May 3, 2024
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It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?
So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.
And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.
There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.
I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.
So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.
But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”
My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher
“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.
~ David Simon
So the question remains: How is “Superman” going to do the same thing? I’m not exactly watching Nickelodeon (or “The View,” mind you), so there may be something I’m missing – but I haven’t seen a single bit of “SR” advertising that would make kids flock to it.
By the way, off-topic, but “World Trade Center” has been given a PG-13 rating – meaning its Oliver Stone’s first non-R-rated film.
haven’t seen it, but good analogy of how disney knows how to work different demos.
My roommate is in his late 20’s and he can’t wait to see it. My sister is in her teens and she can’t wait to see it. My girlfriend’s parents can’t wait to see it. it’s going to be a big one.
Im anticipating pirates 2 very much, i loved the first one.
Something tells me david is going to love the movie no matter what, i just get this vibe, he seems to be putting down SR and promoting pirates 2, but maybe disney pad him, hey i would do the same thing in my blog.
I remember David had the first POTC on his top ten list for 2003 so yeah, maybe he is predisposed to like the sequels. I don’t watch The View but Disney can’t be topped when it comes to marketing to families.
The deck was stacked that way to begin with. Superman’s 17 years of botched development and over $300 m in expenses is something that deserves skepticism. While Fox and Disney both are secure in their knowledge that X3 and Pirates are sure things (Disney has another sequel in the wings). WB has a harder climb…just as they did for Batman Begins.
I think the real question is…why was Poland watching The View?
So we don’t have to. Brave man.
People are going for this movie to watch Depp do Sparrow.
Just like we did back in the day for Ford with Jones.
There’s not many matchups like that in movie’s anymore. A great performance from an iconic actor for an iconic character.
I think it is that undescribable meta quality that has the general public clamoring for Pirates over Supes.
Disney has to advertise that the movie isn’t scary, even after the first one? If I were airing on The View, I’d just have a bunch of slow motion shots of Bloom & Depp looking MANLY, with quick shots of Knightly looking cute.
…
That was exactly what the spot was, wasn’t it? =)
I watch The View – almost never past the opening two segments – to hear those four or five female points of view on whatever is happening in the culture. Same reason I sometimes watch asshole Bill O’Reilly or listen to crazy Randi Rhodes on Air America and love Jack Cafferty on CNN. I want to hear all the sides.
Sometimes it stregnthens my personal take… sometimes it weakens it. But as you should gather from being in here, I feel the need to be challenged. Complacency is intellectual death.
I can’t convince you if you choose not to believe it, but I would have been much happier loving Superman Returns (and Poseidon and M:I3 and Da Vinci Code), all of which I had differing positions on about marketing and expectations. I was waiting to see X3 blow up in Tom Rothman’s face… and it didn’t. Didn’t want it to, but expected it to.
I know it is easier to imagine me reacting to Wells or being paid off by Disney (they didn’t have enough money to get me on board Shopgirl as an Oscar movie last year… and they were buying ads at the time). But my reaction is my reaction. And in the case of SR, I have read every rave review looking for some reason to liek the movie more… and that insight has not been offered.
And you know, if Pirates sucks… I will say it sucks. Yes, I very much enjoyed the original. And I was there on opening night for Superman and Superman II and even Superman III and bought every issue of Cinefantastique with Superman on the cover, etc, etc. And I liked both of Singer’s X-Men movies. And I was one of the few who raved about Apt Pupil, which I still think is very underrated.
And so it goes…
“Smartly and subtly”? That move is Corporate Synergy pure and simple. “The View” airs on ABC, which is owned by the Walt Disney Co.
Then again ABC won’t carry the USA-Ghana match in the World Cup tomorrow (you’ll have to see it on ESPN or Univision). USA and Italy must win their matches for USA to advance to the second round.
Thanks for the perfect comparison, THX5334. While I didn’t love the first POTC, I did enjoy it. I believe that Depp created a great character in Sparrow though, one most folks still think of fondly, and he did it without the sort of easy-to-quote catchphrase that most modern ‘hit characters’ (Austin Powers with “Yeeaaah baby” and Napolean Dynamite with “Sweeeet” for example) seem to be saddled with (and which, in turn, immediately stamps them with an expiration date with which the public will tolerate them and their inumerable impersonators). I’m looking forward to the new POTC less for the Davey Jones storyline than I am the chance to see Depp fill the screen with this unique, goofy gift.
