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
ROGER RABBIT is still on their radar, what, 23 or so years later? I guess that’s possible – I always watch the original when I come across it on DirecTV. In re the NYT article on the failure of MNM: does anyone truly know at this stage whether it’s the motion-capture style that has turned audiences off? The article describes Zemeckis as being more interested in technology than storytelling, which doesn’t strike me as news. I had no interest in CHRISTMAS CAROL, but I liked a lot of BEOWULF, as it is a less-told tale.
I wish that this meant that Zemeckis would get around to directing THE CORRECTIONS like he was attatched to do a couple of years back…
I want Zemeckis to start directing live action again.
I am reminded of an oft repeated line by Jim Cramer on ‘Mad Money’. “Pigs get slaughtered”. And right now, Disney execs are being pigs.
It just sounded awful, period. Had it been live-action, cel animation or even marionettes, it wouldn’t have been any more appealing. And the title also sounds stupid– unless you’re familiar with the Berke Breathed original, which uses it in a slightly satirical manner (and of course there’s no mention of him in the marketing).
Just the stills of the aliens in MNM creeped me out.
ending Zemeckis’ weird mo-cap phase could be considered a mercy killing.
glad i had a chance to do my tour of duty at JBF when I did…it doesn’t seem anything like the place I knew and once loved…
The only issue I have with the article is the usual whining about Zemeckis being more interested in technology than storytelling. Boo-hoo. I wrote about this right after Speed Racer came out, but the same people who couldn’t or wouldn’t notice the genuinely engaging and complex anti-hero myth-making in Beowulf are the same sorts who couldn’t see past the fast cars and pretty colors in Speed Racer and were SHOCKED by how much actual story/character they discovered when watching The Matrix for a second time on DVD. I am constantly stunned by allegedly professional critics and film pundits who often can’t see the forest for the trees, seemingly blind to the narrative and character arcs in fx-filled entertainment and then just blowing it off as ’empty-headed non-stop action’.
As for A Christmas Carol, it’s a pretty faithful adaptation of the original novel, give-or-take some third-act frenetic action (with the first two acts that emphasize character and plot over razzle-dazzle), so what’s the complaint there exactly? That certain critics/pundits can’t see past their own issues with how motion-capture animation looks is their problem, not Zemeckis’s. His work was the real deal, genuinely groundbreaking technology that looked gorgeous and worked better as 3D better than anything else out there other than maybe Coraline. So Mars Needs Moms was a bad idea that didn’t sell (I confess to not yet seeing it due to family commitments). Doesn’t mean you ditch the technology (oh, Rescuers Down Under Flopped, lets burn all the CAPS machines we bought for it). That it’s getting kicked to the curb because it’s cheaper to just to a quickie post-conversion is a genuine tragedy.
For those who care – http://scottalanmendelson.blogspot.com/2008/05/wrong-about-beowulf-wrong-about-speed.html
You don’t kill a guaranted Cashcow Beatles Musical project over a completely unrelated flop.
People blaming mo-cap forget that it’s the only THE FIRST mo-cap film to ever seriously bomb. Zemeckis’ Polar Express for the jabs taken at it by online bozos was both a critical hit and a popular film. Disney didn’t ditch CG animation because of the Wild. Neither should they have ditched YS over Mars Needs Moms which had a billion things going against it.
Even if Tintin makes Zemeckis’ films look vastly dated by comparison… this was still a safe monetary investment, and much more so than Roger Rabbit 2.
It’ll be interesting to see Zemeckis’ next move… I doubt he’d be on safer ground if his name WASN’T associated with MNM though it certainly didn’t help.
This reminds me… he was once offered Tintin 3. With Jackson currently busy, it’d be funny if he actually ended up doing Tintin 2. Not that I’m actually advocating any of it.
To have bad word-of-mouth, people actually have to see the movie so they can spread the news of its badness, yet with ticket sales so low it looks like hardly anyone bothered to go. Why? Perhaps because it looked bad, period.
