MySQL Create Table as SELECT

See also http://www.mysqlperformanceblog.com/2006/07/12/insert-into-select-performance-with-innodb-tables/

if not using replication, can change innodb_locks_unsafe_for_binlog to change this locking behaviour.

Or can dump the data to a file, then reload the data from a file. This also avoids the locks.

Have you tried to do the operation in 2 phases (first Create the table, then Insert the values) and having set the lowest isolation level?:

CREATE TABLE temp_lots_of_data_xxx AS 
    SELECT
        a.*
        b.*
        c.*
    FROM a
        LEFT JOIN b ON a.foo = b.foo
        LEFT JOIN c ON a.foo = c.foo
    WHERE FALSE

INSERT INTO temp_lots_of_data_xxx
    SELECT
        a.*
        b.*
        c.*
    FROM a
        LEFT JOIN b ON a.foo = b.foo
        LEFT JOIN c ON a.foo = c.foo