A Preview of Jaws Estuary Attack Diorama by Sculptoria Studio

In September 2012, I did a two-part interview with Nigel Humphreys, sculptor and founder of Sculptoria Studio, about a selection of collectible dioramas that he was preparing for avid horror and sci-fi geeks like me. I recently received word that one of these dioramas, which depicts the Estuary Attack scene from Jaws, is ready for sale. Click below for more pictures of this amazing piece of Jaws art.

There isn't much I can say about the Estuary Attack diorama other than it is gorgeous, a remarkable scale-adjusted recreation of a memorable attack scene from Steven Spielberg's 1975 creature feature. To give you an idea of how well this diorama compares to its source material, I've provided a screen capture of the scene below for direct comparison with the diorama.

As you can see, Sculptoria Studio has created an impressive piece of art that would make a great addition to the collection of any avid Jaws fan. Here are some additional pictures that provide a closer look at the diorama's many details:

The Estuary Attack diorama is the first of many other collectible items that will be released by Sculptoria Studio. Future releases will include more pieces based on Jaws and other hit movies such as Close Encounters of the Third Kind, The Fog and 300. If you are interested in purchasing the Estuary Attack diorama, contact Sculptoria Studio at nrhcollectables@gmail.com.

The Fantastic Four(th): A Review of Lou & Yana's JawsFest 4 DVD

They said they wouldn't do it ... but the fans demanded otherwise. Thus, with great pleasure I had the privilege of recently receiving a screener copy of Lou & Yana's JawsFest 4: Revenge of the Finatics DVD. This DVD marks fourth and final installment in Lou and Dianna "Yana" Pisano's series of fan-made videos that are devoted to Jaws, the franchise that it spawned, and the locations at Martha's Vineyard and elsewhere that made the franchise possible.

Of course, the Pisanos' previous trilogy of JawsFest DVDs are extremely comprehensive about Jaws and its connections to Martha's Vineyard, so what could possibly be left to cover? PLENTY. Read on for my complete review of Lou & Yana's JawsFest 4, a DVD with plenty of interviews, location tours, sing-a-longs, and shark jumpings.

For those of you who are familiar with the previous three Lou & Yana's JawsFest DVDs know, their productions are mostly tied to the JawsFest events that were held in Martha's Vineyard. The first DVD features footage from the first JawsFest in 2005, while the third DVD features footage from another Jaws event (a pseudo-JawsFest) in 2011. JawsFest 4 covers JawsFest: The Tribute, the third (and possibly last) Jaws-centric Martha's Vineyard event that was held in 2012. I wasn't able to attend any of these events, so I'm very thankful that the Pisanos made the effort to capture footage from each of them and make it available to other Jaws fans who couldn't be there in person and who may never visit Martha's Vineyard at all.

JawsFest 4 does a commendable job in providing the highlights of JawsFest: The Tribute. It features cameos from many franchise alumni, including Jeffrey Kramer, Susan Backlinie, Lee Fierro, Joe Alves, Carl Gottlieb and Tom Dunlop. Even special effects wizard Greg Nicotero makes an appearance due to his astonishing contributions to the event that included life-sized replicas of Jaws actors Roy Scheider, Richard Dreyfuss and Robert Shaw. There were Jaws screenings, autograph tables and panel discussions--including a panel called "The Women of Jaws" that was hosted by none other than Yana Pisano herself!

Yana Pisano (far right) and "The Women of Jaws".

In previous JawsFest DVDs, the Pisanos visit many sites on the island that were featured in Jaws, Jaws 2 and Jaws: Revenge; in JawsFest 4, the Pisanos up the ante through their active involvement in several JawsFest events. The DVD shows them acting as tour guides, both on the water and in a bus, alongside fellow "Finatic" Jim Beller. Not only has Beller appeared in the previous JawsFest DVDs and worked with Matt Taylor in assembling photos for the book Jaws: Memories From Martha's Vineyard, he also had items from his vast collection of franchise memorabilia put on display in Jaws- and shark-related museum exhibits in both the U.S. and abroad. For JawsFest 4, Beller contributed some video footage from a July 2012 exhibition called SHARK, which was curated by famed marine conservationist, author, and painter Richard Ellis at the Nova Southeastern University’s Museum of Art in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Why the Chamber of Commerce of Martha's Vineyard doesn't have the Pisanos and Beller on retainer is still a mystery to me.

