A despondent Andrew Stanton finally has something to do with himself besides moping around the Disney•Pixar offices, telling anyone who will listen, "Sure, it had its issues, but come on, John Carter had some pretty cool stuff. Did you see not those space apes?"
One of the biggest issues against the marketing team behind Disney's John Carter is that, while trailers and TV spots have shown off the film's many layers of CGI aliens, audiences are still pretty confused as to who exactly this John Carter guy is. This ten-minute opening from the movie should hopefully clear some of that up. He is a crazy old prospector, and he growlingly demands a tribute of beans:
"Who is that?" So villain Mark Strong asks in the opening line of the latest trailer for John Carter, thus echoing the sentiment of pretty much every non-sci-fi-nerd who is not John Carter. The film opens in less than two weeks and, according to recent tracking, awareness and interest for the film is dismally low for a $250+ budgeted film. Confirming those tracking numbers, last night, following a John Carter TV spot, I was drawn into this brief conversation:
Back when we first learned that the title of John Carter of Mars was being shorted to John Carter, to many it seemed a strange decision. After all, a guy named John Carter who is of Mars is obviously a lot more intriguing than a guy who is just named John Carter and could be of anywhere. That's just a dude named John Carter. Plus, there are all those "JCM" posters that don't really make sense anymore, so what's the deal?
Speaking in London last month, director Andrew Stanton at last revealed the name change reasoning, which has since been relayed by BleedingCool. As it turns out, Stanton would have loved to call the film Princess of Mars (from Edgar Rice Burroughs' first book of the John Carte series) or John Carter of Mars, but the thing is, boys hate royalty and girls hate the solar system, so:
Here's the real truth of it. I'd already changed it from A Princess Of Mars to John Carter Of Mars. I don't like to get fixated on it, but I changed Princess Of Mars... because not a single boy would go.And then the other truth is, no girl would go to see John Carter Of Mars. So I said, "I don't want to do anything out of fear, I hate doing things out of fear, but I can't ignore that truth."
All the time we were making this big character story which just so happens to be in this big, spectacular new environment. But it's not about the spectacle, it's about the investment. I thought, I've really worked hard to make all of this an origin story. It's about a guy becoming John Carter. So I'm not misrepresenting what this movie is, it's John Carter.
Mars is going to stick on any other film in the series. But by then, it won't have a stigma to it.
So there you have it. Can't refute the combined logic of test groups, Fred Savage's A Princess Bride character, and the fact that your college astronomy club only had the one girl everyone dated.
(via!)
Costing a small fortune and marking the live-action debut of WALL-E/Finding Nemo director Andrew Stanton, John Carter has some big expectations to live up to. The expectation that it won't be a horrible, critical and commercial failure, for example. Unfortunately, this second trailer for the film doesn't do a lot to reassure those of us concerned that John Carter might be composed entirely of CGI bug-men and a jumping, shirtless guy who occasionally tosses in a pithy line. The just-released preview has been hosed down with a smothering dose of computer-generated fighting and some distractingly familiar classic rock, yet still, the lingering stench of Star Wars Prequel continues to creep into my nostrils. Is anyone else smelling this?
We've got X-Men Origins: Wolverine co-star Taylor Kitsch all decked out in his He-Man costume, X-Men Origins: Wolverine co-star Lynn Collins playing the relatively empowered but sexy lady you'd firmly expect Olivia Wilde to play, Willem Dafoe providing voice-over, and Peter Gabriel covering "My Body Is a Cage"--finally proving to Davids Byrne and Bowie that, come on, he's an Arcade Fire fan too, guys. Put them together: Hey, it's the first trailer for Pixar director Andrew Stanton's live-action debut, John Carter!
Samantha Morton (Synecdoche, New York), Polly Walker (Rome), Dominic West (McNulty!) have signed on to Andrew Stanton's adaptation of John Carter of Mars:
Taylor Kitsch, Lynn Collins and Willem Dafoe already are on board the production, which centers on a Civil War veteran (Kitsch) who finds himself mysteriously transported to Mars, where he becomes embroiled with the planet's warring people.Morton plays Sola, the daughter of Dafoe's Tars Tarkas, who must hide her softer side from her warmongering race.
West plays Sab Than, prince of the Zodangans who believes he is entitled to rule Mars.
Walker plays Sarkoja, a merciless, tyrannical Thark.
I'm pretty excited to see basically anything the director of Finding Nemo and WALL-E is working on, but as someone unfamiliar with the property, let me tell ya, all of these character and plot descriptions sound like the insane ramblings of Vinz Clortho, Keymaster of Gozer:
I have only a dim impression that John Carter of Mars is some kind of space Conan (note: this vague perception is formed almost entirely from the above image), but I am beginning to care more and more about this upcoming film adaptation as I learn more about it. Look who's just joined the crew: someone respectable! From The Amazing Website of Kavalier and Clay:
In yesterday’s item by Deadline Hollywood Daily about Michael Chabon switching agents, it mentioned that he was attached to write a script for Disney’s John Carter of Mars. Having never heard that before, I checked in with Chabon to see if it was accurate. The answer is yes.“I’ve been hired to do some revisions to an already strong script by Andrew Stanton and Mark Andrews,” Chabon said. “I wrote my original screenplay The Martian Agent back in 1995 because I wished I could do [Edgar Rice] Burroughs’s Barsoom. So this is pretty much a dream come true for me.”
Disney got the option rights to Burrough’s 11-volume series in 2007 after the rights lapsed at Paramount Pictures. Andrew Stanton, the writer and director of Finding Nemo and WALL-E, is set to direct. It’s expected to hit theaters in 2012.
Michael Chabon and WALL-E director Andrew Stanton: the most promising popular author/director collaboration since it was announced Dave Eggers was working with Spike Jonze on Where the Wild Things Are? Yes, clearly. I don't even know what the other choices would be.
(via AICN)
WALL-E writer/director Andrew Stanton's next project is set to be John Carter of Mars, a CGI/live-action adaptation of the story of a Civil War veteran's adventures on Earth's most enemy planet: Mars. He recently spoke to MTV about the film, divulging some scoopz (they aren't huge scoopz):
“It’s real,” Stanton assured us. “We’re full bore on it right now. We’re over the hump of the writing phase, and we’re certainly far from rewrites.”“The key was putting a story into it and creating characters that had to grow and real basic stuff that we all know a movie needs,” he explained.
Messing with a classic of the fantasy genre is always risky, but Stanton believes the passage of time is on his side. “Fortunately it’s an old enough story,” he said. “There isn’t such huge allegiance to it that people won’t mind that we muck with it a bit to hopefully amplify the essence of what made me interested in it as a young kid and hopefully will keep me interested in it as an adult.”
Andrew, you are so wrong that there isn't a big enough allegiance for people to get angry at divergences from the original text. I care about everything. Even if it was written in 1912 and had practically no story to speak of, and even if I've never read any of it and never will, the movie had better be exactly like my confused, entirely fantasy art-based impressions or someone will be making an anti-Pixar's John Carter of Mars Facebook group so fast it will knock several prestigious awards off your mantel.
I also take issue with this statement:
“There’s so much in it that can’t be real,” he said. “It’s the perfect definition of a hybrid movie,” utilizing both live actors and computer-based animation.
Perfect definition of a hybrid movie? That was called Alvin and the Chipmunks, buddy.
You can read the full interview here.
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I Watch Stuff is a movie and video blog dedicated to bringing you the best and worst that Hollywood and the Internet have to offer and then, more often than not, making fun of it because it sucks.
