A fantastic screen for a personal tragedy. How Steven Spielberg's 'ET' Was Made (16 Photos)

June 11, 1982 in the United States was the premiere of the film "Alien" Steven Spielberg. For 41 years since the release of the film about the friendship of a small a boy painfully experiencing the divorce of his parents, and a bizarre guest from another planet managed to visit the highest grossing film in history movie and become America's favorite family picture.





Strange things are happening in the Californian forest. Group aliens land on Earth to collect samples of the local flora. Government agents are also on the alert, trying at all costs find and explore representatives of extraterrestrial civilization. Having discovered that their actions are watched, the aliens hastily leave the Earth, accidentally leaving his sluggish colleague in an unfamiliar environment. He manages to hide from his pursuers in the house of a simple American families. Elliot the boy gives his new friend the nickname I-ti (original the title of the film E.T., from the English extra-terrestrial, "alien") and trying to help him return to his relatives. To do this, they have to go a long and thorny path that will surely leave a mark in life both.

Familiar characters and plot twists and turns the audience might not see, dare Steven Spielberg to embody on the screen his original idea.

What was "Alien" supposed to be?

By 1978, Spielberg had already directed the horror thriller Jaws and sci-fi film Close Encounters of the First Kind, becoming a real star of Hollywood directing and the parent of a new term in industry is a summer blockbuster. The commercial success of the painting about the first contacts of mankind with an alien civilization pushed the studio Columbia Pictures to launch a sequel, the same was expected fans - but Spielberg went the other way.

Not wanting to turn "Close Encounters of the First Kind" into franchise and realizing that he would not create a sequel brighter than the original, Spielberg abandoned the idea and decided to shoot the story of the first contact in a new way. The plot and atmosphere of the film had to be sustained in the style creativity of Stephen King.

The story called "Night Skies" tells of a family of farmers who fell out of favor with a group of aliens researchers. Space invaders literally terrorize earthlings, experiment on them, but one of the researchers is imbued friendly feelings for the boy and remains on Earth while his colleagues leave the planet.

During the development of the script, Spielberg became frustrated with this gloomy idea, considering some plot details xenophobic. Here, to For example, a short excerpt from the Night Sky script:

"Scar (note the name of one of aliens) stands next to the skeleton of a horse. Horse entrails turned inside out. Scar's claws are outstretched like a tiger's, covered in blood. He calmly looks at Ed.



Apparently, the work on "Indiana Jones", which was conducted in parallel, prompted the director to the idea that the viewer more optimistic and brighter stories are needed - and "Night Skies" went to the table. True, not for long, because later from this idea were born two films at once. Spielberg actually separated black from white: black turned into a slightly modified script for the horror "Poltergeist" (Stephen acted as a producer, entrusting the director's chair to Tobe Hooper), and white - in "Alien".

Personal history of a traumatized youth



The director had another unclosed gestalt that influenced the final version of the film. In his youth, Spielberg was very worried about parents' divorce: mother started an affair with father's colleague and after divorce married him. At the same time, unlike the sisters, Stephen wished stay with your father. They moved to Los Angeles where the boy got opportunity to do what you love.

A reasonable question arises: how is personal history connected director, who remained in the care of his father, with the plot of the film, according to to which the family of the protagonist is left without a father?

In a relationship with Spielberg Sr., Steven has not everything developed smoothly. As soon as the future director stepped over the threshold coming of age, Albert told his son that he did not intend to endure the transformation his home to the studio - the young man gradually equipped it, without even thinking about moving house. This popular conflict in American society is almost escalated into enmity: Spielberg Jr. was forced to move out and change his attitude towards the divorce of parents, taking the side of the mother.

The desire to express your feelings in the form of a movie haunted him for many years. And now turned up comfortable Case - AlienYanin" connected two stories at once: invented fantastic and personal tragic. However, painful for the director the theme of fathers and children was reflected in other, later of his works. At the end of 2022, the autobiographical film "Fabelmans" about Spielberg's childhood, for which he wrote the screenplay.



