THE
MANTIS was made just to do another short movie
after I left college. THE MANTIS was a scifi
comedy again, only much better than PIT STOP and
in color. I shot Super 16 film using my own
Auricon Pro 600 self-blimped studio camera and
Nagra III audio recorder.
Effects
Artist Gene Reynolds played the nameless lead
part, looking very much like Stephen King
onscreen. Gene had also built the 9 foot praying
mantis marionette of the title that looked and
worked fantastic.
We
actually shot at Jonathan Green's factory where
they make ferilizers, grass seed and stuff
and used one of their delivery trucks.
The
story has a mad professor (played by Attorny
George Koukus) breaking into the office of an
executive of the fertilizer company trying to
force them to buy his super grow plant food. He
is thrown out.
The
mad scientist sneaks into the factory and puts a
box of his secret formula on a conveyor belt
with all the reguler fertilizer that gets loaded
into a truck and ends up on the shelf of a
nursery and purchased by the character Gene was
playing. Gene's character was like the part
Stephen King played in CREEPSHOW many years
later, a kinda dumb guy. We see Gene's
character spreading the super grow plant
food around his yard, wiping his nose (coating
it with the chemical out of stupidity). At
nightfall he goes into his house and makes
himself a sandwhich. He stops eating when he
sees a small praying mantis, catches it in a
nakpin and throws it out of the window into the
trash can. We see the little mantis poking his
head up covered in super grow plant food having
fallen into that box within the trash can. (I
used a mantis puppet for this shot and he looks
cute and funny, the little head looking up at
the window that he was just chucked from). As
Gene sits and eats popcorn like a pig and
watches TV, outside the Mantis grows to 9 feet
tall because of the super grow plant food. The
mantis gets into the house, grabs Gene and
heaves him out the door of the house. Gene gets
up and runs back to the door, now closed and
locked, pounding on it to be let back in. We
next see the giant mantis sitting in Gene's spot
in the livingroom, watch Tv, eating popcorn and
laughing at his human enemy banging on the door.
The short ends here.
Because
Gene's character got the white super grow plant
food powder on his nose, there was talk about
having his nose grow huge too, but I don't
think we got around to making that makeup
appliance.
The
interiors/exteriors of what was suppose to be
Gene's character's house was actually my own
house, as was the living room. Gene transported
the huge praying mantis from his studio in East
Orange to my Neptune home. I think gene kept the
Mantis after the shoot.
THE
MANTIS was like a live action Warner Brother's
1940s cartoon and was harmless and fun. Again,
if I can find the master I'll see if I can do
frame grabs to post here and at some point
release it on DVD with the other shorts.
Unlike
most of my stuff this one is rated G and the
kids should enjoy it.
