Worst special effect I've ever seen in a movie…
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ConDeuce — 13 years ago(March 05, 2013 04:24 AM)
I remember that scene very well. Talk about breaking the fourth wall.
I have no idea who came up with the idea to do that (you can necessarily blame the director). Added for shock or schlock value as if "Earthquake" needed more? My guess is that they wanted to make the elevator scene more disturbing. The three big disaster films of the 70s ("The Poseidon Adventure", "The Towering Inferno" and "Earthquake") were a bit perverse and cruel in how they presented deaths. I thought Stella Stevens' death in "The Poseidon Adventure" was horrible as was the way they dispatched Jennifer Jones in "The Towering Inferno" and "Earthquake" seemed to go out of its way to kill people nastily like the first few people who ran down the stairs and got pushed off where the stairs ended. It was done to make the movie's sensationalistic but it felt cheap and unsavory most of the time. -
tedchaynes — 13 years ago(March 06, 2013 03:10 PM)
Well, first off.. I have seen FAR worse effects, that's for sure.. but it IS pretty bad.
That being said, I can honestly admit, as a 9 year old kid who didn't know any better.. it freaked me out a lot. Now I can see it differently, but back then.. yeah.. it WAS disturbing as hell.
I never lie. I willfully participate in a campaign of misinformation. -
InherentlyYours — 10 years ago(June 30, 2015 06:14 AM)
'I thought Stella Stevens' death in "The Poseidon Adventure" was horrible as was the way they dispatched Jennifer Jones in "The Towering Inferno" and "Earthquake" seemed to go out of its way to kill people nastily '
This has been happening since the beginning of the films. Why cite this film? I did notice that you mentioned women as being so horribly killed; maybe that was a subconscious thing on your part since it's less disturbing to you than men. -
aussiebears — 12 years ago(July 31, 2013 03:51 AM)
Apart from the blood splattered elevator there is a scene early in quake when Chuck and Ava are under the car and a building just bends, it is a pathetic special effect and the trivia section here[or somewhere] mentions it was done by warping a mirror.
That said I always like seeing the Capitol Records building collapse and the shot that pans over the city just after the quake finishes with the eerie John Williams score is very effective, that scene was done well. -
Waiting2BShocked — 12 years ago(August 12, 2013 10:53 AM)
The blood splat was a post-production 'money shot' substituting for an originally more graphic aftermath to the scene, which would have shown the detail of the bloodied, entangled heap of the travellers' bodies. However, the MPAA deemed it 'R'-worthy and so a compromise had to be made. There's been some debate over the years as to whether or not it was deliberately done so awfully as a kind of 'forget you' gesture.
There's no excusing the 'warping building' shot though, no. The very first one is just about passable, as there's not so much 'movement' to the building, more a bulging, and it's fleeting enough for you to let it by without dwelling on it, but then they cut back to a much longer shot with laughably apparent optical distortion. They really should have dropped the repetition. -
Avenger69 — 12 years ago(October 19, 2013 12:58 AM)
The warping shot was originally done as a camera test prior to production. The reason the shot is in the film (as awful as it is) is as an inside joke to the Universal executives the tower is the "Black Tower" on the lot at Universal, which houses the executive offices.
"It's people" -
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aussiebears — 12 years ago(November 06, 2013 03:46 AM)
Maybe Universal should have done what Irwin Allen did and find another studio to help finance Earthquake like he did with Inferno,with extra backing Mario Puzo's original script might have been able to be done justice and the destruction of Los Angeles could have been done on grand scale.
Even today The Towering Inferno looks like a class act that was well thought out, Earthquake just looks like a bad lego set thrown together which was rushed out to beat the release of Inferno.