If you could write a book or make a movie

[Goliath]

I would make an HBO miniseries about the Pankhurst family and the struggle for woman suffrage in early 20th-century Great Britain. That would be epic.

Failing that, I would make a biopic about Anton LaVey, founder of the Church of Satan--especially if I could film it in multiple, period-appropiate styles: B&W film noir for his early life, splashy psychedelic colour for the 60s, etc.

 

[Tom Hendricks]

I would make a movie about Alfred Loomis, Loomis emerges as "the last of the great amateurs," a gentleman scientist in the mold of Benjamin Franklin, with a quintessentially American interest in practical, rather than merely theoretical, work. Both patron and player, he turned his massive Tuxedo Park home into a kind of Yaddo for scientists, while also helping to develop a host of inventions, including the atom-smashing cyclotron. Once the Second World War began, he became a central figure, along with his friends Vannevar Bush and Ernest Lawrence, in the orchestration of American science's contribution to the war effort. Conant shows how Loomis, as the head of the M.I.T. Radiation Laboratory, dexterously governed "a scientific republic" of physicists who ended up making major contributions to anti-submarine warfare, radar, and the accuracy of night bombing. Her group portrait offers a healthy reminder of how much good science depends on community and collaboration, not solitary genius.

 

[Finn]

^ You may have to explain that a little more for foreign devils.

I don't even know all some of my fellow Americans mentioned so...

 

[Kirby]

Leonardo DaVinci - The original Mythbuster.

 

[Australis]

Okay, who's Joshua Chamberlain? And what does the lasr sentence mean?

 

[Goliath]

Okay, who's Joshua Chamberlain?

An officer in the US Army during the American Civil War, who distinguished himself at the Battle of Gettysburg. His story is featured prominently in the PBS miniseries The Civil War

And what does the lasr sentence mean?

I was wondering that myself.

 

[Miss Chicken]

One of the people I would like to make a movie about is Albert Goering, the brother of Hermann Goering.

Albert despised the Nazi regime. He would forge his brother's signature to help Jews escape. He would send trucks to concentration camps asking for labour and then have the Jews released in an isolated place. I think he deserves to be as well known as Oscar Schindler is.

 

[Australis]

^True. What happened to him? Did he survive the war? An the Allied control afterwards?

 

[Miss Chicken]

He was questioned by the Nuremberg Tribunal but was released when many people testified about his wartime activities.

Unfortunately the had a hard time making a living because of his family name. He finally received a government pension and just before his death he married his housekeeper so that she could claim his pension and not have to work any more. He died in 1966, without any real recognition for all he had done.

 

[Locutus of Bored]

^True. What happened to him? Did he survive the war? An the Allied control afterwards?

He survived. He was tried at Nuremburg, but the people he rescued testified on his behalf and he was freed. He was arrested in Czechoslovakia, but was again freed when they found out what he had done during the war. Then he was shunned in Germany because of his name, where he lived out the rest of his life with his good deeds largely unrecognized and in relative obscurity until he married his housekeeper before his death in 1966 so she could receive his pension benefits and never have to work again.

[edit] What Miss Chicken said.

 

[YellowSubmarine]

I'm currently trying to write four books, and all of them are about myself.

I don't see myself writing about real events, and thus about real people, so I'll write about fictional characters. And those fictional characters would essentially be me, because I can't write actions or dialogue that don't exist inside me in some manner. I might try to copy some people, but it will still be me. And I copy mainly Star Trek characters.

Not many real people I care about, but I might write something about Varg Vikernes.

 

[Nachtkommen]

Vince Shlomi. (ShamWow guy.)

Straight-to-DVD movie.

 

[Australis]

I'm currently trying to write four books, and all of them are about myself.

I don't see myself writing about real events, and thus about real people, so I'll write about fictional characters. And those fictional characters would essentially be me, because I can't write actions or dialogue that don't exist inside me in some manner. I might try to copy some people, but it will still be me. And I copy mainly Star Trek characters.

Not many real people I care about, but I might write something about Varg Vikernes.

Modest chap aren't you?

He was questioned by the Nuremberg Tribunal but was released when many people testified about his wartime activities.

