Boss Film Studios is a visual effects company, founded by visual effects veteran Richard Edlund

Richard Edlund

Richard Edlund, A.S.C. is a multi-Academy Award-winning US special effects cinematographer.Edlund was born in Fargo, North Dakota. After first joining the Navy, he developed an interest in experimental film and attended the USC School of Cinematic Arts in the late 60s...

 after his departure from Industrial Light and Magic, producing visual effects for over thirty films from 1983 to 1997. Edlund had worked at ILM on such films as Raiders of the Lost Ark

Raiders of the Lost Ark

Raiders of the Lost Ark is a 1981 American action-adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg, produced by George Lucas, and starring Harrison Ford. It is the first film in the Indiana Jones franchise...

 and the original Star Wars

Star Wars

Star Wars is an American epic space opera film series created by George Lucas. The first film in the series was originally released on May 25, 1977, under the title Star Wars, by 20th Century Fox, and became a worldwide pop culture phenomenon, followed by two sequels, released at three-year...

 trilogy.

History

Boss Film Studios (originally Boss Film Corporation) initially undertook two projects, Ghostbusters

Ghostbusters

Ghostbusters is a 1984 American science fiction comedy film directed by Ivan Reitman and written by Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis. The film stars Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Sigourney Weaver, Harold Ramis, and Rick Moranis and follows three eccentric parapsychologists in New York City, who start a...

and 2010, simultaneously. In an effort to get the new venture set up quickly, Edlund acquired Douglas Trumbull

Douglas Trumbull

Douglas Huntley Trumbull is an American film director, special effects supervisor, and inventor. He contributed to, or was responsible for, the special photographic effects of 2001: A Space Odyssey, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Blade Runner and The Tree of...

's Entertainment Effects Group, taking over their Marina Del Rey facility.

Competition with ILM

Boss Film soon established itself as one of the largest competitors to ILM contributing to such projects as Die Hard

Die Hard

Die Hard is a 1988 American action film and the first in the Die Hard film series. The film was directed by John McTiernan and written by Jeb Stuart and Steven E. de Souza. It is based on a 1979 novel by Roderick Thorp titled Nothing Lasts Forever, itself a sequel to the book The Detective, which...

, Poltergeist II

Poltergeist (film series)

The Poltergeist movies are a trilogy of American horror films distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer during the 1980s. The films revolve around the members of the Freeling family, who are stalked and terrorized by a group of ancient ghosts that are attracted to the youngest daughter, Carol Anne. The...

, and Big Trouble in Little China

Big Trouble in Little China

Big Trouble in Little China is a 1986 American martial arts comedy film directed by John Carpenter. It stars Kurt Russell as truck driver Jack Burton, who helps his friend Wang Chi rescue Wang's green-eyed fiancee from bandits in San Francisco's Chinatown...

.

Edlund and his team chose to compete with ILM technically, continuing EEG's preference for using 65mm

70 mm film

70mm film is a wide high-resolution film gauge, with higher resolution than standard 35mm motion picture film format. As used in camera, the film is wide. For projection, the original 65mm film is printed on film. The additional 5mm are for magnetic strips holding four of the six tracks of sound...

 film for the creation of their optical effects work. This provided potentially cleaner effects than ILM's VistaVision

VistaVision

VistaVision is a higher resolution, widescreen variant of the 35mm motion picture film format which was created by engineers at Paramount Pictures in 1954....

 format due to its much larger negative area.

Boss Game Studios

Boss Film branched out into video game production through sister company Boss Game Studios

Boss Game Studios

Boss Game Studio is a defunct video game developer specializing in Nintendo 64 games. The company was formed as an independent offshoot of Boss Film Studios...

. Boss Film also operated a commercial production company producing many television spots for products including Budweiser, Dodge, United Airlines and DHL.

Closure

Boss Film announced it was closing its doors on August 26, 1997 citing the difficulties of sustaining an independent effects house within the competitive environment at the time.

Awards

• Nominated for Best Visual Effects Academy Award 1993 for Alien 3. The named nominees were Richard Edlund; Alec Gillis; Tom Woodruff Jr.; and George Gibbs.

• Nominated for Best Visual Effects Academy Award 1989 for Die Hard
  Die Hard
  Die Hard is a 1988 American action film and the first in the Die Hard film series. The film was directed by John McTiernan and written by Jeb Stuart and Steven E. de Souza. It is based on a 1979 novel by Roderick Thorp titled Nothing Lasts Forever, itself a sequel to the book The Detective, which...
  
