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| Jack Arnold: Creature from the Black Lagoon (US 1954) with Ricou Browning as the gill man and Julie Adams as Kay Lawrence. |
Mustan laguunin hirviö / Odjuret i den svarta lagunen.
US © 1954 Universal Pictures Company, Inc. PC: William Alland.
D: Jack Arnold. [D of underwater sequences: James Curtis Havens]. SC: Harry Essex, Arthur A. Ross – from a story by Maurice Zimm. DP: William E. Snyder – b&w – 3-D. Special photography: Scotty Welbourne / Charles S. Welbourne. SFX: Charles Baker, Fred Knoth, Tim Baar. AD: Hilyard M. Brown, Bernard Herzbrun. Set dec: Russell A. Gausman, Ray Jeffers. Cost: Rosemary Odell. Makeup: Bud Westmore. Gill man special creature makeup: Bud Westmore, Jack Kevan. [Creature designer: Milicent Patrick, n.c.]. Hair: Joan St. Oegger. [M according to IMDb: Henry Mancini, Hans J. Salter, Herman Stein, n.c.]. MD: Joseph Gershenson. ED: Ted J. Kent.
C: Richard Carlson (David Reed), Julie Adams / Julia Adams (Kay Lawrence), Richard Denning (Mark Williams), Antonio Moreno (Carl Maia), Nestor Paiva (Lucas), Whit Bissell (Dr. Edwin Thompson), Bernie Gozier (Zee), Rodd Redwing (Louis), Henry A. Escalante (Chico), Julio Lopez (Thomas), Ricou Browning (the gill man in water), Ben Chapman (the gill man on land), Tom Hennessy (the gill man in stunt scenes), Sydney Mason (Dr. Matos), Rodd Redwing (Louis, expedition foreman). - Stunt double for Julie Adams: Polly Burson. Underwater stunt double: Ginger Stanley.
Helsinki premiere: 10.12.1954 Metropol, distributor: Bio-Kuva Oy – telecast: 4.7.1993 MTV3 – VET 41043 – K12 – 79 min
Sequels: Hirviön kosto (Revenge of the Creature, 1955, D: Jack Arnold), Hirviö keskuudessamme (The Creature Walks Among Us, 1956, D: John Sherwood)
Universal Studios 2K DCP 3D of the 2012 digitally mastered version viewed in XpanD at Cinema Orion (3D), 12 April 2014
Revisited Jack Arnold's fondly remembered scifi / horror film, called "a demoniac pastoral" by Carlos Clarens, the first film that Stephen King saw as a kid (he then realized that death is when the creature comes to get you), and Tom Ewell and Marilyn Monroe's date movie in Seven Year Itch ("I just felt so sorry for the creature... I think it just craved a little affection" is The Girl's remark during the skirt ventilation scene over the subway). Despite its cardboard characters and lurid aspects Creature from the Black Lagoon has aged well.
Strengths of the film include:
1. Jack Arnold has a small budget but his concerns are big.
2. As in all good horror / scifi tales, Jack Arnold treats his subject with respect.
3. Even for those viewers who find the film ridiculous such a deadpan approach is best.
4. The film starts with Genesis, the birth of the Earth and life, when everything was without form and void, and the newly born miracle of life developed in infinite variety. This sense of the sublime is never lost.
5. The beautiful underwater sequences are the artistic core of the film.
6. The poetic vision is enchanting, and perhaps the nearest point of comparison might be King Kong. There is the lagoon "at the end of a dead end". The scientists venture "to the unexplored territory with a woman".
7. Like King Kong, Creature from the Black Lagoon is "Beauty and the Beast". There is a strange Romantic charm in the scenes where the Creature swims backstrokes underwater as the Beauty does the Australian crawl above. Nominally, the Creature is threatening to the Beauty, but there is something puzzling as we don't really sense that the creature would do any harm to her (unlike to all men who are threatening him). There is a Tarzan-like innocent sexual delight in the swimming scenes.
