Friday on Netflix. They’ll find something
remarkably respectful and vast — 83 puppeteers
and 70 different creature species.
“I tell people it’s the biggest puppet production
in history,” said Lisa Henson, daughter of the
creator and chief executive of his entertainment
company. “The scale of it is very awesome.”
The 1982 film, which Jim Henson co-directed
with Frank Oz, was the first big live-action film to
feature no human actors. While not a runaway
success, the film has achieved cult status,
riffed about on “South Park” and its music was
sampled by the Crystal Method.
The new series is set on the same planet of Thra
many years before the events of the movie,
but has familiar characters — the kind, elf-like
Gelflings and the evil dinosaur-buzzard Skeksis.
As in the original, it is often the wonderfully
realized minor creatures, insects and plants that
really wow. Leterrier’s camera swirls and soars
over this dynamic planet.
The new filmmakers were faithful to Henson’s
sense of handcrafted art, using computers only
when necessary — flying or swimming — or
to enhance the characters, with, say, tongues
that wrap around food. Some technology tricks
— 3D printers, animatronics or filming scenes
and then going back to cut out the puppeteers
— were employed but no giant leaps from
Henson’s legacy were made. If the Skeksis in the
original film required six puppeteers, the same is
the case for the series. Foam latex skin was also
used for both projects.
Actor Taron Egerton jumped at the chance to
join the new series, voicing a Gelfling named
Rian. Egerton saw the 1982 film with his father
and found it enchanting.
nora
(Nora)
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