  . The named nominees were Richard Edlund; Al Di Sarro; Brent Boates; and Thaine Morris.

• Nominated for Best Visual Effects Academy Award 1987 for Poltergeist II. The named nominees were Richard Edlund; John Bruno; Garry Waller; and Bill Neil.

• Boss Film was awarded a Scientific and Engineering Award from the AMPAS in 1987 for the design and development of a Zoom Aerial (ZAP) 65mm Optical Printer. Winners were Richard Edlund; Gene Whiteman; David Grafton; Mark West; Jerry Jeffress; and Robert Wilcox.

• Nominated for Best Visual Effects Academy Award in 1985 for 2010 (Richard Edlund; Neil Krepela; George Jenson; Mark Stetson) and Ghostbusters
  Ghostbusters
  Ghostbusters is a 1984 American science fiction comedy film directed by Ivan Reitman and written by Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis. The film stars Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Sigourney Weaver, Harold Ramis, and Rick Moranis and follows three eccentric parapsychologists in New York City, who start a...
  
   (Richard Edlund; John Bruno; Mark Vargo; Chuck Gaspar).

Notable Boss Film alumni

Richard Edlund

Richard Edlund

Richard Edlund, A.S.C. is a multi-Academy Award-winning US special effects cinematographer.Edlund was born in Fargo, North Dakota. After first joining the Navy, he developed an interest in experimental film and attended the USC School of Cinematic Arts in the late 60s...

Neil Krepela

John Bruno

Garry Waller

David K. Stewart

Bill Neil

Neil Krepela

Don Fly

Brent Boates

Patrick McClung

Jim Rygiel

Jim Rygiel

Jim Rygiel is a visual effects supervisor. He has worked on major feature films since 1984, including The Lord of the Rings movie trilogy.- Early life :...

Ellen Somers

Mark Stetson

Evan Jacobs

Evan Jacobs

Evan Jacobs is a visual effects supervisor and director. Jacobs has overseen visual effects and served as miniatures supervisor on the feature films such as Ed Wood, The Hunt for Red October, What the #$*! Do We Know?!, and Resident Evil: Extinction.Jacobs was born in Michigan and moved to...

Christian Colquhoun

Christian Colquhoun

Christian Colquhoun is a mechanical designer who has navigated his career into toy design, prop design and construction, special effects, mechanical effects makeup, and miniatures for motion pictures, television, and other forms of media, working for Mattel, Boss Film, Stetson Visual Services, New...

Screaming Mad George

David Hardberger

Harry Alpert

Thaine Morris

Bill Klinger

Jeff Platt

Greg Jein

Steve Johnson

Stephen Stanton

Stephen Stanton

Stephen Stanton is an American voice actor, impressionist and visual effects artist. He is well known as an "audio double" or "voicematch" for actors: Alec Guiness, John Cusack, Bruce Willis, Clive Owen, Nicolas Cage, Robert Downey Jr., and Peter Cushing among many others...

George Mather

Phil Crescenzo

Todd Masters

Terry Windell

Terry Windell

Terry Windell is a film director, working in commercials as well as long-form television, most notably directing several episodes of Star Trek: Voyager and Enterprise.-Career:...

Filmography

1984

• Ghostbusters
  Ghostbusters
  Ghostbusters is a 1984 American science fiction comedy film directed by Ivan Reitman and written by Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis. The film stars Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Sigourney Weaver, Harold Ramis, and Rick Moranis and follows three eccentric parapsychologists in New York City, who start a...
  
   (credited as Effects Entertainment Group)
• 2010 (credited as Effects Entertainment Group)

1985

• Fright Night
  Fright Night
  # "Fright Night" – 3:45# "You Can't Hide from the Beast Inside" – 4:14# "Good Man in a Bad Time" – 3:41# "Rock Myself to Sleep" – 2:57# "Let's Talk" – 2:52# "Armies of the Night" – 4:34...
  
  

1986

• Big Trouble in Little China
  Big Trouble in Little China
  Big Trouble in Little China is a 1986 American martial arts comedy film directed by John Carpenter. It stars Kurt Russell as truck driver Jack Burton, who helps his friend Wang Chi rescue Wang's green-eyed fiancee from bandits in San Francisco's Chinatown...
  