8. Creature from the Black Lagoon belongs to the immortal interpretations of Paradise, of the Garden of Eden.
9. It is an ecological film, a fairy-tale about the destruction of the Amazon ecosystem. We, and most of the members of the expedition, feel uneasy when the greedy financier urges them to lavish poison in the depths of the lagoon, to force the creature to the surface dead or alive. We start to feel that the humans are worse than the creature who would be happy to be left alone.
10. The conclusion reminds me of a poem by Eino Leino: "rotkoni rauhaan kuin peto kuoleva hiivin" / ["like a dying beast I retire into the safety of my abyss"].
C: Richard Carlson (David Reed), Julie Adams / Julia Adams (Kay Lawrence), Richard Denning (Mark Williams), Antonio Moreno (Carl Maia), Nestor Paiva (Lucas), Whit Bissell (Dr. Edwin Thompson), Bernie Gozier (Zee), Rodd Redwing (Louis), Henry A. Escalante (Chico), Julio Lopez (Thomas), Ricou Browning (the gill man in water), Ben Chapman (the gill man on land), Tom Hennessy (the gill man in stunt scenes), Sydney Mason (Dr. Matos), Rodd Redwing (Louis, expedition foreman). - Stunt double for Julie Adams: Polly Burson. Underwater stunt double: Ginger Stanley.
Helsinki premiere: 10.12.1954 Metropol, distributor: Bio-Kuva Oy – telecast: 4.7.1993 MTV3 – VET 41043 – K12 – 79 min
Sequels: Hirviön kosto (Revenge of the Creature, 1955, D: Jack Arnold), Hirviö keskuudessamme (The Creature Walks Among Us, 1956, D: John Sherwood)
Universal Studios 2K DCP 3D of the 2012 digitally mastered version viewed in XpanD at Cinema Orion (3D), 12 April 2014
Revisited Jack Arnold's fondly remembered scifi / horror film, called "a demoniac pastoral" by Carlos Clarens, the first film that Stephen King saw as a kid (he then realized that death is when the creature comes to get you), and Tom Ewell and Marilyn Monroe's date movie in Seven Year Itch ("I just felt so sorry for the creature... I think it just craved a little affection" is The Girl's remark during the skirt ventilation scene over the subway). Despite its cardboard characters and lurid aspects Creature from the Black Lagoon has aged well.
Strengths of the film include:
1. Jack Arnold has a small budget but his concerns are big.
2. As in all good horror / scifi tales, Jack Arnold treats his subject with respect.
3. Even for those viewers who find the film ridiculous such a deadpan approach is best.
4. The film starts with Genesis, the birth of the Earth and life, when everything was without form and void, and the newly born miracle of life developed in infinite variety. This sense of the sublime is never lost.
5. The beautiful underwater sequences are the artistic core of the film.
6. The poetic vision is enchanting, and perhaps the nearest point of comparison might be King Kong. There is the lagoon "at the end of a dead end". The scientists venture "to the unexplored territory with a woman".
7. Like King Kong, Creature from the Black Lagoon is "Beauty and the Beast". There is a strange Romantic charm in the scenes where the Creature swims backstrokes underwater as the Beauty does the Australian crawl above. Nominally, the Creature is threatening to the Beauty, but there is something puzzling as we don't really sense that the creature would do any harm to her (unlike to all men who are threatening him). There is a Tarzan-like innocent sexual delight in the swimming scenes.
8. Creature from the Black Lagoon belongs to the immortal interpretations of Paradise, of the Garden of Eden.
9. It is an ecological film, a fairy-tale about the destruction of the Amazon ecosystem. We, and most of the members of the expedition, feel uneasy when the greedy financier urges them to lavish poison in the depths of the lagoon, to force the creature to the surface dead or alive. We start to feel that the humans are worse than the creature who would be happy to be left alone.
10. The conclusion reminds me of a poem by Eino Leino: "rotkoni rauhaan kuin peto kuoleva hiivin" / ["like a dying beast I retire into the safety of my abyss"].