Unfortunately the had a hard time making a living because of his family name. He finally received a government pension and just before his death he married his housekeeper so that she could claim his pension and not have to work any more. He died in 1966, without any real recognition for all he had done.

He survived. He was tried at Nuremburg, but the people he rescued testified on his behalf and he was freed. He was arrested in Czechoslovakia, but was again freed when they found out what he had done during the war. Then he was shunned in Germany because of his name, where he lived out the rest of his life with his good deeds largely unrecognized and in relative obscurity until he married his housekeeper before his death in 1966 so she could receive his pension benefits and never have to work again.

[edit] What Miss Chicken said.

Well, the outline of the story would be: It begins with a death, the death of an old man. Someone asks who he is, and his wife tells him a little. At first there's revulsion at the name, but who he really was is drawn out, why they married - doesn't sound like a monster. Then come interviews with the people he saved. And finally someone who was present when the brothers split. The last scenes in the story inform all that's gone before - it's a bit of a mystery until we get to that, but it's all resolved. Now that's a story!

It's the classic Citizen Kane approach, and it works. Ghandi is another example.

Anyone wants to write it up, I don't want any money, just a share on the story credit.

 

[Goliath]

Well, the outline of the story would be: It begins with a death, the death of an old man. Someone asks who he is, and his wife tells him a little. At first there's revulsion at the name, but who he really was is drawn out, why they married - doesn't sound like a monster. Then come interviews with the people he saved. And finally someone who was present when the brothers split. The last scenes in the story inform all that's gone before - it's a bit of a mystery until we get to that, but it's all resolved. Now that's a story!

That does sound good. I'd see it.

While we're on the subject of the Third Reich, I have one more suggestion: a fictionalized version of Christopher Browning's Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland.

Browning's book is essentially a study in the psychology of mass murder. He studies this police unit and its involvement both in shooting massacres, and in rounding up Jews for the death camps, and asks: why did they do it? What motivated them to kill? His answers are pretty surprising, in many ways.

Obviously, this would be a very controversial topic, and would require both skillful and sensitive handling. But I think it could be done--especially since Browning based his research on the documents generated by a postwar investigation by the West German government.

So: the story's main characters would be the investigators, rather than the killers. It would start with the former police being brought in for questioning, and show what happened in flashbacks--including Rashomon-style contradictions, to illustrate the lies and evasions in many of the men's testimonies.

As you say: it's the classic Citizen Kane approach. And it works.

 

[Lonemagpie]

Ooh, I'd have to second the Albert Goering one - sounds fascinating, and even I'd never heard of him.

 

[Australis]

Hey, here's another guy who could have a good biopic or miniseries:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talleyrand

It seems that if he was alive today he'd be Hugh Hefner and Henry Kissinger combined! And maybe it could be a comic interpretation of his life.

 

[Goliath]

Oh, yeah, Talleyrand, definitely.

 

[Finn]

Okay, who's Joshua Chamberlain? And what does the lasr sentence mean?

American Civil War General. Why are you singling me out, when there were others before me who didn't explain who they were mentioning. I don't know some of them either.

 

[scotpens]

Hey, here's another guy who could have a good biopic or miniseries:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talleyrand

It seems that if he was alive today he'd be Hugh Hefner and Henry Kissinger combined!

Now, those are two names I never thought I'd hear mentioned in the same sentence!

 

[Rii]

Given that others are explaining their ideas more thoroughly ...

In my film about Emma Goldman, its narrative axis would be formed around the evolution of her attitude towards violence as a means of bringing about social change; from the McKinley assassination to her experiences in the Soviet Union through to Spain and the rise of fascism in Europe. The film would attempt to maintain a dialectical tension between the audience and the protagonist throughout this evolution, such that the overall effect is to leave the audience uneasy regardless of their politics.

Contrasting with the film's ambiguity wrt her politics would be its emphasis on her personal trials, with particular attention paid to her social isolation - both self-imposed and otherwise - even from those whom one would've imagined as friends and allies: feminists, other anarchists, etc. The film would conclude with the implied sentiment that Emma Goldman was one of God's children, a beautiful, flawed flower that bent further against the wind than most.