Rendezvous With Rama

[RJDiogenes]

^^ I love the sense of wonder. Visiting something like Rama would be amazing.

Motion Picture workers, and actors unions. (I'd include the Writer's unions, but their leadership is incompotent and the 'Hollywood Machine' just rolls over them).

Well, plenty of independent films get made, so this can't be insurmountable. I have no problem with Unions making sure everybody gets a fair shake, but when it makes a movie cost a hundred times more than it should, it impacts everybody negatively.

I'm surprised you care for the Rama sequels, honestly. I thought they were dreadful. In fact, they're the only Clarke novels I've actually taken to the used book store after finishing them. Too much melodrama for a series that is ostensibly about exploring Rama, and they're far too drawn out. I'll just stick to the original.

Well, "caring for them" is overstating it. As I said, compared to epic fails like the Killer B Foundation books or nuTrek, they don't look so bad. The character of Nicole des Jardins is terrific, and I love all the alien species. A lot of the melodrama and some of the alien stuff, like the Birdman, is goofy. I certainly would have prefered that Clarke wrote a couple of sequels himself.

Incidentally, for a more realistic Rama sequel, click here (scroll to page 135-- apparently individual pages can't be linked).

I love the clip, but it's five minutes with a little dialogue from the Clarke novel, a nonprofessional actor or two, and some visual effects that aren't up to feature or television standards. Is it really that surprising that these things are so expensive? A film like Moon is a financial miracle at $5 million dollars, and any Rama film would be several orders of magnitude more complex and expensive than that.

Well, if Moon can do it, anyone can. I mean, a quarter of a billion dollars to poop out nuTrek? Gimme a break.

 

[Hitman]

A Vancouver Film School student made a 3:47 length video showing
feature some key moments from the novel
http://vimeo.com/9739256

Someone give that guy 100 million, and we have ourselves a proper adaptation of the novel.

 

[RAMA]

I love the clip, but it's five minutes with a little dialogue from the Clarke novel, a nonprofessional actor or two, and some visual effects that aren't up to feature or television standards. Is it really that surprising that these things are so expensive? A film like Moon is a financial miracle at $5 million dollars, and any Rama film would be several orders of magnitude more complex and expensive than that.

Let's be fair, its really a trailer, and doesn't need a lot of dialogue..as for the CGI, it may not quite be movie level, but its oh so close...superior to a lot of movies, tv shows in the 1990s.

A Vancouver Film School student made a 3:47 length video showing
feature some key moments from the novel
http://vimeo.com/9739256

Someone give that guy 100 million, and we have ourselves a proper adaptation of the novel.

Let's not forget...a good writer too.

RAMA

 

[jefferiestubes8]

as for the CGI, it may not quite be movie level, but its oh so close...superior to a lot of movies, tv shows in the 1990s.

Which is why the next Trek TV series CGI visual effects and space battles will be better than even these Trek CGI space shots and CG ship models
Star Trek: First Contact (1996)
Star Trek: Insurrection (1998)
Star Trek: Nemesis (2002)
Hell look at what "Star Wars: The Clone Wars" (2008) (TV series) can do these days for television.
Our expectations since ENT for TV series visual FX have only risen.

 

[RJDiogenes]

^^ Only because kids today can't tell the difference between "good" and "photorealistic."

I love the clip, but it's five minutes with a little dialogue from the Clarke novel, a nonprofessional actor or two, and some visual effects that aren't up to feature or television standards. Is it really that surprising that these things are so expensive? A film like Moon is a financial miracle at $5 million dollars, and any Rama film would be several orders of magnitude more complex and expensive than that.

Let's be fair, its really a trailer, and doesn't need a lot of dialogue..as for the CGI, it may not quite be movie level, but its oh so close...superior to a lot of movies, tv shows in the 1990s.

Misquote. I didn't say that.

 

[Harvey]

Well, if Moon can do it, anyone can. I mean, a quarter of a billion dollars to poop out nuTrek? Gimme a break.

$150 million dollars actually. About twice as expensive as Star Trek: Nemesis ($71 million adjusted for inflation) and, whether you like the film or not, it shows on screen. A RAMA film would need to be of equivalent scale, I think.

To restate, I bring up Moon because, while it looks great for the money spent, it also uses CGI very sparingly, is essentially a one actor show, and mostly takes place on one small set. A RAMA movie couldn't succeed on such a small scale. At least not on my mind.

Let's be fair, its really a trailer, and doesn't need a lot of dialogue..as for the CGI, it may not quite be movie level, but its oh so close...superior to a lot of movies, tv shows in the 1990s.

Oh, I'm not saying it needs any of those things. But a feature film would, and would therefore be much more expensive.

 

[RJDiogenes]

Hmm, I could have sworn I read that they increased the budget to over $200 million. Well, whatever. It all looked pretty generic to me. In any case, I still don't think stuff needs to cost so much-- Hollywood and Big Pharma have a lot in common in that respect.

 

[Christopher]

^IMDb gives Star Trek's budget as $140 million.

 

[xortex]

O.K., who stole the ten million that was lying around here?

 

[RJDiogenes]

^IMDb gives Star Trek's budget as $140 million.

Yeah, Wiki, too. I don't know why I thought that.

 

[T J]

Sorry to bring this tread back again but against warning I jumped into RAMA II and thought I'd share some thoughts.

Boy does this book kinda suck! I'm several chapters in... took FOREVER to get to the ship and the characters, I can't bring myself to care about them. It's interesting when they're in the ship doing things but other than that, eh.

This book certainly is a different animal from the first, hoping it will pick up. I was really hoping for something on par with Clarks first book.

 

[xortex]

O.K., who stole the ten million that was lying around here?

Do we have to wonder why other countries hate us?