The main behind-the-scenes faces of the film



First, the gloomy project "Night Nights" was launched into production. heaven", the script for which was prepared by John Sayles. For creating alien aliens and the spaceship Spielberg invited his comrade Rick Baker - a first-class master of special effects and special makeup, who later worked on "King Kong" (2005) and "Planet of the Apes" (2001). For this task, he was allocated almost a million dollars, which amounted to a tenth of the total budget. During the time until director was filming Indiana Jones, Baker had already designed the aliens and was ready to shoot.

However, after returning from a “desert” business trip, Spielberg outplayed. And "Night skies" remained in the past, divided into two movie.

Baker, who had done a colossal job, became angry, quarreled with the director, left the project and never again I crossed paths with him on my creative path. The same fate awaited the screenwriter John Sales.



Replacing the retired found pretty quickly. Took on the script Melissa Matheson is the future wife of Harrison Ford, who from the first words fell in love with Spielberg's new story. Before "Alien" she had there was practically no screenwriting experience, only the family film "Black horse", but the director did not doubt her - Matheson adored children and even worked as a nanny in the house of Francis Ford Coppola. For creating touching story of friendship, she interviewed children and invested in script all my love for them. Subsequently, Spielberg noted this, calling Matheson's text the best first draft of the script, which he met in my career.

In place of Rick Baker, the producers invited an Italian special effects creator Carlo Rambaldi, who worked with Spielberg on "Close Encounters of the First Degree" and creating a head for the Alien in horror film of the same name by Ridley Scott.

All efforts were thrown at the protagonist I-ti. task before Rambaldi was not easy: the alien had to scare first the viewer, and after a few minutes of timing fall in love with yourself. For this he had to create an eclectic image of a creature with a long neck, focusing on the appearance of a turtle without a shell and some facial features of the poet Carl Sandburg, writer Ernest Hemingway and Albert Einstein. So and turned out to be the golden mean - charm, adjacent to a few frightening ugliness.



The main faces in the frame






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Another difficult part of preparing for filming is finding actors. Spielberg came up with a movie in which there are practically no adults: only Elliot's mother and government agent on the hunt for Ee-ti. Other adult characters appear only in separate episodes. Action focuses solely on child characters. As is known, it is not easy for young actors to "pull out" films on their shoulders. Often they the support of more experienced colleagues is required, which "Alien" almost does not envisaged - and the samples were delayed.

Spielberg's first choice was six-year-old debutante Drew. Barrymore. She was cast as Gertie, Elliot's sister. Director liked the boundless fantasy of a young actress who at the casting presented herself without any problems herself a member of the punk band "Purple Cannibals", playing drums.

The image of the eldest child in the family was proposed to be performed 15-year-old theater actor Robert McNaughton. It was planned that with his relatively weighty Broadway experience, he will help to open up younger partners.



Finally, the director gave the role of Elliot to ten-year-old Henry. Thomas already three minutes after the start of listening with the words: "Okay, boy, this role is yours."

The boy managed to cry convincingly and quickly, startling and touched Spielberg. To do this, he had to remember his feelings, experienced when he lost his pet.

With adult characters, everything was renderedaxis is much easier. During search for actors Spielberg successfully remembered Peter Coyote, with a bang failed audition for Indiana Jones. Faerie fail so hard sunk into the soul of Stephen that not to take Coyote for the role of a believer in a miracle he simply could not be a special agent. Elliot's mother was played by actress Dee Wallace-Stone, who fell in love with the director after playing in one of the episodes TV series Lou Grant.

Harrison Ford also took part in the filming - he played principal of the school where Elliot studied. However, in the cinema version of the film, the audience never saw it, except for once flashed in the frame of the back of the head. In the final cut, Spielberg cut small scene with Ford.

Fast but challenging shots






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After the initial idea of the Night Skies project transformed into "Alien", Columbia Pictures decided refuse to finance the new film, citing "no one interesting style of Disney pictures. Then Spielberg turned to his friends at Universal who helped him create Jaws. Bosses new financial patron got excited about the idea and believed in it commercial success, having allocated just over $10 million for the project.