The 3D vision is sometimes beautiful (the lagoon underwater), sometimes ridiculous, often somewhere in between. As for the 3D, Creature from the Black Lagoon belongs to the cinema of attractions: - the fossilized flipper sticking out of the rock - the recurrent image of the gill man's flipper sticking out - the schools of fish swimming towards us and from us - the harpoon shots - the bubbles - the bat in the creature's lair - the fog, the steam - and most importantly: - the voluptuous female forms in the swimming scenes - the prominent breasts as the Beauty swims backstrokes. We are reminded that in Hollywood this was the era of "mammary madness", to quote a chapter title in Marjorie Rosen's book Popcorn Venus.
The 3D does not make the film more realistic; instead, it feels more fantastic and dream-like.
The music is often lurid and strident.
The performances are wooden. We accept the Creature's rubber suit because of the conviction of Jack Arnold, Bud Westmore and Ricou Browning, because of their faith in the Creature. They take us to the land of poetry like Jean Cocteau did.
I have seen this film a few times, and twice in an analogue screening with the red-green filter glasses. This screening of Universal's digitally restored and mastered version is now definitive for me. I enjoyed the glorious, brilliant, oneiric, black and white screening.
Production information from Wikipedia: "Producer William Alland was attending a dinner party during the filming of Citizen Kane (in which he played the reporter Thompson) in 1941 when Mexican cinematographer Gabriel Figueroa told him about the myth of a race of half-fish, half-human creatures in the Amazon river. Alland wrote story notes entitled "The Sea Monster" ten years later. His inspiration was Beauty and the Beast. In December 1952, Maurice Zimm expanded this into a treatment, which Harry Essex and Arthur Ross rewrote as The Black Lagoon. Following the success of the 3-D film House of Wax in 1953, Jack Arnold was hired to direct the film in the same format."
"The designer of the approved Gill-man was Disney animator Millicent Patrick, though her role was deliberately downplayed by makeup artist Bud Westmore, who for half a century would receive sole credit for the creature's conception. Jack Kevan, who worked on The Wizard of Oz and made prosthetics for amputees during World War II, created the bodysuit, while Chris Mueller, Jr. sculpted the head."
"Ben Chapman portrayed the Gill-man for the majority of the film shot at Universal City, California. The costume made it impossible for Chapman to sit for the 14 hours of each day that he wore it, and it overheated easily, so he stayed in the backlot's lake, often requesting to be hosed down. He also could not see very well while wearing the headpiece, which caused him to scrape Julie Adams' head against the wall when carrying her in the grotto scenes. Ricou Browning played the Gill-Man in the underwater shots, which were filmed by the second unit in Wakulla Springs, Florida. Many of the on-top of the water scenes were filmed at Rice Creek near Palatka, Florida." (Wikipedia)
BEYOND THE JUMP BREAK: OUR PROGRAM NOTE BASED ON MARK JANCOVICH, STEPHEN KING, AND FRANK SCHNELLE:
BEYOND THE JUMP BREAK: OUR PROGRAM NOTE BASED ON MARK JANCOVICH, STEPHEN KING, AND FRANK SCHNELLE:
Stephen King, John Carpenter ja Steven Spielberg mainitsevat Jack Arnoldin teokset paitsi varhaisina elokuvakokemuksina myös koko lapsuuden suurimpina elämyksinä. Mustan laguunin hirviö, ensimmäi-nen Stephen Kingin näkemä elokuva, muutti hänen elämänsä (”kuolema on sitä kun mustan laguunin hirviö saa sinut kiinni”). Yön meteori (It Came From Outer Space, 1953) oli saanut arvostusta, mutta Mustan laguunin hirviön suosio oli sellainen, että Universal otti tuottaakseen kokonaisen sarjan kauhu- ja scifi-elokuvia, joista monen ohjaajaksi tuli Jack Arnold.