JawsFest: The Tribute is only part of JawsFest 4; it also includes footage from the Jaws ride at the Universal Studios theme park in Florida, a ride that closed in January 2012. The DVD features plenty of Jaws 2 stuff, including footage of Florida locations seen in the sequel and a Jaws 2 cast reunion that was held in Los Angeles in March 2012. These tidbits neatly dovetail with Lou Pisano's other recent Jaws 2 efforts: Not only was his three-part retrospective, "The Guts of Jaws 2: Appreciating An Underappreciated Sequel", published in SCREAM magazine (you can read the entire article here), but he is also at work with Michael Smith on an upcoming book about the sequel. (Smith also helped with the production of JawsFest 4.)

The Pisanos, adrift in a sea of Finatics on Martha's Vineyard.

Yet with all of the interesting Jaws stuff that it offers, JawsFest 4 wouldn't be entertaining if it weren't for the Pisanos and their merry band of Finatics. Since the release of their first JawsFest video, Lou and Yana have been making a name for themselves within the fan community and building a fan base of their own. By the time JawsFest 4 rolled into production, plenty of Finatics were willing to contribute whatever they could to bring the JawsFest series to a delightful close. If you've seen the previous DVDs, you'll see plenty of familiar faces on the screen; even "Sir" Edward McCormack and Mike "Quint" Hadji, two Finatics from England, contributed some amusing video clips from their corner of the globe as part of the series' finale. Furthermore, the Pisanos have a wonderful chemistry as a couple and that chemistry, along with their infectious enthusiasm, carries over into each of the fan projects they do. In short, if they're having fun you'll be having fun too, and JawsFest 4 is a big bundle of fin-tastic fun.

Click here to learn more about how to get a copy of JawsFest 4 and other related DVDs. While the JawsFest DVD series is officially over, the Pisanos have plenty more "Fests" in store for fans like you and me. In addition to the aforementioned Jaws 2 book project, they also have produced the HalloweenFest DVDs, a short movie trilogy that's a tribute to John Carpenter's classic slasher films, and Lou & Yana's TalkFest, an ongoing online radio show that airs weekly on the Blog Talk Radio site. TalkFest recently recorded its 100th episode and the Pisanos also produced the Lou & Yana's TalkFest: The Movie DVD, a video that was recorded during JawsFest: The Tribute and is a companion piece of sorts to JawsFest 4.

JawsFest 4: Revenge of the Finatics--I've got mine!

Phantom Sharks and Mutant Alligators Come to Life at Shark City Ozark

For as glamorous as it looks from the outside, the entertainment industry is an extremely tough business. For every international superstar, there are thousands of actors, directors, writers and production crew members who are struggling to get by in such a demanding, hyper-competitive business. This is especially true for practical special effects artists: With Hollywood's desire to go digital, artists who aim to keep practical effects alive in both movies and television are facing increasingly steeper challenges from production companies that see CGI as sure-fire means of saving time and money--albeit at the steep expense of quality effects work and fan satisfaction.

Entering the fray of practical special effects services is Shark City Ozark (SCO), a creature effects shop in Missouri. I've been in contact with SCO about their latest projects, the recent SyFy production of Ghost Shark (read my review here) and the upcoming Ragin' Cajun Redneck Gators, which airs on SyFy this Thursday, September 5th at 9 p.m. (Fans of the 1959 creature feature Alligator People should check out Redneck Gators, since both films seem to be cut from similar creative cloth.) SCO provided mechanical creature effects work for both films and given my fascination with mechanical monsters, SCO let me post some of their behind-the-scenes production photos of their work and shared some insights with me about what it's like to break into a field where hands-on monster making isn't nearly as valued as it should be. Click below to continue.

If you're familiar with SCO's work with their mechanical shark maquettes from Jaws and Jaws 2, then you know that the folks at SCO know their movie sharks. Thus, the scaled-sized mechanical shark that SCO provided for Ghost Shark is clearly a labor of love, even if the film doesn't do the shark itself justice. Here are some examples of conceptual art by SCO for Ghost Shark:

When I contacted SCO owner Mike Schultz about SCO's mechanical shark, he mentioned a few details to me that didn't make it into the film. "I built him so he could bend into a deep 'C' curve and thrash around and snap like a Deep Blue Sea Mako, but by the time we went before camera all he was allowed to do was shake his head a little and barely snap his jaws," he told me. "We knew when we got the script what we were in for, but how often does one get the chance to make a mechanical shark for a film?!"

