A movie for review - Not bad

I had to read a review copy of a book called Hornblower's Ships a few years ago.  Frankly it was a rather depressing experience.

The "Grand Turk" was originally built for an Arnold Schwartzenneger fantasy movie that (perhaps mercifully) never got filmed.  In its original form it looked nothing like an eighteenth-century frigate - or any other real vessel that ever floated.  The Hornblower project people modified it as best they could, but the results still, to my notion, didn't pass muster.

Most of the scenes were shot with big-scale models.  They were built, under the supervision of an experienced British modeler (whose name I've forgotten at the moment, but who clearly did know what he was doing) by a team of workmen in the former Soviet Union who had never built a ship model in their lives.  (The project had a tight budget.  These unfortunate people were happy to get hired for, if I remember right, about $50.00 per week.)  The photos in the book made it clear that the models resembled real ships only generally, and the detail on them can most gently be described as highly simplified. 

Some of the filming of the first batch of episodes was done in Eastern Europe.  (My favorite photo in the book showed the machine that was used to generate "wind" to fill the models' sails:  a WWII Russian fighter's fuselage mounted on a farm cart, with the engine running full blast.)  When the British staff got fed up with the working conditions they moved the models to England; the later shots were done in a gigantic tank at one of the big British movie studios.

I'm a longtime Forester fan, but I had extremely mixed reactions to the films.  I thought Mr. Gruffud (I apologize if I've misspelled him) was perfectly cast, the acting in general was of high quality, the scenery was nice, the deviations from the original plotlines were stupid, and the ships were - well, pretty awful.  The building of those models provided desperately needed employment for some fine people.  Whether that consitutes generosity or exploitation depends, I guess, on one's point of view.  I have to say, though, that reading that book left me with no inclination to watch the rest of the series.

Only two full sized ships were used in the making of the Hornblower series, The Grand Turk, the frigate replica, and a 1930s Baltic Trader. The rest were models built to various scales.

I saw the Grand Turk in Whitby Harbour a couple of years ago, she was specially built, but to my eye she is somewhat broad in the beam relative to her length to replicate a true eighteenth century frigate, but perhaps the filming needs dictate  certain requirements.

As regards 'To the ends of the earth', I agree with Big Jake, an excellent atmospheric production which I think gives all us 'armchair' sailors cause to review our daydreams of a long voyage on an old '74'

and i believe the ship used in the hornblower series was the "hms rose" which was bought to become "hms surprise" and is now at the san diego maritime museum. was on board last october for NRG (Nautical Research Guild) convention.

btw this year the conference is in manitowoc, wi and is focusing on model building.

http://www.thenrg.org

 

 

Interesting.  I really enjoyed the Horatio Hornblower series that the BBC put out a few years ago, with Ioain Gruffud.  No idea if that spelling is even close.  I wish they'd air that series again - I'd definitely watch it.