patterson gimlin film

[kensei]

Been away for a while, thought I'd respond to the last several posts.

"The Legend of Bigfoot" was not a true documentary since practically nothing in it is true. It was a promotional piece about the late Ivan Marx who hoaxed many Bigfoot films/photos from the late 60s to the early 80s, and the voice you hear him narrating in isn't even really his own, it is dubbed (since his real voice had quite an unsophisticated drawl). It gives a completely imagined history of the Bigfoot phenomenon and makes Marx out to be the only person ever to have investigated it.

"Finding Bigfoot," meanwhile- well, it's not surprising that they never actually find it because if they did the show would be over. No matter how good the evidence they find in a given area, they never decide to stay and follow up but are always on to the next area for the next episode. It's showbusiness. But they do feature many good sighting reports. They did an episode in my home state that inspired me to go to that area and do my own investigation where I met some of the people involved and got inside info on how they manipulate some of the facts to make them more sensational. The stories were solid, but were "tweaked" for t.v.

I've heard the argument many times about how many cameras are out there as opposed to the low number of Bigfoot photos and films. Actually there are many other than the Patterson film but none are of good enough quality to act as proof and in the YouTube era there are now more hoax films than ever. Any real ones that might exist have a harder time than ever now to shine through.

Modern technology has not revealed a zipper in the "suit." It is just the spine. It has also not proven eyeholes in the "mask." If it seems to look that way it is only an illusion of shadows. And I don't know why there is a perception that "Patty" has brown hair instead of black. She IS black, with gray skin underneath the hair. (Though Bigfoot creatures have been seen with pretty much the full range of hair colors that humans have, but with dark brown and black being by far the most common.)

Pcdunn- many thanks for the compliment and encouragement.

[Pcdunn]

Steadmund: we are addicted to another show of this entertainment-reality type called "Mountain Monsters", about a group of West Virginian men who look into reports of weird critters. They all look as if they hail from the Hatfield and McCoy era, yet they use a laptop and a night vision camera, and their witnesses always pull out a cell-phone or tablet to show the photo or video of the beast. Trust me, this show won't put you to sleep!
They did catch a few wild dogs and a hog of unusual size in two different episodes, so they might be the ones who bring down poor Bigfoot, lol. Or maybe not....

[Steadmund Brand]

The Legend of Bigfoot was on the other night.....and it's funny how to this day I have seen people fight over that film.. some insisting it's real and the best documentary ever in the subject and still others insisting it's a pseudo-documentary and totally fake....I wish I could give my opinion on it.. truth is I have tried watching it at least 5 times and fall asleep each time... do we need that much rambling narration.. really

My question about Finding Bigfoot is...how many season of a show called "Finding Bigfoot" last without FINDING BIGFOOT....or any of the other dozens of " monster hunters" series.. where anyone with a night vision camera can find absolutely nothing and get their own TV show....if Bigfoot is real then he is the world’s greatest Hide and Seek player... funny that all these people all see bigfoot when they don't have their cameras...but alas.. the beast is so camera shy they never see him with their cameras.....plus.. EVERYONE IN THE WORLD has a camera on their cell phone now... you can't sneezy without someone filming it for YouTube.. and yet still.... nobody can seem to find him...makes you wonder...

Steadmund Brand

[Jonathan H]

Plus modern technology has exposed the zipper up the back ...

[Batman]

Why is "Patty" covered in a light brownish fur, when most ape suits are black? Why does "she" lack the laughably fake hard "hairless chest plate" seen in movie ape suits?

Pat D.

As said previously, 2001: A Space Oddessey made the year after the P-G film has apes so realistic as to make Bob... err I mean 'Patty' ... well fake. I mean, show me an ape photograph at a distance where the eye have what looks like two big holes cut out around them.

Also it looks nothing like having ape hair. Its more like old worn brown carpet.

[Pcdunn]

Pinkmoon: I agree that it seems odd that the creature in the P-G film seems so realistic, compared to the standard Hollywood "gorilla" suit of the times. Why is "Patty" covered in a light brownish fur, when most ape suits are black? Why does "she" lack the laughably fake hard "hairless chest plate" seen in movie ape suits? ( I was vividly reminded of this yesterday when I saw an old episode of "Night Gallery", from the early 1970s, featuring a white hunter, his wife, and a strangely aggressive "gorilla" (played by a guy in a suit). That was horrible, and it is AFTER the Patterson-Gimlin film.

Kensei: I was fascinated to hear of your experience as a witness of a Bigfoot sighting! Keep looking for the truth, and don't give up!

Pat D.

[pinkmoon]

I dunno about that-- the "Finding Bigfoot" TV show on Animal Planet is still going strong, finding "sightings" to investigate and going to local town meetings where a third of the audience claim to have seen or heard a Bigfoot critter.

I watch that show for entertainment, but did learn something very interesting about the P-G film: the woman biologist said she saw it shown in a movie theater, shortly after Patterson and Gimlin's story originally broke. She was taken to see it by her father, who developed a great interest in the Bigfoot mystery.

I'm on the fence still on the film footage. I've read the original magazine story about it in one of my Dad's magazines, have read some articles and books on Bigfoot in general, and have always wondered about the "suit" question.

I think the most advanced "ape suit" make-up of the era was in the first "Planet of the Apes" movie. To think Patterson could duplicate it years ahead of that movie... I just don't know.
A good deal of the information in this thread is new to me, though, so I think I'll need to do more research.
Pat D.

Hi,if it was faked then why can't someone fake it now that suit would have Been better then anything Hollywood or Disney could produce and we are asked to believed a skint cowboy betters these film studios.People have tried to make a suit as good and they just can't and some of the detail that thanks to computer enhancement we now see details that Mr Patterson never pointed out at the time surely you would if you arranged such a good hoax

[Pcdunn]

Is it my imagination or are we hearing about fewer bigfoot sightings of late? Hopefully it's finally extinct.