As you can see from the photos above, SCO's mechanical shark was mostly inserted into the movie through green screen shots. (Given its amount of detail and its original range of motion, it's a shame that this shark wasn't around for the miniature shots in Jaws 3D.) Of course, SCO didn't just provide a shark that could do dry green screen work--it could do water shots as well:

As someone who is all thumbs with even the simplest of plastic model kits, my head spins to consider how someone can make both movie-accurate mechanical shark collectibles and a movie-ready mechanical shark that works for both dry and wet shots. Did I also happen to mention that unlike another mechanical shark named "Bruce", SCO's shark never broke down once during production? "I provided extensive art design and story-boarding for almost every key sequence," Schultz mentioned. "Ghost Shark required extensive design work and story-boarding with the shark attack sequences, although much of the action simply ended up as transparent blurs shooting through the frame. I'm not really sure why so few ideas made it to the final print. Then again, when schedules are changed four times a day and things must be done on such a tight deadline, I can understand why much of what we loved, planned for and of what they wanted never made it to print. You just do the best that you can and move to the next need to fulfill."

So with Ghost Shark done, what can we expect this week from Ragin' Cajun Redneck Gators? Unfortunately, Schultz doesn't know. "I am not sure what parts of my gator work will air at this point," he said. "They contacted me really late in production. I actually had to set aside painting the nearly completed ghost shark to make these various gators and gator parts for them and then return back to finish the shark, which was due on another set only days later--and with us running it! I do know that they filmed everything we built and shipped to them, but how much will survive has us really wondering. We'll just have to watch with everybody else."

According to Schultz, SCO made a gator head, tail, and 4-foot long dead baby gator prop for Redneck Gators. Here are some pictures of the concept art and completed work:

"We're really proud of our polyfoam-gators," Schultz added. "When you look at our gators closely, you will see that every scale and wrinkle and armor plate is anatomically correct. We did not make all of the gators for the film, but what we built looks real and scary. The actors did not have to pretend that something was there either. There is very little that cannot be done with a realistic looking practical creature right there on the same set with the actors and crew."

So with so much work to do and so little time to do it, will SCO keep making monsters for future creature features? Absolutely! "I want to keep doing these things," Schultz told me. "These have been roller-coaster adventures for all of us. We'll endure the ever-changing schedules, the crazy scripts, the rushed late hours and last second creature changes. We want to be there on location again. We want to be racing those insane deadlines and trying to make things better and memorable. We love the green screen and the hot stage lights and the cold stale food. We love breathing life into polyfoam and silicon. We build these living things and get to travel to location and operate them. We want these same people to call us back and we want to make more monsters for them."

Click here to see more behind-the-scenes photos from Ghost Shark and Ragin' Cajun Redneck Gator, as well as photos for another upcoming production called Bering Sea Beast.

Retro Review: Let's Scare Jessica to Death (1971)

The way I see it, one of the great things about being a horror film buff is the joy of discovering older films that never caught on with larger audiences but still serve as impressive examples of horror cinema. My latest discovery is Let's Scare Jessica to Death, a 1971 creeper that was directed by John D. Hancock.

I first noticed this film when I saw it on the shelf at our local video store back in the '80s, but I didn't pay much attention to it because I never heard of it before. Yet as the years went by, I noticed how this title kept popping up in many horror film reviews, books, articles and Web sites, so I finally got around to watching it the other week. Fun trivia fact: Let's Scare Jessica to Death is the film that landed Hancock the job of directing Jaws 2, but he was fired from that sequel due to a disagreement he had with a Universal executive. Stephen King has also mentioned in interviews that this movie is one of his favorite horror films, and you can see its influence in one of his novels from the mid-70s.

Let's Scare Jessica to Death begins with the titular character Jessica (Zohra Lampert) traveling with her husband Duncan (Barton Heyman) and their friend Woody (Kevin O'Connor) to a small town in rural New England. Jessica was recently released from a psychiatric facility, and Duncan purchased an abandoned farm outside of the town as a place for his wife to heal and resume her life. Soon after arriving at her new home, Jessica begins to see and hear strange things around the farm that may be linked to its legendary past. Is Jessica relapsing into insanity, or is someone trying to scare her to death?

To say much more about Let's Scare Jessica to Death is to give away too much. What I can say is that it is very similar to films such as Mario Bava's Lisa and the Devil (1973) and Francesco Barilli's The Perfume of the Lady in Black (1974) in that it is a moody, dreamlike story about an emotionally fragile woman who is in the thrall of an unknown force that slowly unravels the fabric of her sanity. Like other films of its kind, Let's Scare Jessica to Death takes its time to set up many different details within the narrative--details that don't make much sense at first--all for the purpose of delivering a relentless ending that ties it all together in a matter of minutes and leaves you reeling over what you just saw. The revelation of who the 'us' is that's suggested in the title (i.e., Let's is a contraction for 'let us') was something that I didn't see coming at all as the film reached its concluding scenes.