According to the plan, the shooting was supposed to last 65 days. They passed where the film takes place, in California. film crew sheltered the pavilions of the Culver studio, which in different years became a platform for the creation of "Gone with the Wind" and "King Kong". Natural filming took place on the territory of Redwood National Park, which famous for its sequoias. It was there that some scenes of the sixth Star Wars episode by George Lucas.



Spielberg finished four days faster than planned But that doesn't mean that filming was easy. On the contrary, many scenes were born extremely hard. This mainly applies to episodes with participation of I-ty. It is understandable - it is not so easy to shoot an inanimate doll.

They tried to revive the alien at once by several ways. In static scenes, an expensive robot was used - a little Isn't it the biggest expense item in the film's budget? From adjoining rooms it was controlled by specially trained people, but even in such conditions technology didn't work. The hands were the weakest part of the mechanism, so in Some scenes had to resort to the help of mime actress Caprice Roth. In special gloves, she "humanized" the movements of the limbs of I-ti, helping him hold objects or even feast on watermelon, humanly wiping drops from face. The alien moved thanks to dwarf actors and legless 12-year-old Matthew de Maritt - inside the doll he moved with the help of hands.

Painstaking work has been done with the voice of I-ti. Sound designer Ben Burrt created it by combining the voices of almost two dozen people, including Spielberg, and animals. At the same time, on the site, the creature spoke in the director's voice. Steven voiced his lines so that young it was easier for the actors to navigate the space of the script.

The key artistic feature of "Alien" was shooting style. The camera, located at the level of the children's faces, allows see the world through the eyes of a dreaming child. At the same time, most adults appear in the frame incompletely: the camera shoots them from the back and mostly below the belt, as is done in cartoons about Adventures of Tom and Jerry. This is not always noticed, but trick works flawlessly: a childish look at parental divorce, injustice on the part of adults or any other problem becomes the main character in "Alien".



The most important factor in the future legendary character of the picture is inspiring and magical soundtrack written by composer John Williams. TO By the time the film was released on the big screens, he had already written an exciting and monumental music for Star Wars and Jaws, but the tone of many future soundtracks of the maestro was set precisely by the work with Spielberg on "Alien".

Airy, fabulous melodies that seem impossible better suited to the mood of the picture, were not born easy. Eg, the excerpt that sounds at the end of the tape, for a long time "did not fit" on the footage material. Williams was very worried about this, but Spielberg reassured, realizing that this music is the best thing that could happen to "Alien".

How it all ended



Could pimagine the bosses abandoned the "Alien" studio Columbia Pictures that the tape will not only not be a failure, but also for ten years it will take the leading place in the list of the highest-grossing hits? But it became a reality already in 1982. And enthusiastic audience reaction followed immediately after the previews. Then it became clear that the ten-million budget was not so exorbitant the amount, given that the film is likely to collect many times at the box office more.

The final results exceeded even the wildest expectations. IN The ET grossed a record $619 million at the box office. This the result will be the box office benchmark for all outgoing films, and beat only Spielberg himself can do it in 1993, when the world box office shaken up after the premiere of "Jurassic Park".

It's amazing how they reacted to the picture professional community. At first, it seemed another touching family drama, the film suddenly became one of the main candidates for "Oscar" - and until the last claimed the award in the nomination "Best movie". However, the golden statuette then went to the biopic "Gandhi", and nine ET nominations have translated into four awards in categories "Best Music", "Best Sound", "Best Sound Editing" Effects” and “Best Visual Effects”.

It is unlikely that the absence of prizes in the main categories is strong Spielberg worried. Much more important that the naive and sincere "Alien" turned into an opportunity for him to speak out about the divorce of his parents and his childhood fantasies, which allowed him to first hide in imaginary worlds and then share those worlds with devotees spectators.

“It was a very personal story about my divorce. parents - more specifically, how I felt during their divorce. When I when I was a child, I imagined that strange creatures were spying on me from the bedroom windows, and I dreamed that they would come into my life and magically will change it."

And so it happened: "Alien" came into Spielberg's life and drastically changed it. According to Stephen, after the film, for the first time he I wanted to start a family, become a father and throw off the label entertainment director.

From that moment on, Spielberg's paintings differed not only large-scale events and ongoing action, but also the author's handwriting, the core of which has always been a story about a person.