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Kerry Conran grew up on films and comic books of the 1930s and 1940s. He and his brother, Kevin, were encouraged by their parents to develop their creative side at a young age.

Kerry studied at a feeder program for Disney animators at CalArts, and became interested in 2-D computer animation. While there, he realized that it was possible to apply some of the techniques associated with animation to live-action.

Conran had been out of film school for two years and was trying to figure out how to make a movie. He figured that Hollywood would never take a chance on an inexperienced, first-time filmmaker, so he decided to make the movie himself.

Conran was influenced by the designs of Norman Bel Geddes, an industrial designer who did work for the 1933 Chicago World’s Fair and designed exhibits for the 1939 New York World's Fair. Geddes also designed an Airliner#4 that was to fly from Chicago to London.


Another key influence was Hugh Ferriss, one of the designers for the 1939 World’s Fair who designed bridges and huge housing complexes. He was an American delineator (one who creates perspective drawings of buildings) and architect.

In 1922, skyscraper architect Harvey Wiley Corbett commissioned Ferriss to draw a series of four step-by-step perspectives demonstrating the architectural consequences of the 1916 Zoning Resolution. These four drawings would later be used in his 1929 book The Metropolis of Tomorrow.

Regarding the 1939 New York World's Fair itself and its futuristic theme of the World of Tomorrow, Conran noted: "...obviously the title refers to the World Expo and the spirit of that was looking at the future with a sense of optimism and a sense of the whimsical, you know, something that we've lost a lot in our fantasies."

"We're more cynical, more practical... I think what this film attempts to do is to take that enthusiasm and innocence and celebrate it-to not get mired in the practicality that we're fixated upon today."


Awards

2005 Academy of Science Fiction,
Fantasy & Horror Films Saturn Award

Won Best Costumes
Nominated Best Music
Nominated Best Science Fiction Film
Nominated Best Supporting Actor
- Giovanni Ribisi
Nominated Best Supporting Actress
- Angelina Jolie
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Las Vegas Film Critics
Society Sierra Award

Won Best Visual Effects
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2004 Phoenix Film Critics Society Awards

Won Best Visual Effects
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2005 MTV Movie Awards

Nominated Best Kiss
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2005 Satellite Awards

Nominated Best Art
Direction/Production Design
Nominated Best Costume Design
Nominated Best Visual Effects
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2005 Online Film Critics Society Awards

Nominated Best Breakthrough Filmmaker
- Kerry Conran
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2005 Visual Effects Society Awards
Nominated Outstanding Performance by an Actor or Actress in a Visual Effects Film
- Jude Law
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2005 Hugo Awards

Nominated Best Dramatic Presentation



Sky Captain and the
World of Tomorrow Poster


Click thumbnail for larger view




Excerpts and References:
wikipedia.org, imdb.com






Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow | Story and Screenshots

This story presentation includes some dialogue



A trek through the snowy mountains with Kaji and a couple of guides brings them to an old mine, where the guides trap Polly and Joe in a vault. Joe and Polly take cover behind a box, which is revealed to be labeled "DYNAMITE'.

Polly: Oh, great... we're safe.

The guides make off with the metal vials, which Polly had never mentioned to Joe.


Kaji finds them and lets them out in time to save their lives, but not Polly's extra film. She has only two shots left in her camera and spends the rest of the movie agonizing over how to use them.

Joe will not Polly her go back to get her case of film that was in cave that was about to explode.

Polly: You should've let me go back for my film.

Joe: You're right, I should've.


The explosion knocks them out and the three of them wake up naked in a large, richly appointed bed.

Joe: Naked... you can say it, Polly.

A Nepalese monk comes in and tells them (via Kaji) that they are in Shangri-la. He agrees to help them when they say that they're after Dr. Totenkopf. Totenkopf had forced the people of Shangri-la to work in the "poisoned mine" -- a uranium mine -- and all but one of the miners have died.

They ask to speak with the survivor, who gives them a cane that he says will guide them to Totenkopf's base. In return for this favor, the horribly disfigured miner asks them to kill him.

Back in the plane, Joe and Polly use the inscriptions on the cane to plot a course to Totenkopf's location, which Joe marks with an X on the map.

Polly: There's nothing there. Are you sure you did it right?

Joe: I'm sure. If the old man was right, that's where Totenkopf is now. Dead center in the middle of nowhere.

Then he makes another X, somewhat closer to them than the first.

Polly: What's that point there?

Joe: That's where we run out of fuel.


Joe radios a message to his old friend Franky, who commands a secret British airborne air base where he hopes they can refuel. Shortly after the plane's tank runs dry and they begin a gliding descent, the air base materializes out of the clouds.

Joe: It's a mobile airstrip. Dex had a hand in designing it. It's kind of a secret. You can keep a secret, can't you, Polly?

Polly [raising her camera to photograph it]: Yeah. I can keep a secret.

But she sees she has only two shots left and holds off. They're able to land safely.


Franky turns out to be Commander Francesca Cook.

Franky: Joseph Sullivan, I was sure you'd be dead by now.

Joe: It's good to see you too, Franky.

Franky: This had better be important or one of us is in trouble.

Joe: It's important.

Franky notices Polly trying to climb down from the plane in awkward fashion.

Franky: What is that?

Joe: You be nice. Commander Cook, meet Polly Perkins.

Franky: Polly Perkins. I've heard so much about you. It's a pleasure to finally meet the competition.


Polly realizes must be Joe's other woman when Franky mentions Nanjing. Moments later, the air base is attacked by robot missiles.

Franky: What have you gotten me into this time, Joseph?

Joe: Nothing you can't handle, Franky.

Franky: Alert the amphibious squadron.


