Wednesday, May 7, 2008

"Tony Stark's Pad"

The "Iron Man" movie just released is spectacular in my opinion, but I'll leave the reviews for that movie for the comic guys. Suffice it to say there was not one moment of the movie that did not impress me, even though I have never read a single Iron Man comic book until today. But of course what totally blew me away was the house that he lived in, which was one of my favorite styles of architecture -- sweeping curved concrete with glass walls. I just read that the house was mostly CGI and sets, of course, but is based on a house owned by some bazillionaire oil sheik. When I searched on his name though, not one site came up for it. So thus far I doubt the house's actual existence in any capacity.

But, the house does look a lot like the Arango House built by John Lautner, one of the premier architects of the mid 20th Century. It resides on the side of a hill in Acapulco, Mexico. I hope that later this year more information will surface as to whether or not any particular house was a model or inspiration for the one in the movie. For more on the movie architecture, view a video that Yahoo released of the director giving a short tour of the set:
For more on John Lautner see this site: http://www.johnlautner.net/
Additional Lautner factoid: his Elrod residence (which is also similar to Stark's house) is the round concrete house used in the Bond movie "Diamonds Are Forever".

6 comments:

maven said...

Thanks for adding the quilt on your links!

Capcom said...

Sure! I want to spread the word so people can see it. :-D

Ohighway said...

Starks "pad" definitely was noteworthy! Too bad is was CGI and sets. <:~(

I basically liked the movie, however there was an aspect that put me off, and is increasingly showing up in more and more movies. I'll call it the "physically impossible". I can buy high tech. I can sort of buy a genius cobbling together a flying suit in a cave. What I can't buy is a guy that can get violently slammed against the ceiling of his own house , or do a free fall to the desert floor, then get up and walk away. Ditto the folks who can fly and float in the chop socky movies. Until they somehow create a reason this can happen in the story line, then to me it's just plain detrimental.

Capcom said...

Heheh, I know what you mean. I just keep telling myself, "It's only a comic book, it's only a comic book..." Batman movies are like that for me too. But I do love the scientific explanation for his "snappy" new cape in Batman Begins!

I love those flying chop-sockies, especially the older ones from the 1970s that started them all. I have to think of those as if they were Grimm's fiary tales, or something like that. :-) But the new ones are beautiful visually. Hey, that would be a good subject for this blog! :-D

Ohighway said...

I have a favorite, though it's not a chop sockie. It's a parody that uses original footage from a 1970's film.
The movie is Kung Pow (Steve Oedekirk) Admittedly it's pretty juvenile, but with the ages of my boys, and considering my twisted sense of humor, well.... it is definitely on the family favorite list.

I really liked Batman Begins.

Capcom said...

I'll have to look that film up! Have you ever seen The Blind Samurai? There was a TV series that Bruce Lee was fond of, but I've only seen the recent movie remake (2003?), which is pretty interesting. Somewhat adult overtones though.