If you prefer horror films that have oodles of violence, jump scares and gore, Let's Scare Jessica to Death won't hold your interest at all. Yet if you're interested in older horror films that crawl under your skin through ghostly imagery, strange landscapes, disorienting narratives and pervasive dread, you should give this one a try.

Ghost Shark Review: Just When You Thought it was Safe to Swim with a Ouija Board

Ripoffs of the classic creature feature Jaws are a dime a dozen, especially if the ripoff in question also has a monster shark similar to the one in Jaws. Usually, these kinds of ripoffs try to distinguish themselves with by putting the monster sharks in an unlikely location (in a lake, in a supermarket, in a research lab, in a tornado, etc.) or giving the sharks some unique attribute or ability (swimming in the snow, swimming in the sand, etc.). Yet for fans of Jaws ripoffs who are looking for something a little different in their derivative entertainment, Active Entertainment has decided to ripoff the least of the Jaws movies, Jaws: The Revenge, with its latest film Ghost Shark. If anything, Ghost Shark proves that if you ripoff the lowest point of a popular franchise, you at least have a decent shot at making watchable (albeit not very memorable) entertainment. Read on for my complete review.

Even though the location and characters are different, Ghost Shark shares the same central concept as Jaws: The Revenge: A monster shark that's out for revenge against a group of people. Yet unlike Revenge, which was produced to showcase the acting talents of a studio executive's wife (yes, really), Ghost Shark is a cheap excuse to set up a series of increasingly preposterous shark attacks. Whereas Revenge kept piling on absurdities in its story to accommodate its unlikely star and astonishingly prohibitive production schedule, Ghost Shark takes the absurd concept of a vengeful shark and knowingly pushes it even farther every chance it gets.

Ghost Shark starts with an inept fisherman and his dimwitted daughter on a charter boat trying to catch a prize fish in the wee hours of the night before fishing season ends. Just when they hook what they perceive to be their winning fish, a large great white shark snatches it out of their grasp, which launches the frustrated fisher-folk into a violent rage against the shark. As the dying shark lurches away from the boat, it finds its way into a cursed cave where it becomes a ghost shark that wreaks havoc in a neighboring coastal village. Because it's a ghost, the shark can now attack wherever water is present: buckets, swimming pools, fire hydrants, bath tubs, toilets, emergency sprinklers, water coolers, leaky kitchen pipes, water toys, rain, bikini car washes, etc. With the local authorities baffled by the sudden explosion of grisly deaths, it is left to a group of teenagers to discover the secret of the ghost shark and put its reign of terror to an end.

No water container is too small for Ghost Shark!

If the premise of Ghost Shark sounds silly to you, then you know what you're in for. The cast that plays the teenage protagonists looks like they just arrived from the Disney Channel, and they come across as a much blander version of the teenage characters from Scooby Doo. This kind of film exists to providing a high body count of bloody deaths and in that sense, Ghost Shark delivers to a point. To its credit, the film eschews CGI effects for a practical effects shark made by Shark City Ozark. (You can see behind-the-scenes pictures of Ghost Shark at the official SCO site, and you can read my two-part interview with SCO owner Mike Schultz here and here.) The mechanical shark itself is actually a three-foot mechanical miniature that is inserted via green screen shots, but it looks great and moves mostly like the real thing. Indeed, watching a practical effects shark instead of a CGI shark gave me flashbacks to Roger Corman's numerous cheapjack creature features from the pre-CGI era. Good times, indeed.

Oddly, my biggest complaint against Ghost Shark is that it doesn't go far enough with its whacked-out premise. Sure, the script's dialogue is clunky and its characters are cardboard, but the film's flat direction is what really keeps the flick from hitting its high notes. Even though he has a few special effect-laden titles under his belt, director Griff Furst appears to have no idea about how to shoot special effect-driven scenes to their maximum effect. He doesn't even know how to shoot the scale-sized mechanical shark to get the most shock value out of it. Ideally, this kind of film should play as a gorier, goofier version of Jaws parodies such as Saturday Night Live's "Land Shark" skit or the Carol Burnett Show's "Jowls" skit. Instead, even the film's most outrageous kill scenes are shot without the slightest hint of dark humor or morbid inspiration. It makes me wonder what an experienced professional such as practical effects guru "Screaming Mad" George would have done with Ghost Shark.