Franky leads her amphibious squadron to escort Joe and Polly to the island they've identified as Totenkopf's hideout.

Joe and Polly are preparing to take off along with Franky. Polly looks annoyed with Joe.

Joe: What?

Polly: 'Nanjing'?

Over the roar engines, he taps his head gear . . .

Joe [shouts]: I can't hear you, Polly! You'll have to speak up!

They take off.


Franky [over the radio]: Keep your nose up, Joseph. You always were bad at the short takeoff.

Joe: Keep up, Franky. I don't wanna have to come back for you.


Polly: I thought your takeoff was just fine.

Joe: Thank you, Polly.

Polly: So you heard that, did you?

As they submerge under water, Joe and Franky reminence over the radio about an old adventure, a milk run over Shanghai.

Franky: We had the target buttoned up and he was jinxing in the flax.

Joe: Pops a rivet, thinks he's taken a hit.

Joe and Franky: And started yelling:

Joe and Franky: Protect the rabbits! Protect the rabbits!


Franky and her squadron take out the robot guardian of the hideout's underwater entrance so that Joe's plane can slip through.

Polly [on Franky]: She's some kind of girl.

Joe: Yes, I know.

As they disembark, Polly sees the registration number on the fuselage reflected in the water: h-110d, inverted, reads "polly." She doesn't say anything to Joe. They make their way through the island's jungle terrain and encounter strange creatures. Polly starts to shoot a photo but holds off.

Joe: You're not gonna photograph that?

Polly: I've only got two shots left. Who knows what's waiting for us out there.


They make their way to a clearing and are confronted by a large flying beast. They race over a fallen tree forming a bridge between a steep ravine. Barely escaping the beast, Polly has dropped her camera but manages to retrieve. Once in safety, Joe scolds her for taking that risk to go back for her camera, she begins crying. He thinks she's upset over risking her life, but she reveals the real reason she's crying. . .

Polly: While we were running, I shot the ground!

Joe laughs hysterically.

Polly: It isn't funny! I have only one shot left!

They continue their trek through the jungle.

Polly: Joe, I wanna ask you something and I want you to tell me the truth. I don't care one way or the other, I swear. I just need to know. The girl in Nanjing was Franky, wasn't it?

Joe: Polly...

Polly: How long were you seeing her?

Joe: Look me in the eyes. I never fooled around on you. Never.

Polly: I sabotaged your plane.

Joe: Three months.

Polly: I knew it!


They discover a cavernous opening and make their way underground.


In the island's huge underground base, a spaceship is being loaded with animals. Polly starts to shoot a photo but holds off once again. Joe is astonished that Polly doesn't find this spectacle worthy of her last remaining frame of film.

Joe: What are you doing? You honestly think you're gonna find something more important than every single creature on Earth being led two by two inside a giant rocket ship?

Polly: I might.

Joe: Like what?

Polly: I'll know when I see it!

The countdown for the launch begins. Joe and Polly are discoverd by the mysterious woman and a squad of hovering robots converge on them. Dex turns up in a kind of flying flat-bed truck to rescue Joe and Polly. Dex has also rescued several of the scientists who disappeared.

Joe: Good boy, Dex.

They tell Polly and Joe that the spaceship is meant to give life a fresh start on a new world that Totenkopf calls the World of Tomorrow. In addition to the animals, the ship will carry the mysterious vials, which contain genetic material for a new, improved human race -- Totenkopf's Adam and Eve. However, after the ship takes off its booster rocket will destroy the Earth.


The group locates Totenkopf's quarters, but they're booby-trapped, and Dr. Kessler is electrocuted trying to get in. The booby-trap triggers a projection of the head of Dr. Totenkopf, a la the Wizard in The Wizard of Oz.

Totenkopf: Who dares come before me? Who dares enter this place? What has begun cannot be stopped. The time for this world is over.

Polly: Totenkopf.

Joe: Hello, doctor. Why are you doing this?

Totenkopf: I have been witness to a world consumed by hatred and bent on self-destruction, watched as we have taken what was to be a paradise and failed in our responsibilites as its steward. I know now that the course of human race has set for itself cannot be changed. I am the last desperate chance for a doomed planet. Now, leave this place or die!

Dex unplugs the Tesla coils that previously electrocuted Dr. Kessler.

Joe: Is it safe?

Dex: Well, there's only one way to find out.

Sky Captain and Polly cross the threshold together and are relieved to be unharmed.

Dex: I meant throw something.

The party enters the villain's study to find Totenkopf's dessicated, long-dead corpse clutching a note that says "Forgive me." Joe, deciding that he'll have to board the spaceship to stop it, first socks Polly in the jaw -- if she's unconscious, she can't insist on coming along and she'll be safe.


As he attempts to get inside the ship, he's attacked by the woman in black, who turns out to be a robot.

Polly turns up to save him, and gives him a sock in the jaw for good measure. Joe and Polly go aboard and cross a narrow bridge over the deep, hollow core of the ship to reach the controls. The rocket takes off and begins a countdown toward the release of the booster stage, which will destroy the planet.

As Joe and Polly struggle to turn off the booster, the robot in black attacks again.

Joe: Why won't you die?

Joe fends her off and uses her raygun to disable the booster. He and Polly get away in an escape pod just before the rocket blows up without harming the Earth.


Franky's fleet of air bases are closing to mount a rescue of the survivors.


They land in the water, surrounded by pods containing animals from Totenkopf's space-ark, which Polly released before they disabled the booster. Polly pans around in search of an image for her final photograph and finally settles on Joe. After she snaps the shutter, he looks disturbed.

Joe: Polly... you...

Polly: It's all right. You don't have to say anything.

Joe: Lens cap.




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