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Ridley Scott to direct Haldeman's Forever War

Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2008 5:41 pm
by Omphalos
Just take a look at this article at variety. Sounds like its in the early stages, and Scott has a lot to clear off his plate before he gets to it. But this has apparently been something that he has wanted to do for years.

Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2008 8:32 pm
by Robspierre
I wouldn't mind seeing his take at all.

Rob

Posted: Tue Oct 14, 2008 6:59 am
by GamePlayer
I've not read it, but it sounds interesting.

Posted: Wed Oct 15, 2008 3:28 pm
by Omphalos
Forgot about this. Guess he's changed his mind, huh?

Posted: Wed Oct 15, 2008 3:35 pm
by Freakzilla
Omphalos wrote:Forgot about this. Guess he's changed his mind, huh?
Sorry, but I thought 2001 sucked. It didn't make any sense until I read the book.

Posted: Wed Oct 15, 2008 3:51 pm
by Omphalos
All except for the visual extravaganza that was the wormhole, I though that movie was excellent.

Posted: Wed Oct 15, 2008 6:27 pm
by Freakzilla
Oh the effects were incredible, I just didn't get it.

Posted: Wed Oct 15, 2008 6:40 pm
by GamePlayer
There was nothing to get. 2001 has been given a bad reputation because pretentious fans talk of Kubrick's film like it's high art and snobbishly declare you have to be cultured to "get it". You don't; all Kubrick wanted to do was create some kind of sequence that communicated what it must be like for a primitive human flying through a superluminal stargate, with his own style of filmmaking thrown into the mix. That's it. No "impressionist" bullshit or arthouse crap that one must "get". It was just thematic and that's all it was

Nonetheless, 2001 was brilliant.

I do see rough times ahead for science fiction. No one even wants to call it science fiction anymore, because the term has almost become a pejorative; we're supposed to call it speculative fiction, like it makes a difference. I cannot deny that at least in the film world, science fiction is a rather tired genre. What's worse, all the exciting science fiction being done in print is way too provocative and daring to risk adapting into a $100+ million film that isn't appealing to a big budget audience anymore. I look at the work of Iain M. Banks, Ken Mcleod, Dan Simmons, Peter F Hamilton and I just can't see them adapted into live action without the soul being ripped out to appeal to the lowest common denominator throngs. And even if that's done with a few properties, it definitely won't "help" the genre.

I can see parallels between the sci-fi film and the western. Hell, when I was in theatres watching caped crusaders and billionaires in flying armor, all that came of the trailer for Terminator 4 was laughter from the audience. Even the most successful sci-fi right now is Battlestar Galactica and to be honest, it's barely science fiction. Though I love the show, it's so low tech it could have been set in an ocean rather than space. The sci-fi film's place at the top of the box office has now been firmly supplanted by the comic book super hero movie (even though most comic books are technically science fiction themselves). If Spider-Man and X-Men were the heralding, The Dark Knight and Iron Man were pretty much the proof in the pudding.

If science fiction does have one thing going for it, it is "modern". The western was old when it was new, so to speak, and selling period pieces has always been difficult to an industry largely run off the spending of the teen-to-20-something demographic. If sci-fi film does go dead, I think it's still likely to take at least another decade to do so. We may yet get some great films out of the genre before it passes (Cameron, is that you?), but after that, we'll need an sci-fi Sergio Leone to get anything else of quality. The next great movement in science fiction film might come from, of all places, Japan. Hollywood seems obsessed with bringing new blood into the genre by adapting the modern classics of anime. Buzz is abounding with confirmed talks about Ghost In the Shell and Akira adaptations, not to mention the long running development hell of the Neon Genesis Evangelion live action production. It's strange to say it, but with audiences now fixated on super-powered heroes and North American viewers primed by asian-influenced cinema such as The Matrix, anime live action adaptations almost seem inevitable at this point. Especially with the 80's being sold back to us, the science fiction of anime's golden age seems ripe for the picking.

Posted: Wed Oct 15, 2008 6:53 pm
by Liege-Killer
GamePlayer wrote:[...] with his own style of filmmaking thrown into the mix.
Speaking of Kubrick's filmmaking, a couple weeks ago I watched Dr. Strangeglove for the first time ever. Wow, wow, wow, brilliant!

Posted: Wed Oct 15, 2008 7:01 pm
by Omphalos
Actually, there is a bit more to it that that. Those kinds of effects were used quite a bit in films from that era to give it some counter-culture credibility. Certainly not a hoighty-toighty type appeal, but probably gave the more pretentious art-house fucks to make a "bad" = "cool" argument.

Personally I think that the best thing that could happen to the genre is if the movies give up on it. Blockbuster films tend to dumb down stories so that the lowest common denominator can "get it." This kind of thing has obvioulsy leeched into the literature, which is, has and always will be the most important part of the genre. What we need is a good house-cleanin'.

There is also a difference between SF and other genre work, especially westerns. Westerns look backwards too much. There have been some brilliant ones, like Unforgiven. But those are are few and far between. SF has some predictive ability, but more importantly it takes current problems and predicts outcomes and solutions. Not many other genres do that (and that is probably why the "spectulative" tag is so meaningful; because the genre work that is more likely to survive will do so because it has that certain social utility that romance, western, detectives and others do not).

Posted: Wed Oct 15, 2008 7:03 pm
by Robspierre
Freakzilla wrote:
Omphalos wrote:Forgot about this. Guess he's changed his mind, huh?
Sorry, but I thought 2001 sucked. It didn't make any sense until I read the book.
Drop acid and watch it.

Rob