Worst case of acid reflux ever.

Ghost Shark may not rank among the best of the Jaws ripoffs, but it's still more fun to watch than Jaws: The Revenge. To Jaws ripoff fans, that's got to mean something, right? If not, that's OK--Ghost Shark 2: Urban Jaws is already on its way.

30 Years Later, Jaws 3D Swims Back to the Movie Theater

My source of disposable income has been tight as of late, so I've fallen behind on this summer's recent blockbuster releases such as Iron Man 3 and Man of Steel. However, my financial problems haven't kept me from squeezing out enough cash to see a limited release of a film that I missed seeing in the theater during its original release in 1983: Jaws 3D.

As I wrote in a previous post about Jaws 3D, "I have a soft spot for the third entry in the Jaws franchise because it was THE film that got me interested in 3D movies. ... Before Jaws 3D, I had a ViewMaster toy and a few sets of reels, and I also knew about previous horror and sci-fi movies from the 50s that were shot in 3D--movies such as Creature from the Black Lagoon, House of Wax and It Came from Outer Space--courtesy of the Crestwood House books and their ilk. But Jaws 3D solidified in my mind just what the illusion of three dimensions meant in terms of movies (as well as comic books and later video games), thus starting my lifetime affair with 3D entertainment. Furthermore, Jaws 3D was the only one of the 3D movies from the early 80s that caught my eye, since it was the only film to offer the chance of seeing one of my favorite movie monsters jump out of the silver screen and into the audience."

The rose-tinted glasses of nostalgia aside, I believe that if you can't see Jaws 3D in a 3D format then it's not worth seeing, because most of the film's effects vanish in a 2D format. In the era before digital filmmaking, studios didn't have the option of converting a film to 3D in post-production. A film had to be shot in 3D for it to be released in 3D, and 3D cinematography required additional planning, funding and technical expertise as part of the production process. When seeing an older 3D movie in 2D, you're missing half of the movie; hence, I've spent the last few years trying to find a DVD copy of Jaws 3D in 3D to see what I was missing in the third Jaws movie.

So far, I've picked up two low definition copies of the Japanese laserdisc release from the 80s, with one copy in anaglyph 3D and one in field sequential 3D. Yet because I never saw the film during its original theatrical run, I had no standard by which I could evaluate these copies to determine how accurately they imitated the original theatrical 3D experience. Thankfully, the nearest Alamo Drafthouse Cinema solved my problem when it announced that it was going to hold a one-night showing of Jaws 3D in 3D last weekend as part of its "Summer of '83" series. Read on for more details about my retro-Jaws experience at Alamo, and what it might mean in regards to future Blu-ray releases of the Jaws sequels.

If you've never been to an Alamo Drafthouse Cinema theater, you're missing a fun movie experience. Alamo holds all sorts of film-related events, and it includes an on-site restaurant that allows you to order food--from snacks to dinner platters--to eat during the movie. For its showing of Jaws 3D, Alamo offered its own Jaws 3D dinner special of fish and chips (see below). I didn't order the special for fear that I would somehow smudge my 3D glasses.

Since this showing was part of Alamo's "Summer of '83" series, it was preceded by a half-hour's worth of various video clips from the early 80s in order to get the audience in the right mindset before showing the big block of 80s cheese that is Jaws 3D. The clips included the SCTV Count Floyd "3D House of Beef" skit, game play clips from Activision's Fishing Derby video game, advertisements for public aquariums, and beach-themed commercials for brands such as Coca-Cola and Wrangler. Inserted between the clips were 2D ads for other 3D movies from the 80s: Amityville 3D, Metalstorm: The Destruction of Jared-Syn, Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone, and Treasure of the Four Crowns. I suppose that Alamo's inclusion of these ads were to remind the audience that 3D movies made a brief comeback in the 80s, but they also reminded me that a lot more money was spent to make Jaws 3D than was spent for most of the 3D titles from that decade.

As for the movie itself, I was amazed at how good the 3D effects were. Many of the notorious gimmick shots (e.g., the bleeding fish head, the floating dismembered arm, the partially disappearing mini-sub, and the pirate skeleton in the lagoon) looked exactly how a good 3D gimmick shot should look, with objects appearing to hover in the air over the audience. There were some minor flares of ghosting from time to time and some of the gimmick shots didn't work at all (e.g., the "biting" Jaws 3D title graphic in the beginning of the film), but none of these glitches were enough to ruin the overall 3D experience. Futhermore, I now believe that Sea World must have been more satisfied than anyone else with how Jaws 3D looked as a finished product. Each of the 3D shots that involved things specific to Sea World--dolphins, killer whales and acrobatic waterskiing--were nearly flawless.