It wasn’t lousy storytelling or flimsy character arcs or lame jokes–the promotional ads just looked so awful that people didn’t even bother to give it a shot. And for me, it was the appearance of the aliens that would’ve motivated me to go anywhere else last weekend but into a theater showing this movie. It’s like someone took the “cute character” stereotype to its absurd extreme and made the aliens’ eyes so huge they occupy 2/3 of their head, because that’ll make them really cute, right?
Heck no.
People in the biz are already throwing out armfuls of excuses for why MNM failed and most of them ring hollow–I’m waiting for someone to argue that folks stayed home to watch tsunami coverage on CNN. Bad motion-capture might have played a part, but the whole design of the movie looks hideous to me. Sorry, Berke.
And Scott, I’m sure I’ve mentioned this to you before but I always said that Speed Racer was a terrific family film with everything to offer. The only fault I have with it that it runs a little long and becomes a bit repetative. But… what a ride.
I would have loved to see a sequel to that.
Removing any hint of Berkeley Breathed’s artwork makes about as much sense as doing it to a Dr. Seuss book. Anyone want to spend $150 million on photo-realistic Sneetches?
Makes me sad cuz I liked seeing Beowulf and Christmas Carol in theaters. But using the tech for Mars Needs Moms and Yellow Submarine are both bad ideas. I don’t see Yellow Submarine as a guarantee. Yellow Submarine was 43 years ago.
For what it’s worth, Speed Racer came out nearly three years ago. I (and others) have been trumpeting it ever since. And I have yet to find a single person that caught the film on DVD/Blu Ray or some kind of home format who didn’t think that it was at least a pretty solid piece of mainstream entertainment.
Does anyone who saw Mars Needs Moms feel like there’s any validity to this piece?
“It’s not often in this line of work that I get to write pieces that really matter, so I want to make the most of this. Mars Needs Moms isn’t just offensive to gays, it’s offensive to anyone who has a non-structuralist family. The overall message of the film is “Unless you’re raised by one Mom AND one Dad, then you’re wrong.” Single parent? Wrong. Living with other relatives? Wrong. The film even makes sure we know that Milo has a Dad, though he serves no purpose other than letting us know Milo is in a “proper family.” Hell, there’s even an inter-species romance between Gribble and Ke, because apparently that’s okay, as long as it’s not gay.”
http://www.somethingawful.com/d/current-movie-reviews/battle-los-angeles.php?page=2
Joshua – I think that review is an overreach. The point that the movie’s making there is that men and women need each other, and perfection can’t be attained by getting rid of one gender almost completely.
I think even gays have positive interactions with the other gender. Making it all about sex, in a kids movie that could never have dealt with sex anyway, is a massive extrapolation (it’s never even explained how babies could happen heterosexually if all males are discarded after birth). Like saying Disney is anti-gay because all their princess want handsome princes rather than other princesses.
I think Yellow Submarine would be the best use of Zemeckis’ 3-D CG work and the first I’d see in the theaters. I skipped Christmas Carol entirely because I’ve read the story, I’ve seen a dozen iterations, and I’m done with it. I half-watched Polar Express one night and it didn’t really do anything for me. But if they back off on the uncanny valley aspect (And I don’t see why they wouldn’t, considering making a realistic CG of John and George is an entirely new layer of creepy), I see no reason why Yellow Subamrine wouldn’t be a dazzling experience if done right. But yeah, I don’t care if it’s a hybrid like Roger Rabbit 2, but please, Zemeckis, get back into live action…..
Krillian: While I certainly don’t see YELLOW SUBMARINE as a guaranteed hit, the fact that the original came out 43 years ago seems irrelevant to me. The Beatles’ popularity is ongoing.
Purely offtopic but I have to comment on that quote on the left. Wow, Wim Menders totally missed the point on Inception.
And, I’m fine with having your own interpretation of the movie but to pretend your’s is a definitive and judge movie by it is just wrong.