I know it’s not a catch-phrase like the others, Ju-osh, but I want to note that my friends have been saying “But why is the rum gone?!?” since the first Pirates. I suspect it has lasted for two reasons: 1. It wasn’t a deliberate attempt at a marketable phrase, and 2. We go through a lot of rum.
Yeah, the “why the rum?” line is classic. It’s the first thing that popped to my mind when reading Ju-osh’s post. I occasionally say it when something just doesn’t make sense. A few people I’ve said it to have gotten it right away…
Pirates is going to be HUGE. I’m looking forward to SR more, but ya, everyone and their dog is looking forward to Pirates it seems.
Three years ago Disney ran the POTC trailer heavily on ESPN. There’s been nothing like that this time out, at least so far. Probably it’s because they don’t have to.
The SR ad that I’ve seen doesn’t do anything for me. It seems to be all over the place. David says they’re trying to appeal to boys and to girls separately. This commercial doesn’t seem to be appealing to anyone. Not good.
Dead Man’s Chest is far too gruesome to be characterized a “Disney” movie. If it’s the studio’s intention to play up the Disney-ness of the film it might come back and bite them in the ass when mothers see the film.
The first Pirates of the Caribbean was the first *ever* Disney movie with a PG-13 rating. Not sure, but this could be the second. I think that the skeletons in the first movie could have been deemed scary, but I think kids really loved it. On the other hand, my nephew was terrified of the crocodile in the trailer for the PG “Peter Pan”… you’d be surprised what scares kids and what doesn’t.
EDouglas beat me to it. The first Pirates film got a lot of press for slapping the Walt Disney logo on a PG-13 film for the first time. This is merely history repeating.
I mean, it just doesn’t make sense to make it Touchstone when this is based on the Walt DIsney theme park ride. Not quite sure why they couldn’t gotten away with a PG for this… there’s a lot worse things in the PG-13 Click than anything in the first Pirates movie, including swearing (lots of sh*ts and the ubiquitous one f*ck), lots of sex jokes and drug references… and you just know that it’ll get more parents with kids than previous movies cause of the way it’s being marketed.
Yes, Curse of the Black Pearl was the first ever Disney branded PG-13 movie. Dead Man’s Chest ups the ante: more gore, more creepy crawlies, sexual inuendo, adult content.
In other words, everything audiences loved in the first movie – plus more!
Sounds good to me.
Yes, very good. Very, VERY good.
Not to bring up an old thread, but could Dean Man’s Chest be the first movie since Temple of Doom to truly understand what scares kids? Skeletons have always been considered cool by kids. Poltergeist, Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark (I hate the new title), Nightmare Beofre Christmas, and Corpse Bride can attest to the appeal of skeletons.
EDouglas is right to mention that the croc from Peter Pan was more frighening. It’s jst one of those things.
Is it me, or did Poland sound a little testy when responding to Marty’s joke post. I seriously believe Marty was just busting Poland’s balls, and not really questioning his ethics. We all pretty much know Poland doesn’t work that way. He can be contrdictory and frustrating at times, but he’s hardly on the take like other “Net critics.
Lighten up, Francis.
EW’s review of SR sounds like what most people are going to think of the movie. In a nutshell, Gleiberman says that the glut F/X movies have, in a way, taken away from the possibilty of being surprised. It’s no longer a question that we’ll believe a man can fly. Now, we take it for granted that men can fly. Will there be a again time when we won’t believe our eyes?
“I’d just have a bunch of slow motion shots of Bloom & Depp looking MANLY”
1. Bloom can never look manly
2. Depp’s character is overtly fey, I don’t think manly is what they’re (or, i should say, Depp himself) is going for.
The rum quote is exactly what I thought about too when discussing the quotes. As someone mentioned, it wasn’t a deliberate QUOTE THIS moment, it was just a bit of inspired dialogue that caught on.
