The History of Movie Special Effects Le Lorcán agus Earnán, 2004
One thing you might wonder while watching a famous movie like, The Matrix, or The Lord of the Rings, is normally how do they do that? or that's a lot of guys. Well it started way back. In the 1930s, movies were really popular back then because there was no TV. In 1933 they made the classic King Kong. It was a primitive film but it was hugely entertaining.
In the 1950s, man asked questions about dinosaurs and the earth and odd and exciting things. They made Adventure to the Centre of the Earth. It was immediately a hit. In the 1960s it was all sci-fi movies like Planet of the Apes. It was the first movie to have twists and turns in the storyline.
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Then in the 1970s, a young man called George Lucas made the first instalment of the blockbuster Star Wars movie A New Hope. Then came The Empire Strikes Back the final one made at this time was The Return of the Jedi.
Then in the 1980s the film industry turned to horror and guts and gore - a lot of gore indeed! The Texas Chainsaw Massacre was still banned to the public but a low budget director called Mr. Romero made the famous Dead trilogy it shocked audiences but there was still more to come.
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Alien was next. Then Aliens was another hit. But they took it too far with Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection.
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In the 1990s the world of films turned to action and loud explosions and, of course, bad language. Films like Lethal Weapon and James Bond won the day. Now in the modern age we have a lot of different things with a mixture of horror action and comedy.
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SPECIAL EFFECTS IN A MOVIE
The Matrix Reloaded has many different special effects in it.
When Neo launches off the ground to begin flying he's actually being pulled by a cable and when he is flying the sky the clouds and doing computer animation. On the freeway chase when a car crashes it is sent flying because there is a hidden ramp. During the fighting scene on the roof of the building in the first movie when Neo is dodging bullets from an agent, there are special techniques used. When it goes into slow motion they're actually using one hundred and twenty still-motion cameras around Neo forming a circle. During a shooting scene when bullets hit a wall there are actually no bullets but charges planted in a wall and when they are set off the plaster explodes off the wall. It was a great movie because of the special effects.