#Quicksand in movies tv

In 1909, quicksand first appeared on screen in a 12-minute melodrama, Saved from the Quicksand, in which a young woman is rescued by hooded monks. In Jeremiah 38, the eponymous prophet is thrown into a well where he вЂњ down into the mudвЂќ before being rescued with ropes. Quicksand was first a crucial plot device in the Bible. Yet if OsmunвЂ™s experiences are so different from what we see on screen, why is it that quicksand was once such a popular trope? And why has the plotline now sunk out of sight?ДЄrguably, God started it. He waited through the night for rescuers during a snowstorm, his life endangered not by suffocation but by exposure.

Instead, his right leg sank up to his thigh and he found himself unable to pull it out. Nor did he sink up to his chin as Robin Williams did in 1995вЂ™s Jumanji. The Arizona photographer wasnвЂ™t sucked under the sand in seconds as Buttercup was in 1987вЂ™s The Princess Bride. It was so prominent in childrenвЂ™s entertainment that roughly two people every single day now tweet a variation of the comic John MulaneyвЂ™s gag: вЂњAs a kid, I always thought that quicksand was going to be a much bigger problem than it turned out to be.вЂќДЇor Osmun, quicksand turned out to be a very big problem, but, as with most things, it wasnвЂ™t quite like the movies.

From Flash GordonвЂ™s narrow escape from a swamp in 1980, to ArtaxвЂ™s harrowing death in The NeverEnding Story in 1984, quicksand was once a pop culture staple. But after 11 hours, with no sign of rescue, his clothes frozen solid, and his body aching from exhaustion, he wasnвЂ™t certain he would survive.ДЄs a child of the вЂ™80s and вЂ™90s, Osmun was no stranger to the perils of quicksand before his ordeal. вЂњIt was sunny out, at first it wasnвЂ™t too bad,вЂќ he says. Fifty minutes after sinking, Osmun still felt optimistic. вЂњI pretty much thought it was mud,вЂќ Osmun says now, six months after he sank in a freezing puddle at UtahвЂ™s Zion National Park on February 17, 2019. Quicksand even featured in Black Beauty, Little House on the Prairie, and I Love Lucy.For the first 20 minutes that 34-year-old hiker Ryan Osmun was stuck in quicksand, he thought everything would be all right.

Any time there was a bit of quick peril required, quicksand was the go-to solution, in shows ranging from Batman to the Dukes of Hazzard, the Incredible Hulk to the Lone Ranger.

#Quicksand in movies tv

A huge number of TV shows and movies from the Sixties to the Eighties featured quicksand as a hazard and plot device. Possibly even to the centre of the earth. Even growing up in Wigan in Lancashire, I had an inordinate fear of stepping into quicksand and being sucked down who knew how far? Deep enough to get horribly killed, at the very least. Quicksand вЂ“ also known as sinking sand вЂ“ was a very real concern for my generation. The old TV shows that were a staple of summer holiday scheduling in the Seventies and Eighties вЂ“ be they the episodes from the 1960s version starring Ron Ely or the black and white movies from the 1930s with Johnny Weissmuller in the ape-man role вЂ“ invariably featured, among the many jungle perils, an encounter with quicksand. The general consensus seems to be that itвЂ™s all TarzanвЂ™s fault.