Cover Those Tracks
Wednesday, March 16, 2011 at 7:12PM My best friend recently moved apartments and I got one of his bookshelves in the move so suddenly I'm noticing my old buried movie books again that couldn't fit onto my previous shelving. I used to buy them in the 90s at garage sales or used book stores. This image is from "Life Goes to the Movies." published in 1975. It's basically just a picture book.
Caption:
In Lawrence of Arabia (1962), Peter O'Toole practices crawling to the resuce of a guide trapped in quicksand while two production crewmen stand by to sweep away the dry-run tracks before actual filming.
Never once while watching Lawrence of Arabia have I stopped to think "damn, that's a lot of sand sweeping during production!" you know? Hee. Movie-making is so magical and mundane. Was that the least epic duty on that epic set? The sweepers undoubtedly had good tans by the end of production.
Lawrence of Arabia, books, on the set
Reader Comments (7)
This post is straight out of Spaceballs -- the gag where the soliders comb the desert with actual over sized combs.
*soldiers
Is there any way we can organize a Tuesday Top Ten or something for Peter O'Toole? He's one of the best actors in film history and an infinitely interesting real life character. Just because everyone recognizes him as criminally under-appreciated by awards bodies doesn't mean he is no longer criminally under-appreciated.
Casey --- good recommendation. I'll admit i have never really spent a lot of time pondering him. should do that.
I think he warrants lots of pondering. just think of the output in the 1960's alone.
"Life Goes to the Movies" was my bible growing up. There was a copy of it in my house and I used to pore over it at least every weekend when I was a kid. I was entranced by the beautiful people and the way Life put them into neat little slots and all the behind-the-scenes stuff. My favorite behind-the-scenes picture may be the one showing all the people surrounding the actors on a movie set. I still have that book and flip through it every once in a while.
Oh and I second the Peter O'Toole recommendation. In addition to his work in the 1960s, My Favorite Year holds a very special place in my heart and he's amazing in it.