Ring of Fire Outdoor movie - FREE

315 Railroad Ave,Shelton WA 98584

04 June, 2021

Description

To launch the movie nights, Forest Festival Timber Days will host this 1961 Metrocolor drama in Evergreen Square. Generational Mason County residents will want to catch a showing of the locally filmed Ring of Fire – if just to see a familiar sight or family member! This thriller features music from the twangy rock’n’roll veteran Duane Eddy (of “Forty Miles of Bad Road” fame) and the acting of David Janssen (The Fugitive), Howard Hughe’s starlet Joyce Taylor and Frank Gorshin (Riddler, in the original Batman). Although the storyline of three rebels with no apparent cause, a police officer kidnapping, flirtations with statutory rape and the daring evacuation of a town under threat of forest fire is disjointed to say the least, the film is a genuine piece of Pacific Northwest history. Much of the filming was done in Mason County with many of the extras and even the police officer uniforms (and few of the officers themselves) sourced from Shelton and the surrounding area. The director/ producer Andrew L. Stone was famous for a high degree of realism in his shooting, not only did he splice in real forest fire footage, but an actual mill in Oregon was burnt for the production, the US Army was used to shoot flamethrowers for some of the scenes and an actual wooden trestle bridge over the Wynoochee River was destroyed by fire in the final scenes. Additionally, a 1924 Locomotive and two ex-Southern Pacific coaches were burnt on the Wynoochee Trestle which plummeted into the gorge below amidst well timed dynamite charges. The train and coaches are still laying in the canyon to this day and are an extreme geocache collector destination. Thank you Bowman Financial, Karen Schade, Edward Jones Advisor, FM 101.9 Boomer Rock and Roll and Williams Architects for sponsoring the movie and All About Parties and the Cantina/El Sarape for hosting! The festival was created to help combat the destructive wildfires in the region, while also promoting the importance of forests to the local economy.