Most people I know are excited about POTC too. Superman sort of seems to just be there. Although me and my friends are going to see it because coke currently have a promotion where if you take three bottle labels to the box-office you get a ticket for $5 (compared to $11 for students/conc, $13 adult) and I’m addicted to coca-cola so I have a whole lot of labels that means a whole of lot of us can get in for cheap and that’s always good.
BTW, I know nobody will be interested, but the Australian box-office this year up by $48.4mil compared to this time last year. That’s a whole lotta cash. Seven films have already made over $10mil (aquivilent to $100mil in the US) compared to 4 at this time in 2005. And it’s not all big fx movies, stuff like Brokeback Mountain and Capote is being credited as boosting the fringes too. So… yay!
Moving on.
Is it true that DMC is 150 minutes plus long? Well, at least I’ll get my money’s worth. I can just hear all the bitching now about HOW LONG it is!
The first one was twenty minutes too long. I was hoping they’d run a tighter ship (har, har) this time.
Dead Man’s Chest does run 2 hours 30 minutes, but it doesn’t drag at all. If anything it feels like some scenes were taken out.
But as Ebert says, “No good film is too long and no bad film is short enough.”
The original was over 2 hours too so it would make sense (and obviously doesn’t effect grosses).
But Blackcloud was right, the first one needed a bit of tightening and it would’ve been flirting with A- territory instead of B+ (in my books anyway). But that was 2003 and outside of 5 movies there weren’t many movies to L-O-V-E
“No good film is too long and no bad film is short enough.”
I dunno. The really sick part of me to this day still craves the long version of Quest for Peace.
I remember reading the comic adaptation and there was a really long disco sequence where Nuclear Man freaks out on a bunch of dancers.
I would like to see it…someday.
I was one of those who was very happy that POTC was on the long side. Some might call it flab, I called it added awesomeness.
Hey KCamel, are any of this year’s successful movies in Australia home-grown?
I think it goes like this:
“You are the worst pirate I have ever heard of”
“But you have heard of me”
Whoever wrote about the link between Depp and Jack Sparrow has hit it right on the head. EVERYONE likes Jack Sparrow — young, old, male, female, gay, straight. POTC has a sens of style that most summer popcorn movies lack. It will be huge.
For me, the only part of Pirates 1 that felt long was the extended scene with Sparrow and Elizabeth left on the deserted island. On it’s own, it was completely irrelavent to the plot and characters. Even upon first viewing, it was apparent that the scene existed only to give Depp and the Knightly at least one or two scenes by themselves together, as if that was needed at all in terms of story.
Ironically, the pay off for this scene wasn’t even kept in the film. One of the deleted scenes involves after they’ve been rescued, where Sparrow implies that Elizabeth will now have blood on her hands because she didn’t tell the british navy about the curse (ie – she willingly sacrificed all the soldiers so that Will could have a chance to be rescued). It was a nice dark scene that should have stayed and would have justified the scenes before it.
Scott Mendelson
There’s a bit of a payoff in Dead Man’s Chest. Their relationship is expanded and their time on the island together, while not explicitly indicated, is clearly a precedent to their arc.
Jeff, there haven’t been that many Aussie releases so far this year, but the biggest have been Kokoda (WW2 film) and Candy (Heath Ledger, Abbie Cornish and Geoffrey Rush taking lots of drugs). Australian films don’t usually break out into the upper stratosphere unless they’re zeitgeist films. The new film from Ray Lawrence is out soon and that will hopefully be BIG (Lantana was huge) plus Happy Feet later in the year and a bunch of smaller titles.
So far for 2006 these are the highest grossing movies in Australia.
1. Ice Age: The Meltdown
2. The Da Vinci Code
3. X Men: The Last Stand
4. Walk the Line
5. Chicken Little
6. MI3
7. Memoirs of a Geisha
8. Brokeback Mountain
9. Cars
10. Scary movie 4
(11. Nanny McPhee)
The first Pirates felt too long because of the fifteen or twenty minutes that exist after they had finished off Barbosa. With the main villain defeated, we have to sit through yet another escape-from-the-military scene? It’s a structural error.