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Thread: Irwin Allen

  1. #1
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    Irwin Allen

    So there was a thread of 70s movies somewhere else and someone asked does Irwin Allen have one?

    Well, now he does!

    Birth: Jun. 12, 1916
    Death: Nov. 2, 1991
    Motion Picture Director, Producer. He popularized the big-budget disaster epics of the 1970s. His films included "The Poseidon Adventure" (1972), "The Towering Inferno" (1974), which was nominated for Best Picture, and "The Swarm" (1978). He was a producer of the television show, "Lost in Space."

    Cause of death: Heart attack

    God, I love disaster movies!

    The survival of everyone on board depends on just one thing: finding someone on board who can not only fly this plane, but who didn't have fish for dinner.

  2. #2
    Kathyf Guest
    Some of my favorit movies. Nice Pic.

  3. #3
    SueWahoo Guest
    Quote Originally Posted by nytkrew View Post
    So there was a thread of 70s movies somewhere else and someone asked does Irwin Allen have one?

    Well, now he does!

    God, I love disaster movies!
    I'm the one who asked and x2 on the loving disaster flicks! I got the special edition Poseidon Adventure and Towering Inferno on DVD and I loved all the extras included. Postcards, thick pamphlet and lots of extras on the discs. Irwin was such a showman.

    Thanks,

    Sue

  4. #4
    Danny62 Guest
    The Poseidon Adventure is one of my favorites. for what they had to work with at the time its very great movie!

    I love how the ship flipped and everything was upside down!! Talk about some creative talent on that!! And no Computer help!!!

  5. #5
    Jack-O-Lantern Guest
    The "Master of Disaster" himself. I lived and breathed for the next Irwin Allen project as a kid.

  6. #6
    Morbid1 Guest
    Those were really some big movies..the Poseidon Adventure is great!

    -Morbid1

  7. #7
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    Quote Originally Posted by Danny62 View Post
    The Poseidon Adventure is one of my favorites. for what they had to work with at the time its very great movie!

    I love how the ship flipped and everything was upside down!! Talk about some creative talent on that!! And no Computer help!!!
    Even with the technical limitations of the time the Poseidon Adventure far out shines the recent remake. The remake was a stage for the special effects. The story took a backseat. The original use the effects as a backdrop to the story.

    Irwin Allen rocked.
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  8. #8
    SueWahoo Guest
    Quote Originally Posted by johntrim040851 View Post
    Even with the technical limitations of the time the Poseidon Adventure far out shines the recent remake. The remake was a stage for the special effects. The story took a backseat. The original use the effects as a backdrop to the story.
    I haven't seen the new version. Despite the lack of story, how was it? Should I give it a shot anyway?

  9. #9
    JdoubleL Guest

    Love.

    When I was young (I suppose that's a relative term) I fell completely head over heels in LOVE with Bill Mumy. He played Will Robinson on Lost in Space. Consequently, I went to a sci-fi/horror convention and MET him! Wish I could have met Irwin Allen, though. So classic. I loved all of his stuff. I thought he was so clever. The original Poseidon Adventure is one of the movies that I can't flip past. <3

  10. #10
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    Quote Originally Posted by SueWahoo View Post
    I haven't seen the new version. Despite the lack of story, how was it? Should I give it a shot anyway?
    I would say yeah see if your into special effects. The Effects were decent but that's about all I can say for the film.
    John Trim On Face Book
    On the internet you can be anything you want.
    It is strange that so many people choose to be stupid.


    [SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]

  11. #11
    Blondin Guest
    Don't forget "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea". I loved that show.

  12. #12
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    Quote Originally Posted by Blondin View Post
    Don't forget "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea". I loved that show.
    Voyage was a great show. I hope they don't try to remake it.
    John Trim On Face Book
    On the internet you can be anything you want.
    It is strange that so many people choose to be stupid.


    [SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]

  13. #13
    TheMysterian Guest
    Irwin Allen,way ahead of his time! I guess my favorite as a kid was "voyage to the bottom of the sea" and Land of the Giants" I liked Lost in Space,and I read that since Irwin was on a strict budget and had to save money,he would "double use creatures" between series.

  14. #14
    Ghoulie Girl Guest
    Good action movie, for back then.

  15. #15
    BigBootyJudy Guest

    Irwin Allen

    Don't forget Time Tunnel with Robert Colbert and James Darren!!! I loved that show!!!

  16. #16
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    I LOVED the Poseiden Adventure and The Towering Inferno, as well as Lost In Space. Would have loved to see what he could have produced with today's special effects...
    By my troth, I care not; a man can die but once; we owe God a death.... He that dies this year is quit for the next.
    --William Shakespeare!

  17. #17
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    Quote Originally Posted by Dangitbawb View Post
    I LOVED the Poseiden Adventure and The Towering Inferno, as well as Lost In Space. Would have loved to see what he could have produced with today's special effects...
    Ditto.
    GOD IS NOT DEAD





  18. #18
    aLiLdirt Guest
    I truly appreciate Allen's work. Specifically, Poseidon and Inferno.

  19. #19
    stephenmiller Guest
    Each Irwin Allen show usually had a very strong first season, storywise, but towards the end the scripts got worse and worse. Anyone ever noticed that?

  20. #20
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    I loved Poseidon Adventure and Towering Inferno as a kid....but there sure was a lot of bad acting in them! All the Airport movies too.
    - Chris

  21. #21
    Morrissey Guest
    I love how Michael Caine was always yelling in The Swarm. My dad and I always joke about it.

  22. #22
    knightstemplar22 Guest
    Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea was great! Especially the first season. Lean left, lean right, fall down.....

  23. #23
    What's interesting to me is that there is no biographical info on Irwin Allen. Bascially, he was born in New York. Then, the next thing you know he's in his 30s producing movies. He married a long-time friend Sheila Matthews (who played the fat lady opera singer in an ep of "Lost in Space") in the 1970s when he was almost 60. If he had ever been married before, it's elusive. When Sheila Matthews died last year, one of the acknowldgements was to the "Allen family" in Massachusetts. Who might they have been? Siblings? Cousins? Ex-wife and children? It's all a mystery.

  24. #24
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    Just had a little Allen mini-marathon last weekend with Towering Inferno and Poseidon Adventure. I miss the old disaster movies...
    "I was 12 going on 13 the first time I saw a dead human being" --Stand by Me

  25. #25
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    Was "Irwin Allen" his true birth surname? I am always kind of surprised when show-business people from that era, even producers, were really born with Anglo-Saxon-type monickers. It seemed that to succeed in those days especially, one had to shed those pesky "bergs", "steins" and "skys" to get ahead (you had to become REALLY huge, like Selznick and Mayer, to stay true to one's ethnicity), and maybe that's why it's hard to trace much of his life?

    Example: for years, whenever I asked "fan experts" what the late Dan Curtis's birth name was, I always got a blank stare or insisting that "Curtis" was it. (Um, yes, maybe he was Tony Curtis's brother... Another great Hollywood synthetic renaming.) After he died, THEN his original family name was put into his obituaries: Cherkoss.
    Last edited by Linnie; 02-13-2014 at 06:43 PM.

  26. #26
    Quote Originally Posted by Linnie View Post
    Was "Irwin Allen" his true birth surname?. . . .
    Who knows? Based on what scant information I've picked up in the census records, I found some "Irving Allens" in New York that might the same person. If that's the case--and that's by no means corroborated--it would be a case of possibly is father or further back having already changed the surname to something a little less obviously Jewish, and instead Allen changing his first name. I found him in the 1940 census already living in California with an uncle. But that's pretty much it. I'll leave the rest up to any real researchers.

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