I have heard over the last few years that a digitally remastered version of Jaws 3D has been appearing in theaters and 3D festivals around the world, so I can only assume that what I watched at Alamo was one of the remastered prints. The film didn't have any blemishes and scratches, the colors were vibrant, and the sound quality was clear, so I obviously wasn't watching a 30 year old print. However, there were enough inconsistencies in the print to indicate that if this was a remastered print, the remastering process only went so far. Many shots were sharp with minor film grain, but some others were very grainy. I also noticed a few shots that were flat in hue and/or slightly out of focus, and almost all of the scenes that involved blue screen composites were of poor quality.

I'm not sure if the remastering process exposed flaws that were already present in the original print or if something else was at fault. Unfortunately, I couldn't find any information about when the remastering was done, who did it, and to what extent. I even stayed through the all of the credits to see if extra information was added to identify the remastering team behind the Jaws 3D print I was watching, but nothing was there.

So, while I was satisfied with finally seeing Jaws 3D on the big screen, the print quality left me wondering what Universal has in store for the three Jaws sequels. Since Jaws appeared on Blu-ray last August in a fabulously restored format, there has been much speculation in the fan community about if and when the sequels will appear on Blu-ray. On the basis of what I saw, I think that the sequels will either not be released on Blu-ray or if they are, they will be of low quality with little to no bonus features. I'm also basing this prediction on two other details:

* Universal has been very stubborn about the Jaws franchise over the years, so much so that it frequently has been left to the fans to share information about the movies and preserve artifacts from them because Universal refuses to do so itself.

* High-definition versions of Jaws 2 and Jaws: The Revenge have already appeared on on-demand video services but not on Blu-ray.

Between the on-demand releases of the sequels and the limited theatrical re-releases of Jaws 3D, Universal probably believes that it will get the greatest return on investment with these venues of distribution and not through Blu-ray. This is very frustrating, especially since Universal has the resources to correct the misaligned 3D shots in Jaws 3D but won't anyway. With that in mind, I strongly recommend that fans of the Jaws franchise and 3D movies in general should watch Jaws 3D on the big screen whenever it's possible, because I doubt that it's going to be available in any other format.

Yes, This Almost Happened: The Car Game--for Kids!

When looking back at the history of the American toy industry, it’s amazing to consider some of the toys that the industry thought would be “appropriate” for kids. Take Kenner, for example: After making boatloads of cash from Star Wars toys, it hastily picked up the toy license for Alien simply because it was a high-profile space movie without giving a second thought about how horrifying the film actually was. Along those lines, Kenner did something else based on movie popularity, with likewise questionable results. It created a game for kids based on the 1977 horror movie, The Car, about a possessed, driverless car that loves to run over people. I had no idea that this game was even an idea in someone’s head, let alone something that Kenner thought about releasing to toy stores, until I found a post about it on the Plaid Stallions site.

With Kenner's The Car game, kids can get run down by

a demonic vehicle in the privacy of their own homes.

(Photo courtesy of Plaid Stallions.)

From licensing and design perspectives, The Car game sort of makes sense. Ideal released a similarly-themed game based on Jaws that proved to be quite popular, so someone at Kenner probably thought that a game based on a Jaws rip-off would be almost or just as popular. Furthermore, toy cars and motorcycles that could be propelled from a launcher base had been reliable sellers during the 70s and 80s, so I could see Kenner utilizing such a design as part of a game, possibly based on a preexisting launcher design that could be modified and relabeled for the game at minimal cost. Nevertheless, just reading the description of the game in the picture above makes it pretty clear that the players who lose the game are killed by the monster car, thus making the winning player the survivor. Candyland this isn’t.

I’m not sure why Kenner never actually produced the game, although I suspect that it was scrapped after The Car failed to live up to expectations at the box office. It should be noted that the movie went on to become a cult classic and that ERTL released a die-cast replica of the titular vehicle back in 2003. Those replicas now go for a few hundred dollars on the collectors' market.

ERTL's replica of The Car.

The Universal Studios Jaws Ride Lives on at the Amity Boat Tours Site

Fans of Jaws and its subsequent franchise were crushed when the Universal Studios theme park in Orlando, Florida decided to close its Jaws ride back in January 2012. Yet while this piece of Jaws history is gone, it is far from forgotten. The folks behind the Amity Boat Tours Web site, a site that has been around for 13 years, are updating the site into the "Finale Edition" that will serve as an archive for all things concerning the Jaws ride.

