The hike itself was easy and mostly flat, which was nice because my legs are sore. At the beginning of the hike there is an old dodge town movie set that was used in many western movies and is where they shot the television series Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman.
I'm not a big movie buff especially when it comes to western movies, and I don't recognize any of the old movies on the list. Most of the movies on this list are from 1927 to 1948. After that time period, I do recognize The Love Bug. Others that you many recognize include Munster Go Home, Herbie Rides Again, Red's with Warren Beatty. Then for some reason Flintstone's Viva Rock Vegas, Van Helsing, The Lake Houst, and Norbit are the latest ones on the list.
Right, when I think of western movies, Norbit is the first thing that comes to mind. The Flintstone's move I can kinda see being filmed here on some parts, but Norbit? Really? This means that I need to re-watch both the Flintstone's movie and Norbit.
By the way, other people today went to the beach to hike and Matthew McConaughey was there pushing his twins in a stroller. I haven't seen any pictures but I don't doubt it one bit.
Now onto the pictures of the old movie set. If you recognize any of these from a move, please let me know.
Closing thought for the day: I am always interested to see any movie or television set, even if it is a set from old western films that I don't recognize. After seeing the movie set and list of films shot here, I am still wondering which parts of Norbit were filmed here?
The pics remind me of Blazing Saddles
ReplyDeleteMy thoughts exactly David!!
ReplyDeleteHi,
ReplyDeleteI'm a Paramount Ranch historian. Paramount Ranch isn't used just for Westerns. It's been used for many different genres of movies and television. The Western town set has been seen as a frontier town for Westerns, but also as ghost towns, theme parks, movie studio backlot, you name it. It's versatile!
As to some of the movies that you named and were puzzled about, many of them did not use the Western town. For the Flintstones: Viva Rock Vegas, the film studio built a large temporary set for Slaghoople Manor, the large "Southern" style mansion seen as Wilma Flintstone's parent's home. It took several months to build, was used for filming for a few days, then torn down.
For Norbit, the film company erected two separate facades that they used. One was for the Chinese restaurant. The other was for the backside of the restaurant, which was the orphanage. Even though it was supposed to be the same building, they put up two facades in two separate sites on the ranch!
I could go on, but you get the idea that not everything is a Western, not everything uses the Western town and sometimes temporary sets are built or temparary alterations are made to the Western town, such as was done for Carnivale.
Regards,
Don Bitz, Paramount Ranch Historian