Boats from the movie The Merchant of Venice

[katiedobe]

Just saw the movie, with Al Pacino as Shylock. Good movie by the way.

They were using wonderful wooden boats, propelled the way a gondola is, one oar off of the starboard stern quarter.

But no gondolas were used in this movie. It raises a few questions in my mind.

Were the boats that they used period specific?
The movie was set in the 1500's.
Is this prior to the development and use of fancy gondolas?

Who built these boats, anyone know?

What happens to wooden boats after the movie is over, like this one and like those wonderful lapstrake boats from "King Kong"?

I know some member of this forum built those NZ boats for the King Kong movie, I forget who it was. Does he know what happened to the King Kong boats?

Thanks for your answers.

[Spokaloo]

I have just recently returned from Venezia and can tell you the archetype gondola isnt what you would expect. Only American tourists (and some germans) ride in the big, black, constantly curved sedans of what your thinking.

A true gondola in the Italian's sense is just a narrow canal boat which is driven in one of two ways: a stern quarter scull like your thinking, and venetian style with two oars, rowed standing and facing forward. Most of the older Venetians actually row-troll for fishing on a regular basis to this day, which is great to see amongst all the water taxis, waterbusses, cruise ships, etc in the harbor and on the Grand Canal nowadays.

E