Nor are mine. One that I don't have is the concern that Abrams and company "justify their decisions" as regards to the movie. If I watch it and I like it, that's all I care about.
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Retro Look Good Enough for Another Sci Fi Remake
- Thread starter Basil
- Start date
Nor are mine. One that I don't have is the concern that Abrams and company "justify their decisions" as regards to the movie. If I watch it and I like it, that's all I care about.
So you don't care if they justify.
If I watch it and I like it, they've justified all they need to.
But you are hoping they justify.
So you don't care if they justify.
If I watch it and I like it, they've justified all they need to.
But you are hoping they justify.
No, I'm just hoping to have a good time at the movies. We're clearly just playing rhetorical games here, so I'll go back and edit the misleading language:
"If I watch it and I like it, that's all I care about."
So you don't care if they justify.
If I watch it and I like it, they've justified all they need to.
But you are hoping they justify.
No, I'm just hoping to have a good time at the movies. We're clearly just playing rhetorical games here, so I'll go back and edit the misleading language:
"If I watch it and I like it, that's all I care about."
Yeah, I couldn't tell if you were agreeing with me or disagreeing with me, since you were essentially saying the same thing I was, but in a way that had a contradictory tone.
Keep in mind that
1) This FP remake could suck giant retro balls.
2) FP doesn't have a terrible reputation it's trying to salvage, unlike, say Star Trek or the Batman movie franchise (there's that overused analogy again, sorry)
3) Abrams is clearly keeping some of the 60's stuff: Uhura's big earings, bright colors, hairdo's, skirts, etc. He's just not doing a straight out of the 60's look, and I doubt FP will either. Oh, it may be retro, but it'll not actually be the same, just as STXI is not.
4) We're getting what we're getting. There's nothing that can be changed now, it's a finished film sitting on a shelf at this point.
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Actually, the ponderous, deliberate and overly formal style that jms brought to stuff like B5 might be a very good match for any sequel that intends to capture the feeling of the original "Forbidden Planet." I'm a huge FP fan and I'm not a jms fan but I'm pretty encouraged by the notion of him writing this one.
BTW, jms himself has posted that the article we're discussing is not accurate and that the film will not be "retro" after all. I'm somewhat disappointed.
Syd Mead did some design drawings for elements of an FP remake a few years ago.
BTW, jms himself has posted that the article we're discussing is not accurate and that the film will not be "retro" after all. I'm somewhat disappointed.
Syd Mead did some design drawings for elements of an FP remake a few years ago.
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The damn thing aired on the PTEN network and was watched by so few people that it was on the verge of getting cancelled every season. I'd hardly call Babylon 5 a major success in terms of the accumulation of power in Hollywood.
Again, when it comes to the accumulation of power in Hollywood, his successes in animation, novels, and comics are irrelevant. They're not irrelevant in terms of creative success -- he's a great writer and very accomplished. But the only thing on the list that matters in terms of gaining power in Hollywood is that last bit -- mainstream Hollywood success. It's projects like Changeling that yield power in Hollywood, not Babylon 5. And as much as I like Babylon 5, Lost, Felicity, and Alias were many times more successful in Hollywood terms than anything JMS has done up until Changeling. (And how they got there is irrelevant, too. Again, I'm trying to quantify power, not deservingness or quality.)
Again, that's not to say that JMS can't become a powerhouse. But when you compare JMS's mainstream successes -- which basically boil down to Murder, She Wrote and Changeling -- to JJ's -- which include Armageddon, Felicity, Alias, Lost, and Cloverfield -- I don't think there's any real comparison.
To put it another way: JMS, in terms of the accumulation of Hollywood power, is up and coming, whilst Abrams is already fairly well established and possibly getting more powerful (depending on how well Fringe and Star Trek do).
There are any number of possibilities. Are JMS and Abrams aiming for the same audience demographics? Are they aiming for the same audience numbers? What are their creative goals?
I think you're perceiving a false conflict here. You might as well demand to know why anyone would follow Brecht's Epic Theatre mode when the Realism/Naturalism of the Stanislavsky Method is being chosen by other playwrights and directors.
