Video: "The Old Man Hottabych": How They Made a Fairy Tale Film with Amazing Special Effects
2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55
More than half a century ago, a color film was released on Soviet screens "Old Man Hottabych" … Boys and girls were ready to stand for hours at the doors of cinemas to watch Volka and the genie on the flying carpet soar in the clouds. The protagonists' "flights" were far from the only special effects in the film that staggered the imagination of viewers in the late 1950s. Despite the fact that then there was no trace of computer graphics, "Old Man Hottabych" became an example of incredible ingenuity and skill of its creators.
The film crew had a task: to surpass Hollywood, so they did not spare money for the film. The greatest burden fell on the shoulders of the combined shooting workshop. The Research Institute of Television has specially developed a new film camera and a developing machine for this film. The scale of the special effects of that time is striking: palaces appeared out of nowhere on the screen, and caravans moved along the Moscow streets.
One of the most difficult "magic" scenes was the flight on the flying carpet of Hottabych (Nikolai Volkov), Volka (Lesha Litvinov) and Zhenya (Gena Khudyakov). The actors themselves were filmed on the carpet in the pavilion, and then the flight was superimposed on the desired background.
To make clouds, smoke was blown into the pavilion. In the episode where Zhenya throws bunches of bananas from the flying carpet, the boy is in tears. They were caused by the annoyance of the smoke, but they were so appropriate in the frame that the director left them in the film.
It also took a lot of work to create other "magical" special effects. The scenes with a football match, where the goal "played" the way Hottabych wanted, turned out to be incredibly funny. In the frame, the bar was bent, then hitting, then passing the ball. In fact, the "magic" gate was custom made. They were sliding and due to this they could decrease and increase in size. Plus, the goal was set on rails to guide them to the ball at the right time. The bar itself was made of rubber. On a signal, the workers sitting in the pit pulled the ropes, and the bar “let” the ball pass.
In an episode with a circus script, old man Hottabych eats a whole tray of ice cream. In fact, he ate glazed curds. Since a lot of takes were filmed, the actor hated curd bars until the end of his days.
"Old Man Hottabych" was so fond of the audience that he is still included in the lists the best films for children and adults.
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