I dunno about that-- the "Finding Bigfoot" TV show on Animal Planet is still going strong, finding "sightings" to investigate and going to local town meetings where a third of the audience claim to have seen or heard a Bigfoot critter.

I watch that show for entertainment, but did learn something very interesting about the P-G film: the woman biologist said she saw it shown in a movie theater, shortly after Patterson and Gimlin's story originally broke. She was taken to see it by her father, who developed a great interest in the Bigfoot mystery.

I'm on the fence still on the film footage. I've read the original magazine story about it in one of my Dad's magazines, have read some articles and books on Bigfoot in general, and have always wondered about the "suit" question.

I think the most advanced "ape suit" make-up of the era was in the first "Planet of the Apes" movie. To think Patterson could duplicate it years ahead of that movie... I just don't know.
A good deal of the information in this thread is new to me, though, so I think I'll need to do more research.
Pat D.

[Batman]

Even Loren Coleman had to admit it was raccoon but that didn't stop a million posts from people wanting it to be the result of the so called Philadelphia experiment, lol.

[Jonathan H]

Hey, look a monster has washed ashore--this is what BigFake needs, at a minimum:

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2014/12/18/-montauk-monster-mystery-creature-washes-california-beach_n_6347812.html?utm_hp_ref=uk

But it will never happen, as there is no evidence and cannot be. The true origins of the so-called "Sasquatch" tale are entirely modern: a hoax that took on a life of its own, perpetuated a decade prior to Pattersons's faked footage.

[Batman]

Furthermore- there is a difference between a "skeptic" and a "debunker." A sceptic is someone with an open mind who needs to see the evidence and is prepared to make up their mind either way. A debunker is someone who goes in with a preconceived disbelief and is determined to defend it no matter what. I am glad to see Jonathan H identify himself and Batman under which of those titles they wish to be known.

Debunking means to falsify something because you have evidence to the contrary. Being skeptical means to doubt claims that lack evidence.
They are not mutually exclusive.

For example I am skeptical of bigfoot and believe science has debunked it in many ways.

[kensei]

The best book on this is by Greg Long: an unforgettable portrait of a desperate [and harmless] American hustler. By the end you wish Patterson had pulled off the Big Score!:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Making-Bigfoot-Inside-Story/dp/1591021391

From one debunker to another, I cannot recommend it highly enough.

I have left this thread for days at a time to reflect and ponder and I think it is pretty much winding down now. On Greg Long's book, it is a hatchet job. If I remember correctly it mentioned Bigfoot sightings around Yakima, Washington (Patterson's home town) including one where a man driving in a rainstorm was stopped in the road by a white haired Bigfoot that circled his car and looked through the window at him. The book actually postulated that that must have been Patterson in a costume, out faking sightings. Curious that he would have constructed a white haired costume when most sighting reports describe dark haired creatures, and that he would have gone so far as to go face to face with someone through a car window, giving the best possible view of himself. That is also a very good way of getting oneself shot, for anyone who tries something that stupid.

Furthermore- there is a difference between a "skeptic" and a "debunker." A sceptic is someone with an open mind who needs to see the evidence and is prepared to make up their mind either way. A debunker is someone who goes in with a preconceived disbelief and is determined to defend it no matter what. I am glad to see Jonathan H identify himself and Batman under which of those titles they wish to be known.

[Batman]

This is even true of the superb French mimes playing simians in Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey" re: the "Dawn of Man" sequence. They are wonderful -- and also obviosuly people in costumes.

That's a great reply. For eons one of the big Patterson bigfoot claims is that even the film Planet of the Apes wasn't as good as this bigfoot, but the apes in Planet of the Apes are supposed to be .... [[SPOILER]]... evolved futuristic apes, so they are going to look pretty different from a creative point of view. Sasquatch is supposed to be a modern ape, not futuristic anything. The apes in 2001 are not only well acted, but darn close to the reality of it given the transitional fossils we have turned up since the late 60s when these films where made.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wstIBq2H0z8

The fact is we know these are actors in suits for this movie and yet it was done so well (Kubrick probably trained them for a year or something nuts like that) that the 'real' sasquatch in Patterson's movie pales in comparison. The only reason its failing is because it isn't real and isn't as good as what Hollywood can conjure up with the right talent.

[TomTomKent]

I really can't see the argument that the Bigfoot Costume would be impossible to fake holding water. I mean there is existing footage of somebody in an almost identical costume, for a film The danged camera was rented to make.

At best it is a subjective opinion that relies on an argument from assumed authority. But given they were making a faux documentary about native americans seeing bigfoot, and an apparently impossible costume to hand....

[Jonathan H]

BigFake

Even when we were kids, thoroughly enjoying a Rod Serling-narrated documentary called "Mysterious Monsters", whilst we were prepared to believe some of the picture of Nessie were real (they're not) and that some of the Yeti reports were definitely kosher (nope, wrong again) the Bigfoot film was rejected by us as an obvious fake.

A laughable fake.

There is something about human movement that is so different and distinctive from animals that the first time you see the Bigfoot hoax it is quite jarring, e.g. it's ... a guy in a suit, right?! This is even true of the superb French mimes playing simians in Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey" re: the "Dawn of Man" sequence. They are wonderful -- and also obviosuly people in costumes.

The best book on this is by Greg Long: an unforgettable portrait of a desperate [and harmless] American hustler. By the end you wish Patterson had pulled off the Big Score!:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Making-Bigfoot-Inside-Story/dp/1591021391

From one debunker to another, I cannot recommend it highly enough.