According to the site, "(T)he Finale Edition of AmityBoatTours.com celebrates the life, and community of the JAWS World -- from the honorary JAWS Skippers to the Summer vacationers of Amity, this site was built and designed for you. We have received many questions and concerns that the site will close, and grow old, now that the attraction is gone. Quite the contrary has occurred. We have been working, since weeks before the announcement of its closure, to begin crafting a brand-new way to bring Amity Harbor to you and something that we can walk away from proud and dedicated to. The Finale Edition of the site is just that... we are extremely proud to bring this new experience to you, as well as 'bulk-up' the AmityBoatTours.com world."

A bird's-eye view of the Orlando Jaws ride. You can see the most of the places 

where the shark surfaces to terrorize theme park visitors.

I've been looking around the updated site and it appears to be on track (no pun intended) to becoming the definitive resource for anyone who is interested in the Jaws ride and its history. The Finale Edition site features a detailed history of the ride, plenty of trivia and photos, and video clips of the fictitious Amity TV station WJWS that would play on monitors in the ride pavilion to keep visitors entertained while they waited in line. The site also features photos of a similar Jaws ride that still operates in the Universal Studios theme park in Japan.

In honor of the revamped Amity Boat Tours site, I'm posting two Jaws ride video clips that I found on YouTube that are different from most others that are available on the Internet. The first is a video of the ride in anaglyph 3D (think of it as the other "Jaws 3D") and a video from 1990 that will give you an idea of how the ride functioned as it was originally designed Ride and Show Engineering, Inc. In this version, the shark would attack the tour boat and spin it to the side, shortly before the final confrontation between the shark and the boat's "Skipper". As you can see in the video, the shark that was supposed to attack the boat wasn't very convincing; however, the shark that surfaces in the boathouse (at about three minutes into the video) is very impressive with its thrashing head and snapping mouth. The ride was redesigned and re-launched in 1993 due to repeated technical problems, but it's a shame that Universal didn't keep the original boathouse shark.

An Interview with Jaws Diorama Sculptor Nigel Humphreys (Part 2 of 2)

Here is the second half of my interview with Nigel Humphreys from Sculptoria Studio about his upcoming series of collectible Jaws dioramas. In this part of the interview, Nigel talks about how he goes about selecting the Jaws scenes and images he hopes to recapture in diorama form, the list of collectibles he plans to release in the near future, and additional movie collectible work he has lined up outside of the Jaws license. Read on....

Titans, Terrors, and Toys: I've noticed that you've already sculpted--or are in the process of sculpting--a Bruce shark bust and an Estuary Attack diorama.

Nigel Humphreys: Oh yes, I've come a long way since those dreamy, childhood days of kit building. I now have the power to create the collectibles of my dreams, and I am loving every moment of doing them. The nose-to-gill Jaws bust I sculpted in 2009 has been put on hold, since Sculptoria Studio will be doing a full version of the movie shark--comprising of the head, the tail, the whole darn thing--quite soon. At the moment though, there are a number of people doing full body sculpts of the shark from Jaws so there is quite a plethora of them out there at the moment. I, on the other hand, am far more interested in sculpting entire, amazingly detailed scenes from the movie Jaws.

I always knew that whenever I finally got around to sculpting the world of Jaws, I would recreate collectibles for the young boy I used to be and for the all the other die-hard fans out there. I design my pieces to evoke all the thrills and spills and horror of Jaws. My primary area of concern when creating my collectibles was that I needed the sea to be as realistic as possible. I would accept no compromise on this issue. There was no way on earth I was going to create Jaws sculptures and paint a plastic sea blue--NO WAY! I wanted to sculpt a really, really realistic sea where I wanted the shark to be seen doing its huge 1975 thing--and with utter attention to detail from every conceivable point of view.

The first of my collectible Jaws movie moments is the Estuary Attack scene. Lovers of Jaws will recall this is the second time in the movie when the shark is revealed, the first being below the waterline--and what a scene that was! I was blown out of my cinema chair when I watched the shark moving sideways under water. That nasty rock pool nightmare of my childhood was back with vengeance and this time it was in the shape of a Great White Shark!

TTT: What goes into deciding which Jaws sculpts you are going to do, or would like to do but decide otherwise?

NH: Good question. In the case of Estuary Attack, I wanted to sculpt something which will thrill, truly thrill the passionate collector. I intend each of my detailed creations to evoke their very best memories from the film. I want every button in their re-collective childhood memories pushed.

