Dharma Initiative Films -
Training films created by a group called the
Dharma Initiative on the supernatural/science
fiction drama
series LOST/ABC/1994+. The Dharma Initiative was
a research project established in 1970 by
University of Michigan doctoral candidates
Gerald and Karen de Groot.
Financed by the Hanso Foundation, the DI set
about to conduct research in the areas of
meteorology, psychology, parapsychology,
zoology, and electromagnetism.
Their base of operations
was a complex of eight
underground laboratories built on a remote
island in the South Pacific. In 1987, the underground facilities that housed
the experiments and community of researchers was
abandoned.
In 2004, the complex was discovered by the survivors of
Oceanic Flight 815 where a flight was
pulled down by a strange pulse of
electromagnetic energy emanating from the
island.
Survivor John Locke uses dynamite found
on the wreck of a sailing vessel called" The
Black Rock" to open a large hatch which gained
them access to the underground facility. As they
investigate the research labyrinth, the
survivors find stations called "The Swan," "The
Pearl," "The Arrow," "The Staff," and "The
Flame" (only mentioned but not explored).
In station No. 3 labeled "The Swan"
survivors Locke and Eko find a training film
(the third of six) which orients
research volunteers as to their responsibilities
in that area. The narrator of the film is a man
identified as Marvin Candle who has a prosthetic
hand.
The films (©
1980) provide and overview of the DI project and
instructions on how to monitor the
computer and reset it every 108 minutes
by typing the code 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42 into
the system. The 815 survivors later learned that
if the code was not entered, a cataclysmic
electromagnetic discharge would rock the island.
One such discharge had caused the Oceanic Flight
815 to fall from the sky.
In station "The Pearl" a video
explains this section's
responsibility: to monitor researchers in
other areas. Their observations are to be
recorded in journals and then sent via pneumatic
tubes to another station for analysis. However,
the journals, instead, are found dumped in a
large pile on the island's surface.
The
narrator of this video is the same man as in
the "Swan" film but he identifies himself as Dr.
Mark Wickman.
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| Swan Film
#3 |
Dr. Marvin
Candle |
Psychology |
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Para-Psychology |
de Groot Observers |
Zoology
Specimens |
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Electromagnetism |
Hanso
Foundation |
Pearl Film |
External Links
