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Dear Mr. Keillor, While sitting

August 22, 2006 |

Dear Mr. Keillor,
While sitting through the credits at the end of your movie, I was astonished to see a "special effects" coordinator. I admit I arrived a few minutes late, but if the beginning was like the rest of the film, I'm certain I didn't miss any rampaging dinosaurs or spectacular explosions. What gives? Did a space-battle sequence get cut? Or did you perhaps create the position for an underemployed friend?

James K.
New York, NY

James, I take it as a tribute that you sat through the credit roll. I only do that for movies I like or if I'm very curious about where they were shot ----- usually the location credits come at the verrrrrry end. The only special effect in the movie was the rain on the pavement in the opening shot, with Guy Noir inside Mickey's Diner, and in the later shot outside the Fitzgerald Theater, in which the Axeman drives away in a black Lincoln. The guy who got the special effects credit is Steve Hintz, who wielded a fireman's hose and wet down the street so that there were puddles in it to reflect Mickey's neon lights. Steve also put the raindrops on the glass windows of the diner at the end of the movie, when the Angel of Death walks along the sidewalk. outside of the diner and rounds her way in to see Garrison, Kevin, Meryl and Lily. I never met Steve Hintz before the shoot, but if you're making a movie and want rain , he's your rainmaker.

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