ceqa02 Reviews

Mysterious Island (2005 TV Movie)

Design of Nautilus

[5/10 · 29 August 2006]

I only saw the preview/trailer on another movie rental, and I tried to find it locally to rent, or at amazon to buy, and no luck. So I've only seen the trailer.

That said, my comment is that the design of the Nautilus uses elements found in the Disney Nautilus (also known as the Geoff Nautilus, after its maker), rather than the Verne Nautilus.

There is a whole sub-genre of model-makers and illustrators busily turning out models and pics of the Disney Nautilus. I joined a forum they hang out at, and asked, 'How do you get permission to copy Disney's sub?' Answer, you can't get permission. According to the freelance and do-it-yourself model-makers and illustrators, they just do it. IOW, they are ripping Disney's Nautilus design. They are also selling what they make without paying Disney. Supposedly, Disney is 'overlooking' this.

The Disney/Geoff design looks like a fish, and has a toothed arched bow piece, which is unique to Disney. The Verne Nautilus looks like a double-ended cigar with horizontal fins in the middle, and no saw-toothed arched bow piece.

So anyone adding a toothed arched bow piece to their Nautilus, possibly runs the risk of infringing on Disney. Unless they can argue that U-boats also had this, with their net-cutters, which had a cable extending from the cutter to the conning tower. IOW, a generic toothed arched bow piece. But Disney has enough money and lawyers to scare off anyone wanting to argue the point.

Which brings us to this movie. I see a comment that Hallmark made the movie; so it's definitely not a Disney production.

My point is, the Nautilus in the trailer for this movie looks like a super-science version of the Disney/Geoff Nautilus. What little I saw of it looks nice, real slick. Nearly everyone seems to hate the movie, but from what little I saw of the sub itself, it totally rocks. Fabulous workmanship.

As for the idea that this new movie rips Disney, this does not necessarily seem either unfair, or totally accurate. We have the example of the U-Boats, preceding the original Disney 20k movie by about a decade. Also, Disney did a fair job of appropriating much of Verne's story as a freebie, and then fighting Verne's descendants over giving them a fair share of the proceeds. The same can be mentioned of Bambi, in which the original author was more or less conned into selling movie rights to Bambi for pennies to Walt Disney, who turned around and made a fortune on the animated version. The author deserved better. What goes around, comes around.

This not a legal statement, but just my personal opinion. It's just my impression, based on what I was able to see from the trailer. I did try to find a copy to see the whole thing, and failed, so my apologies for not succeeding in that. But I had to comment on the sub design elements.

Disney may defend their actual design, but there is a worldful of model-makers, illustrators, and enthusiasts who would love to get involved in creating their own versions and renditions of the Nautilus, and branch away from the purists' Verne Nautilus.

It looks to me like, with the issuance of this movie, someone has taken a big step in putting the generic Disney/Geoff Nautilus design elements, a big step closer to being Public Domain.

I for one applaud this.

Sky Riders (1976)

classic Coburn at his best

[10/10 · 5 June 2006]

The movie starts with machinegun-toting terrorists killing the hired help and kidnapping a wife and child. The husband seeks his wife's former husband's help in getting them back. The gang's hideout territory scenery is breathtaking, an abandoned and isolated monastery in mountainous Greece. The inside of the monastery depicts ancient Christian Orthodox iconography. Coburn lines up a travelling troupe of circus-act type hang gliger performers to teach him how to fly. These are the early design of hang gliders, with a rogallo wing design. The rogallo wing consists of fabric stretched out in a triangle over two leading-edge hollow aluminum spars, with another aluminum tube for a spine, and another for a cross bar, and a lower metal loop for the dangling pilot to grip and steer by. Very much like a modern delta-style steerable kite. These were dangerous but beautiful designs, which are capable of going into a stall and nose dive, straight into the ground from a thousand feet up if you are not careful and experienced, but a delight to watch in flight. Before he approaches them, Coburn watches the travelling aerialists' circus-style open-air act, as the heartstoppingly colorful hang gliders perform aerial maneuvers with breathtaking poise and beauty. There's a pretty girl in the troup. One flyer pretends to lose his grip and plummets dozens of feet into a nearby body of water while his pilotless hang glider drifts lazily down without him. So Coburn approaches them and asks to be taught how to pilot one. Somewhere along the line, while learning to fly, Coburn gets casual and cozy, and proposes to the performers that they join him in the rescue. "If we fail," you get your money back," the teacher volunteers. "Right!" Coburn grins skeptically and knowingly, to which the others laugh. Coburn isn't bitter, but he's no fool, and suddenly they have all been won over to his side and looking at the challenge as a team. Like I said, Coburn at his best. From there on, it's a class act as Coburn and the aerialists make a stealth infiltration of the sky-high monastery via hang glider, and seek to get the woman and child out and escape again on their hang gliders before the terrorists can discover and stop them.