This is like asking, "If the original sixties look was good enough for Frank Sinatra, why not make George Clooney's Ocean's Eleven look exactly like it?"
Because George Clooney is NOT Frank Sinatra. The wannabe will never be as timeless as the original.
In your scenario, Trek has always been the wannabe. It needs the update. Forbidden Planet don't, and never will.
Star Trek doesn't need an update. It just needs to be good again. (And when I say "good," I mean considered good by enough people for the franchise to remain viable.)
If it gets an update along the way, so be it, but it is certainly not necessary.
As an oversimplification, we have roughly four options:
A: Retro look, bad movie.
B: Retro look, good movie.
C: Updated look, bad movie
D: Updated look, good movie.
Both B and D (in bold) are acceptable. And if the movie is good, we won't care so much about the changes.
The changes only become intolerable if the movie is bad.
If it gets an update along the way, so be it, but it is certainly not necessary.
As an oversimplification, we have roughly four options:
A: Retro look, bad movie.
B: Retro look, good movie.
C: Updated look, bad movie
D: Updated look, good movie.
Both B and D (in bold) are acceptable. And if the movie is good, we won't care so much about the changes.
The changes only become intolerable if the movie is bad.
Damn you and your lawyer's fancy words and big city attorney logic!!!
I'm not sure that this is a viable option, commercially, on the scale that the studio wants this film to succeed. In the last few decades period films have sometimes been successful, though very very rarely have they been megahits ("Titanic" being the obvious exception) and "period sf" is doubly problematic IMAO.
Exactly so. Straczynski is most certainly not the "Hollywood powerhouse" that Abrams is. Nowhere near.
trevanian
Rear Admiral
So for you this is style over content? Because Sinatra might have style, but Clooney totally clobbers him in acting.
I think it would be cool if the Krell essentially became the Talosians.
Altair didn't blow, that was just a telepathic hoax.
FP II is essentially a remake of The Cage.
This goes on to become Star Trek, but not Star Trek. Like Shazaam and Superman... Two franchises competing in the same arena with the same backstory and the same premise. Both going for a mix of intelligent psychological exploration and space opera action adventure.
In my dreams...
Altair didn't blow, that was just a telepathic hoax.
FP II is essentially a remake of The Cage.
This goes on to become Star Trek, but not Star Trek. Like Shazaam and Superman... Two franchises competing in the same arena with the same backstory and the same premise. Both going for a mix of intelligent psychological exploration and space opera action adventure.
In my dreams...
ST-One
Vice Admiral
'The Cage' is almost a remake of Forbidden Planet.
Maybe this will be the changeling. just as DS9 'stole' Babylon 5, now JMS is out to 'steal' Star Trek. I hope he does
number6
Vice Admiral
I hope he doesn't.
Babylon 5 was awful.
He shouldn't be allowed anywhere near Forbidden Planet.
It won't be Babylon five, it'll be a new Star Trek.
Star Trek is not supposed to be linked to any one era. It needs to always feel au courant so that it can continue to be extended with movies and TV series.
Forbidden Planet can be a nostalgia-fest because it isn't expected to be anything more than one movie. It's not a franchise.
Star Trek needs to be taken seriously by modern audiences to be continuously viable. Forbidden Planet can just be an ancient artifact and still make enough money for a single movie.
Also, we don't yet know if the retro look will get Forbidden Planet laughed off the screen. I think it should do okay, the "old-movie-look" gimmick has been used several times in movies, like that one with George Clooney and Cait Blanchett made to look like a Warner's Brothers' WWII era movie.
Forbidden Planet can be a nostalgia-fest because it isn't expected to be anything more than one movie. It's not a franchise.
Star Trek needs to be taken seriously by modern audiences to be continuously viable. Forbidden Planet can just be an ancient artifact and still make enough money for a single movie.
Also, we don't yet know if the retro look will get Forbidden Planet laughed off the screen. I think it should do okay, the "old-movie-look" gimmick has been used several times in movies, like that one with George Clooney and Cait Blanchett made to look like a Warner's Brothers' WWII era movie.
