Hand statue

That Hand statue has to have some big meaning to someone . It seems to popup in the studio lot seens. Is it still around ? I just was thinking it wa od to use it so much.

Jay

The thing about the hand statue comes up often. I think most likely it was
a prop from another series or film being done at the studio at the same time
as UFO was being filmed. I can't remember off hand if it was in the episode
films at Borehamwood Studios or the later ones at Pinewood. But once you
figure that out and the time period the episode with it in it were filmed you
could check to see what series and films were being done at that time and
check them out to see if you can spot the hand.
James K.


In a message dated 3/11/2009 12:54:07 P.M. Central Standard Time,
[hidden email] writes:




That Hand statue has to have some big meaning to someone . It seems to popup
in the studio lot seens. Is it still around ? I just was thinking it wa od
to use it so much.

Jay





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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

> The thing about the hand statue comes up often. I think most likely it
> was a prop from another series or film being done at the studio at the same
> time as UFO was being filmed. I can't remember off hand if it was in the
> episode films at Borehamwood Studios or the later ones at Pinewood.

The large white hand was at Pinewood studios -- it apparently was featured
in THE PERSUADERS episode "Five Miles to Midnight".

Marc

The major studios in the UK are now "four wall" i.e. a production
company hires stage and office space and pretty much everything else is
sourced from outside companies.
In the days when UFO was shot, MGM, Pinewood, Shepperton and ABPC
Elstree directly employed set construction workers etc and the
production company had to use studio staff and paid the studio a premium
for this. Although this was expensive, one benefit was the use of the
stock costumes, props and sets left over from previous films - some from
many years earlier. Sharp-eyed viewers with too much time on their hands
can often tell within minutes which studio housed a particular film or
filmed TV series.
Don't forget though that a prop like the big hand might easily have been
originally built for a TV or cinema commercial which also sometimes shot
at the studios.

A great insight into film production of the period, including Jack
Shampan's clever re-use of sets, can be gained from a (long out of
print) British Film Institute book "Making of Legend of the Werewolf".
Made only a few years after UFO at Pinewood the film was low-budget and
the way it was produced was little different to a filmed TV series like
UFO. The book is particularly interesting because it was deliberately
about a routine British film of the period and is more like a study
guide than the usual shallow "Making of a Blockbuster" nonsense.

Another fascinating book of about the same time, again long out of
print, is Film Design edited by Terence St. John Marner - Tantivy Press
- who also published the equally interesting Practical Motion Picture
Photography and Directing Motion Pictures, both ed. Russell Campbell.
These are all unusual for the time in concentrating on UK production,
interviewing practitioners of the crafts concerned and being more like
textbooks than fan fodder.

Regards
John