  
• Poltergeist II: The Other Side
• Solarbabies
• Legal Eagles
• The Boy Who Could Fly

1987

• Masters of the Universe
  Masters of the Universe (film)
  Masters of the Universe is a 1987 science-fiction fantasy film based on the toy line by the same name. The movie stars Dolph Lundgren as He-Man and Frank Langella as Skeletor...
  
  
• The Monster Squad
• Date with an Angel
• Leonard, Part 6

1988

• Switching Channels
• Die Hard
  Die Hard
  Die Hard is a 1988 American action film and the first in the Die Hard film series. The film was directed by John McTiernan and written by Jeb Stuart and Steven E. de Souza. It is based on a 1979 novel by Roderick Thorp titled Nothing Lasts Forever, itself a sequel to the book The Detective, which...
  
  
• Vibes
• Twins
• Big Top Pee Wee

1989

• Tales from the Crypt series opening

1990

• The Hunt for Red October
• Ghost
  Ghost (film)
  Ghost is a 1990 romantic drama film starring Patrick Swayze, Demi Moore and Whoopi Goldberg. It was written by Bruce Joel Rubin and directed by Jerry Zucker.-Plot:...
  
  
• Solar Crisis

1992

• Alien 3
• Batman Returns
  Batman Returns
  Batman Returns is a 1992 American superhero film directed by Tim Burton. Based on the DC Comics character Batman, it is the sequel to Burton's Batman , and features Michael Keaton reprising the title role, with Danny DeVito as the Penguin and Michelle Pfeiffer as Catwoman.Burton originally did not...
  
  
• Far and Away
  Far and Away
  Far and Away is a 1992 adventure-drama-romance film directed by Ron Howard from a script by Howard and Bob Dolman, and stars Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman. Cinematography by Mikael Salomon, with a music score by John Williams...
  
  

1993

• Cliffhanger
  Cliffhanger (film)
  Cliffhanger is a 1993 American action film directed by Renny Harlin and starring Sylvester Stallone and John Lithgow. Stallone plays a mountain climber, who becomes embroiled in a failed heist set in a U.S. Treasury plane flying through the Rocky Mountains...
  
  
• Last Action Hero
  Last Action Hero
  Last Action Hero is a 1993 American action-comedy-fantasy film directed and produced by John McTiernan. It is a satire of the action genre and its clichés, containing several parodies of action films in the form of films within the film....
  
  
• Journey to Technopia

1994

• True Lies
  True Lies
  True Lies is a 1994 American action-comedy film directed by James Cameron and starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jamie Lee Curtis, Tom Arnold, Bill Paxton, Tia Carrere, Charlton Heston, and Art Malik. Eliza Dushku also appears in the film in one of her first major film roles...
  
  
• Drop Zone
  Drop Zone (film)
  Drop Zone is a 1994 action movie directed by John Badham. It stars Wesley Snipes, Gary Busey and Yancy Butler.-Plot:Aboard a commercial airliner, U.S...
  
  
• The Scout
• The Specialist
• Tales from the Crypt: Demon Knight

1995

• Outbreak
  Outbreak (film)
  Outbreak is a 1995 American disaster film starring Dustin Hoffman, Rene Russo, Morgan Freeman, and Kevin Spacey. The film was directed by Wolfgang Petersen. In addition, Outbreak features Cuba Gooding, Jr., Donald Sutherland, and Patrick Dempsey....
  
  
• Species
  Species (film)
  Species is a 1995 science fiction horror film directed by Roger Donaldson, and starring Ben Kingsley, Michael Madsen, Alfred Molina, Forest Whitaker, Marg Helgenberger, and Natasha Henstridge...
  
  
• Waterworld
  Waterworld
  Waterworld is a 1995 post-apocalyptic science fiction film. The film was directed by Kevin Reynolds and co-written by Peter Rader and David Twohy. It is based on Rader's original 1986 screenplay and stars Kevin Costner, who also produced it. It was distributed by Universal Pictures...
  
  
• Heat
• Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls

1996

• Multiplicity
  Multiplicity (film)
  Multiplicity is a 1996 comedy film, starring Michael Keaton and Andie MacDowell. The film was co-produced and directed by Harold Ramis. The original music score was composed by George Fenton....
  
  

1997

• Turbulence
• Air Force One
• Starship Troopers
  Starship Troopers (film)
  Starship Troopers is a 1997 American military science fiction film, written by Edward Neumeier , directed by Paul Verhoeven, loosely adapted from Starship Troopers, a science fiction novel by Robert A. Heinlein. It is the only theatrically released film in the Starship Troopers franchise...
  
  
• Desperate Measures