast is totally a labor of love and it shows, you guys. There ain't gotta be no argument--you guys, it's one of the most successful attempts ever made to convey in the stop-motion medium the grandeur of dinosaurs and their environment. If you watch, you must underscore just how fortunate it was for Steven Spielberg, Universal Studios, and fans of the dinosaur movies that Phil Tippett stayed aboard on the biggest, greatest, coolest, most awesome, most spectacular, most ambitious, most totally epic, most groundbreaking, most amazing, most influential, and most ultimate dinosaur movie of all time and of our lives....JURASSIC PARK!!!!!
It's very hard to discuss Phil Tippett's Prehistoric Beast without you being carried away by it, for it's ten minutes of dinosaur bliss for you guys. In addition, Phil Tippett's Prehistoric Beast is retro, for it's made between 1983 and 1985.
Well you guys, it's virtually flawless, technically speakin', and it's nothin' short of beautiful, artistically speakin'. From the incredible skies full of pinks and purples, to the humid richness of the forests, Prehistoric Beast by Phil Tippett unfolds in a new world that looks totally real and epic and yet totally better than real and epic.
It's some kind of enhanced reality, like some gret painter might achieve, and even the lighting effects would totally do a Renaissance master proud of. In daytime, the shafts of light from the sun, could filter through the forest canopy and cast dappled patterns on the skins of dinosaurs.
At nighttime, the cold silver moonlight reveals their nocturnal activities with an eerie sheen. The very near-perfect music may be ominous and anticipatory but ain't obtrusive, and the camerawork is consistantly and totally epic, inventive and full of energy. Dinosaur's-eye point of view scenes from both predator and prey, may have heighten the life or death scenario.
T-rex's vision is sure and steady, always fixed confidently ahead, while Monoclonius' eyes dart back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, as he desperately tried to find a way out of the forest. During the fight, the "Cameraman" may seem to struggle to keep the thrashing dinos in frame, just like a real wildlife photographer would while shootin' some kind of lion p'wning a gazelle on the Serengeti plains of Africa.
And then, there are the dinosaurs. The Stop-Mo Animation Puppets are totally amazing and epic, especially Mr. Monoclonius. In its painstaking detail, its wrinkles and scars and warts and patterns---the horned dinosaur can hold its own against anything in Jurassic Park.
It's gotta be one of the all-time best stop-mo puppets, and T-Rex is very nearly his match. All those great qualities could be wasted, however, if the animation is not also of the highest caliber, but of course it is, you guys. T-Rex is simultaeously stealthy and powerful, and Monoclonius' gait is perhaps the best stop-mo ceratopsian walk cycle ever done in a stop-mo dino movie.
Yeah, Prehistoric Beast is totally a labor of love and it shows, you guys. There ain't gotta be no argument--you guys, it's one of the most successful attempts ever made to convey in the stop-motion medium the grandeur of dinosaurs and their environment. If you watch, you must underscore just how fortunate it was for Steven Spielberg, Universal Studios, and fans of the dinosaur movies that Phil Tippett stayed aboard on the biggest, greatest, coolest, most awesome, most spectacular, most ambitious, most totally epic, most groundbreaking, most amazing, most influential, and most ultimate dinosaur movie of all time and of our lives....JURASSIC PARK!!!!!
But wait, I forgot to tell ya about the production and people responsible for it! It's the mid-1980's, folks, Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi (1983) was finally completed and Mr. Phil Tippett said, "I need a break from feature work and I'll begin a personal project I've been thinkin' 'bout." Phil Tippet once said words out of his mouth, "I had been working pretty intensively at ILM for a number of years and I took about nine months off and made my own project, Prehistorc Beast."
Somewhat like Ray Harryhausen's unfinished Evolution of the World, Prehistoric Beast was originally concieved as a totally ambitious effort. Phil recalled that "I wanted to make a dinosaur feature for quite a while, and this was going to be liek an episode from it, then I culled it down from there for production reasons...it was turned much more into like a teaser/trailer design."
He also thought that the film might find a niche in the educational arena. So he said, "Tom Smith was the general manager of Churchill Films at the time, and he was thinking about doing about doing some quasi-educational type things. Not really dry documentaries, but kind of action-oriented tales that would be somewhat representative of the way creatures actually moved."
That idea ain't pannin' out, though for Tippett remember that "My idea was to educate through entertainment but nobody bought that. At the same time the whole industry was undergoing a huge change as well, from film to tape, and Prehistoric Beast never found any kind of a market." But not to worry, for that little movie is far from being a castoff.
"Ultimately, it paid itself back many many times," said Phil Tippett. " I licensed it to a number of different places." I really think 2 of its higher-profile exposures were on Microsoft's Dinosaurs CD-ROM (hosted by Don Lessem), and as part of a glossy made-for-TV documentary from 1985 called Dinosaur! That TV Special, narrated by Superman's Christopher Reeve (right before he got an accident) and which you have never seen since the '80's, also featured a totally great deal of new animation created by Phil Tippett expressly for the program.
Although Prehistoric Beast was Phil Tippett's project, he did get a little assist from his buddies. Here's what Phil Tippett's got to say...