TTT: Other than the movie itself, what Jaws materials do you use for reference?

NH: It begins and ends with the movie. There is such a lot of reference material which has surfaced recently, especially as a result of the stunning book Memories From Martha's Vineyard by Matt Taylor and Jim Beller. Those boys and The Shark Is Still Working troopers, its composer, Michael McCormack, Edward McCormack and his Jaws movie archives site, and artist Paul McPhee are the true guardians of the memory of Jaws. I like to think my sculptures will only add to their previous hard work in preserving this celluloid masterpiece forever.

TTT: How supportive has Universal been of your efforts?

NH: Very! As far as Universal goes, I deal with the UK office and although its can be a little long winded going through their channels, they know my intention is to respect the movie they own. They are the governors and an artist like myself has to be patient with the owners of such guarded material from which he or she wishes to derive his own protected works. I have great respect for Universal Pictures, it's a truly wonderful backer of visionary movies.

TTT: What kind of feedback have you been getting from Jaws fans and movie prop collectors?

NH: Fantastic feedback! Since exposure of my highly detailed Jaws: Estuary Attack diorama, I've been getting lots of e-mail from fans who have told me they have been waiting for Jaws collectibles of this quality for years and thanked me for taking the time to create them. I thought this was really sweet. Our debut Estuary Attack is certainly causing big waves, forgive the pun. We will be launching during September so for fans reading this article, all I can say is watch this space!

TTT: Indeed! Have any cast and/or crew members from Jaws commented on your work?

NH: No, not yet. But we are planning a special series of presentations through Universal.

TTT: Good luck with those. What future Jaws sculptures do you plan on doing next?

NH: We are already working on the following Jaws diorama projects:

• All Banged Up! (Ben's Head and Boat
• Hull Diorama with Internal L.E.D Light)
• Shock in the Sand (Chrissy's Remains Diorama)
• Sinking Severed Leg (Sailing Coach) Diorama
• Just Ten More Minutes (Alex Kitner Diorama)
• Holiday Roast (Jetty Tyre/Tire Diorama with L.E.D Light)
• Not with Three He Can't (Chase Barrels in Action!)

TTT: Depending on how well your first wave of collectibles sell, do you see yourself doing something regarding the Orca?

NH: To be honest, I have already done sketches of Quint in the shark’s mouth on a detailed section of the Orca, as well as one of Quint being dragged under the water. It’s quite possible depending on how they go.

TTT: Will you be sculpting anything from the Jaws sequels?

NH: A few select diorama scenes from Jaws 2, but certainly not any of the sequels thereafter. Are you kidding me? (Laughs.)

TTT: So no Jaws: The Revenge “Ellen Brody stabbing shark with boat” diorama? Bummer. How can fans go about purchasing your work?

NH: Links will be available soon via our Facebook page and our 'Forever Jaws - The JAWS Appreciation Society' Web site when it surfaces shortly. People can also e-mail me with their interest to purchase any of our collectibles at NHumphreys@SculptoriaStudio.Com. Each diorama will be very limited in number, I just wanted you to know that. This makes them utterly, utterly valuable thereafter. We plan a range of supporting payment methods as well.

TTT: In addition to Jaws, what other movie collectibles do you plan to sculpt?

NH: Now, this is amazing news I have to tell you. As well as two CGI television series that I have created, designed and produced (Editor’s Note: The two TV series are The All Weathers and Skid, The Amazing Automobile), I am working on a range of long awaited and totally thrilling sculptures and dioramas from Close Encounters of the Third Kind. I am so very excited about these projects. In fact, I am having discussions about producing an ultra Limited Edition box set comprising of a full, glossy color hardback book by Philip Heeks, of which he has very kindly granted us exclusive, a DVD, music soundtrack and a stunning senior alien sculpture from the end sequence of the movie, all in one awesome CEOTTK box! Phil Heeks is a very talented guy and we are proud to have him on board with us on this thrilling project. His publication is amazing.

An early photo of one of Nigel's Close Encounters dioramas.

TTT: That sounds amazing! Will you continue to produce other movie replicas for collectors?

NH: Absolutely! I am designing some really hardcore projects for serious collectors, and I mean some really clever stuff. So, for all your dedicated readers all I can say is, "Watch the skies!"

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Thanks for the interview, Nigel! Be sure to check out the Sculptoria Studio and Forever Jaws sites for updates regarding Nigel’s Jaws dioramas. Click here to see a preview video of the Estuary Attack diorama, and we’ll also be posting Sculptoria Studio collectibles announcements here on this blog as well.