To help make sure the film's complex plot held together, the script of the film was translated into a comprehensive storyboard. This complete storyboard, a first in the history of live-action film, was invaluable in helping all departments to plan the production elements of each scene in unison. In the film clip accompanying this article, actor Kirk Douglas introduces this storyboard to the television audience of Walt's "Disneyland" series.

For art director Harper Goff, the greatest challenge was to create the Nautilus as a credible and technologically advanced machine that nevertheless remained within the aesthetic realm of Jules Verne. "The leading actor in the picture, in my mind," said Goff, "was the Nautilus. It had to be interesting from every angle. I wanted rivets all over because that would make it look like the rough alligator hide of a menacing crocodile."

Another challenge was the development of a practical diving suit that not only provided a reliable supply of oxygen to the actors, but also remained within the overall art direction and "look" of the film. Walt's diving experts designed a special suit that gave actors plenty of maneuvering room. It weighed some 225 pounds, however. Shooting time underwater was limited to set-ups of 55 minutes, since this was the amount of oxygen that crews could store in their tanks at one time.

The most difficult scene to shoot was the battle against the giant squid. It required a great deal of imagination to make a battle with a rubber squid look realistic. For example, how to make the squid attacking the sub make audiences shiver in their seats? Explains designer and artist John Hench, "We took a two-foot rubber submarine and a scaled down rubber squid. I wrapped the tentacles around the sub and tacked them down with thread. Then we reversed the camera and gradually pulled the squid away from the submarine. In the end, after the film was reversed, it looked like the squid was attacking, extending its two long feelers out to the sub and then wrapping around it."

But while a miniature squid worked well for this one shot, most of the scene involved real live actors, who would make a two-foot squid look like a guppy. So, a full-size squid was built. Director Richard Fleischer first filmed the entire scene in daylight, on a calm sea. During a review of the takes, it turned out that the wires operating the tentacles of the sea monster were visible in almost every shot. Worse, the battle was not as dramatic and convincing as Walt had wanted.

Recalled Fleischer, "Well, the light from the sunset, of course, exposed the cables. Couldn't hide those cables no matter what we did. And there was no excitement in it. The sub was flat, the lighting was flat, the squid wasn't working, and I was going crazy with it. And the stuntmen were fighting a big hunk of blubber.

"After a day or two of shooting, maybe a little longer even, I felt a tap on my shoulder and it was Walt. And he said, 'I just saw the dailies.' He said, 'What are you shooting here, a Keystone comedy?' I said, 'No, Walt.' And I explained what the situation was. And he understood it immediately. He said, 'I see your problem. . . Quit the sequence, go into another sequence, a dramatic sequence, and give me time to talk to my geniuses out at Disneyland to see if we can't come up with a squid that works for you."

Said Walt. "I just didn't like it. It didn't look believable." The solution Walt favored was as expensive as it was straightforward. He'd re-shoot the scene. Price tag: at least $250,000. As Walt recalled, "You run into a spot where the picture just falls down on you, and you've got to make a decision right there that you're either going to spend another quarter million or half million. And that's about what it amounted to. And I just had to have faith in the property and everybody with me."

Walt was never short of faith in his work, and the scene was entirely re-shot as a night scene, set during a violent squall. The torrential rain and the dark lighting made the suspension wires all but invisible, while fully sustaining the idea of a terrifying battle of life and death that Walt originally had in mind. The scene was shot at angles, to create a sense of unease. "You can take a scene and tilt it slightly and the audience knows something is wrong," said Hench. "That's ten million years of intuition or instinct or whatever the word is."

Walt constructed huge new soundstages on his animation lot in Burbank. This included a massive indoor tank on Stage 3. Even so, the available stage space was not enough, and the Disney Studio had to lease space on the Universal Studios and the 20th Century Fox back lot to shoot all required scenes.

In addition, Walt took the unusual step of filming many underwater scenes on location in the waters off of Nassau, in the Bahamas. "I could have done it in my Studio tank," Walt said later, "but I felt I should go to the ocean. And I did feel when it went down that it would be unique in the field of exploitation."

Of course, the gamble paid off. Winning Academy Awards® for both Art Direction/Set Direction and best Special Effects certainly proved that point. And thus the stage was set for many of Walt's future works -- that including filming the impossible: flying cars, leprechaun kingdoms, and air-loft nannies all owed a debt to "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea."

Be sure to also visit the other exhibits on the picture:

The Story of "20,000 Leagues"
The Cast of "20,000 Leagues"
The Animation of "20,000 Leagues"