"Randy Dutra helped me make the molds on some of the puppets-we stayed up all night making molds once, and some of the armatures, Tom St. Amand helped me mout on. Randy also helped me out on a couple of shots; it was his first foray into animation."
And true to the history of intrepid FX artists, He made the most of available resources. He said that "Return of the Jedi had wrapped up and they had thrown a bunch of the model trees, of the redwood forest from the speeder bike chase into the trash, and so I scavenged those for my forest."
Ultimately, Tippett feels the endeavor's greatest value was the opportunity to see a production through from beginning to end. Phil Tippett concluded that "It was a good project for me, in that I had never before taken a film all the way to completion, So it was an exercise in getting something finished."
And Finally, Last but not least, as a footnote, the film's title was lifted from some dialogue in one of Tippett's early inspirations, the original 1933 King Kong. Any fan of Kong will recall Jack Driscoll and Carl Denham walkin' past the dead Stegosaur. Driscoll asks "A Dinosaur, eh?" and Denham will reply, "Yes, Jack...a Prehistoric Beast!"
Somewhat like Ray Harryhausen's unfinished Evolution of the World, Prehistoric Beast was originally concieved as a totally ambitious effort. Phil recalled that "I wanted to make a dinosaur feature for quite a while, and this was going to be liek an episode from it, then I culled it down from there for production reasons...it was turned much more into like a teaser/trailer design."
He also thought that the film might find a niche in the educational arena. So he said, "Tom Smith was the general manager of Churchill Films at the time, and he was thinking about doing about doing some quasi-educational type things. Not really dry documentaries, but kind of action-oriented tales that would be somewhat representative of the way creatures actually moved."
That idea ain't pannin' out, though for Tippett remember that "My idea was to educate through entertainment but nobody bought that. At the same time the whole industry was undergoing a huge change as well, from film to tape, and Prehistoric Beast never found any kind of a market." But not to worry, for that little movie is far from being a castoff.
"Ultimately, it paid itself back many many times," said Phil Tippett. " I licensed it to a number of different places." I really think 2 of its higher-profile exposures were on Microsoft's Dinosaurs CD-ROM (hosted by Don Lessem), and as part of a glossy made-for-TV documentary from 1985 called Dinosaur! That TV Special, narrated by Superman's Christopher Reeve (right before he got an accident) and which you have never seen since the '80's, also featured a totally great deal of new animation created by Phil Tippett expressly for the program.
Although Prehistoric Beast was Phil Tippett's project, he did get a little assist from his buddies. Here's what Phil Tippett's got to say...
"Randy Dutra helped me make the molds on some of the puppets-we stayed up all night making molds once, and some of the armatures, Tom St. Amand helped me mout on. Randy also helped me out on a couple of shots; it was his first foray into animation."
And true to the history of intrepid FX artists, He made the most of available resources. He said that "Return of the Jedi had wrapped up and they had thrown a bunch of the model trees, of the redwood forest from the speeder bike chase into the trash, and so I scavenged those for my forest."
Ultimately, Tippett feels the endeavor's greatest value was the opportunity to see a production through from beginning to end. Phil Tippett concluded that "It was a good project for me, in that I had never before taken a film all the way to completion, So it was an exercise in getting something finished."
And Finally, Last but not least, as a footnote, the film's title was lifted from some dialogue in one of Tippett's early inspirations, the original 1933 King Kong. Any fan of Kong will recall Jack Driscoll and Carl Denham walkin' past the dead Stegosaur. Driscoll asks "A Dinosaur, eh?" and Denham will reply, "Yes, Jack...a Prehistoric Beast!"
Well, as for the rest of you, remember Phil Tippett's 10 minute experimental film, Prehistoric Beast (1983-1985) and the 1985 CBS TV special, Dinosaur! hosted by Christopher Reeve AKA Superman, and animated by Phil Tippett? Well, tell me all about them. Also, any memory of Phil Tippett's Prehistoric Beast and the Emmy Award-winning Stop-Mo animation in Christopher Reeve's Dinosaur!?
Thank you!
Thank you!
P.S. I really think Phil Tippett made Prehistoric Beast in his garage, you guys.
Hey! Watch bits and pieces of Phil Tippett's stop-mo animated dinos for Prehistoric Beast (1983-1985) and the 1985 CBS TV Special, Dinosaur! (hosted by Superman and earning Phil Tippett an emmy for the stop mo dinos) here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5eQ3LDhGfpU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bkgr2kKnmH4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6mvpVmXIbjU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YAju363IMAI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XyxHX0ENZ14
Have you enjoy those stop mo dinos from Phil Tippett? Do you like it or not? What do you see in these 5 videos? Well, tell me, any of you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5eQ3LDhGfpU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bkgr2kKnmH4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6mvpVmXIbjU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YAju363IMAI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XyxHX0ENZ14
Have you enjoy those stop mo dinos from Phil Tippett? Do you like it or not? What do you see in these 5 videos? Well, tell me, any of you.
Although this thread hasn't been updated in a few years, Phil finally got around to putting up his short on YouTube!
Enjoy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlaXIRTjNfo
Enjoy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlaXIRTjNfo