Our buds over at Dread Central sent us word that they snagged exclusive first stills (and a buttload of info) from Marc Lougee’s stop-motion adaptation of Edgar Allen Poe’s THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM!
The film is the first out of the gate under the Ray Harryhausen Presents banner, and obviously, the great Harryhausen is involved with the animation. In an interview with DC, Lougee (who got his start on a little show called “Celebrity Deathmatch”) says the whole project started from the time he and his friend Steve Jaworski were asked to contribute to a ‘video birthday card’ being made for Harryhausen’s surprise 80th birthday party. Eventually, it led to the two having lunch with the legend, and the idea for making a short film in stop motion was, um, in motion.
Originally, the trio decided to do a short based on Poe’s “Fall of the House of Usher”, but previous commitments forced the idea onto the backburner until recently. “So last April Arnold, Ray and I settled on doing “The Pit and the Pendulum” [instead], as it seemed the most readily accessible short story of Poe’s that we all felt strongly about, and it’s got a relatively limited scope of sets, puppets, etc.” explains Lougee. “When I had pitched “The Pit and the Pendulum” to Ray and Arnold, I wanted to pay homage to Ray’s pioneering work by creating a “classic” feel for the film (as though it was shot 50 years ago) by animating the main characters via stop-motion while seamlessly integrating CG 3D elements.” An homage to classics like JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS and THE GOLDEN VOYAGE OF SINBAD? Sweet!!
Shooting began in May of 2005, with the group shooting for 4 1/2 weeks, starting from 9 am and going until 12 in the morning, 6 days a week for the length of the shoot. That’s a lot of coffee. Recently, postproduction on the short completed and all the rough edges smoothed, which left time for the film’s official site, which is currently undergoing a facelift. To check out the rest of the interview, along with more of the stills, head over to Dread Central’s story here.
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