Shark treatment.

More Spielberg-baiting!

A friend of mine worked on a big “Making of” documentary about 70s fish-based megahit JAWS. I won’t repeat what he told me about how Spielberg supposedly lost his virginity because I can’t afford a lawyer, but he was very interesting about the shark itself.

You all know the story: the mechanical shark built for the film malfunctioned constantly. “I was forced into making those creative choices, because I didn’t have a shark to use.”

Well, as my contact says, “We were told, by more than one person, that the mechanical shark worked fine. I mean, it looked like what it was, a fake shark, but it did everything it was supposed to do. The reason for the delays was that some high-up production personnel had acquired girlfriends on location and were in no hurry to return home.”

I just wanted to get that out there, true of not, in memory of the poor chap who built Bruce the Shark, (he also did the giant squid in Disney’s TWENTY THOUSAND LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA) who’s had decades of people thinking his shark didn’t go. Doesn’t seem fair.

“Ain’t war hell?”

 SO QUIET ON THE CANINE FRONT.

World War One reenacted by dogs. What can I say?

And this is just an extract, the whole film is twenty minutes long and is part of a SERIES, the Dogville Shorts, for Dog’s sake. I showed this to students and asked what it made them think of, and one (Julie) solemnly said it made her think of some stupid movie exec saying ‘Guys, I got a great idea!’ and then some unfortunate underlings being forced to carry it out.

Which I said deserves full marks, though in reality the guys who conceived the idea also made the films, which serves them right.

“Some of those dogs sure don’t look happy.” - B. Kite.

Fact-file: the dogs’ costumes are attached to piano wire so they can be “puppeteered” about the set, and their gums have been smeared with peanut butter to produce those realistic “talking” motions of the mouth. Which I believe is how Lars Von Trier directed Nicole Kidman in his own Dogville film.

I would love to see a Dogville version of DOGVILLE, actually. Here is the closest thing in existence:

From THE DOGWAY MELODY. The horrors of sexual assault, vividly manifested in canine form.

I don’t actually recommend you watch both of those clips back-to-back, you’re apt to get a little punchy and insane. They are like waking fever dreams, which is kind of good, but the concentration of nightmare fuel is so high it approaches toxicity, and then the jokes are just awful. Proof once again of the strangeness of thirties Hollywood cinema.

“The past is another country: they do things differently there. With dogs.”