Aluksi kaikkitietävä kertoja selostaa evoluution vaiheita. Näemme alkuräjähdyksen, ja kertoja muistuttaa miten alussa Jumala loi taivaan ja maan. Mutta alussa maa oli autio ja tyhjä, kunnes meret alkoivat nousta. Elämä alkoi kehittyä vesien lämpimässä syvyydessä loputtoman monimuotoisena. Kuvin ja sanoin korostetaan ihmiselämän vähäpätöisyyttä luonnon mahtavuuden ja moninaisuuden rinnalla. Laguunin hirviön paikka evoluutiossa hahmottuu: se on elämän varhaisia yrityksiä siirtyä vedestä maalle, elämän feminiinisestä alkuperästä sen maskuliiniseen hallintayritykseen. Kyseessä on muinaisuuden jäänne, joka on jäänyt eloon Amazonin viidakkoon alueella, jossa kaikki on säilynyt sellaisena kuin se oli 150 miljoonaa vuotta sitten.
Laguunin alainen maailma on toinen todellisuus. Se voi olla tappava ja tuhoisa, mutta toisaalta siihen liittyy mielikuvia kadonneesta viattomuudesta, paratiisista, Eedenin tarhasta. Kypsymättömyyttä ei esitetä elokuvassa kielteisenä tilana: se kytkeytyy elämän alkuperään ja toisaalta kuoleman uhkaan. Jack Arnoldin muiden elokuvien toistuvien autiomaanäkyjen tavoin Amazonin viidakko on vaarallinen, arvaamaton ja monikasvoinen miljöö. Se tarjoaa haasteita, epävarmuutta ja heterogeenisyyttä. Kohtaamme subliimin: luonnon pelottavan, käsityskyvyn rajoja horjuttavan mahdin.
Kalaihmisen viehtymys Kay Lawrenceen on omaperäinen muunnelma kaunottaren ja hirviön teemasta. On kysymys jostakin monimutkaisemmasta kuin siitä, että hirviö uhkaisi kaunotarta väkivaltaisesti. Useassa kohtauksessa nainen ja hirviö tuijottavat toisiaan aivan kuin he tunnistaisivat toisissaan jotakin mitä kukaan muu ei havaitse. Hirviö kiinnostuu Kaysta kun tämä lähtee uimaan laguunille, ihmismaailman ja hirviömaailman rajapinnalle. Hirviö ei uhkaa naista vaan koskettaa tämän jalkaa varovasti. Se vaikuttaa ujolta naisen seurassa, vaikka se ei pelkää taistella miesten kanssa. Siinä on lapsellista epävarmuutta omasta identiteetistään suhteessa toisiin. Yhä naista varoen hirviö alkaa uida tämän alla ja peilata tämän liikkeitä. Hirviön käytös ilmentää pikemminkin samastumista kuin dominointia. Vedenalaiset kohtaukset on kuvattu hätkähdyttävästi tavalla, joka luo kajastavasta valosta ja virtaavista liikkeistä sadunhohtoisen romanttisen tilan. Musiikki korostaa sitä.
Näennäisesti elokuva noudattaa kaavaa, joka johtaa normaalin heteroseksuaalisen parin muodostamiseen. Kalaihmisen kuvauksessa on kuitenkin sellaista sympatiaa ja arvokkuutta, että hirviöstä tulee tärkein samastumiskohde. Hirviö ilmentää alkukantaista, monimuotoista ja liikkuvarajaista seksuaalisuutta. Se tarjoaa näyn rodun ja sukupuolen ristiriidoista, myös siirtomaa-alistuksen mielikuviin liittyen. Viimeisessä kuvassa hirviön nähdään uppoavan hitaasti laguuniin. Kyseessä ei ole vain muinaisen kehitysvaiheen häviö. Hallitsevaksi jää traaginen tunne vaihtoehtoisten kehitysmahdollisuuksien tukahduttamisesta.
– Lähteinä Mark Jancovich: Rational Fears. American Horror in the 1950s (1996), Stephen King: Danse Macabre (1981) ja Frank Schnelle (toim.): Hollywood Professional. Jack Arnold und seine Filme (1993) AA 25.4.1999
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