I second the first posters suggestion of the novel "Footfall". If it were done correctly. If Hollywood gets a hold of it, it will be Elephants with acid blood attack from the planet Phycadermia. It is a beautiful and well thought out book.

Also a recent novel "War in 2020" by military author Ralph Peters would be an excellent story to adapt, rather timely in this day and age.

I'd like to see Clarke's 2061: Odyssey Three and 3001: The Final Odyssey . . . but not done cheaply.[/i]

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Later . . .

I think Footfall should be a mini series(It would be great, if done right of course). I have read a little of War in 2020; I prefer Red Storm Rising.

I don't remember who said it, but I think it quite accurate: "Footfall was published in 1980's, but it is not a 1980's SF story. It is a 1950's alien invasion story, with 1980's technology trappings."

If faithful to original book, I do not believe Footfall the movie (or mini-series) would be a success today. There is a good reason why the book has not been reprinted in over a decade - unlike Ringworld, for example.

Well; modern CGI is just about up to the task of depicting the Moties from The Mote in God's Eye;

it is about time that some non humanoid aliens were revealed to the public. And it's a good detective story too.

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Orion's Arm . The Starlark . Voices: Future Tense . OA Flickr set

Imagine this one, done with CGI and in the 'Indiana Jones' comedy/adventure/drama vein...

Harry Turtledove's 'The Case of The Toxic Spell Dump'...

I swear, that book was written just to allow the opportunity to use one singularly hideous and odoriferous (yet absolutely masterful) pun...worked pretty good!

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"If a tree is cut down in the rainforest, and is used to make paper to print a book, and the book is really bad, and there's nobody that will read it, do you still hear a sucking sound?"
Charlie in Dayton, A.AsC.

The SciFi Channel's Dune adaptation certainly proved that most things are not too big, too complex or too "deep" to be done; they just need to be done in more than a two-hour slot. Same for LoTR... regardless of how one feels about the changes made (I thought they were unnecessary, but on the other hand didn't hurt things.)

The movie Nightfall, I have been told, had nothing to do with the Asimov story other than the title. I don't know which one was being referred to, however, since I haven't seen either.

Some things mentioned earlier that I *wouldn't* do: Zelazny, almost any of the titles. I can't see a movie, mini-series or series capturing any of the worlds mentioned. (And commercially at least, Creatures would be beyond most viewers' grasp.) But yes, all are outstanding stories that deserve to be made--Lord of Light in particular--*when* it seems possible to make them. Let them wait. Jack Chalker? Again, I don't think it would adapt well. And no matter how good CGI gets, it will *never* be able to capture Lovecraft correctly--precisely because HPL depends so much on the *implied,* on the reader's imagination, versus the *seen.* You could, however, do (correctly) the stories that did not depend on manifestations of Great Old Ones or other entities of horrid nature: The Case of Charles Dexter Ward would make an excellent movie (even though it itself was little more than a remake of The Picture of Dorian Grey). The Foundation trilogy? Go back and reread it, then see if you think it would be adaptable. I'm not sure it's good visual media material: dry, sparse. How about some of his "robot" stuff? (No, that thing that came out under the title I, Robot does *not* count... there never even was a story with that name, to the best of my knowledge. It was the name of a collection of stories, none of which, as far as I can tell, are reflected in the movie. Haven't seen the movie itself, though, so I'm going on secondhand info.)

You don't get the thing with the berets, jumbo. They're traditionally associated with elite forces, thus making it easier for the viewer to identify them as such without knowing who/what they were beforehand. Why do elite forces wear berets? Because they can. Because anybody who isn't elite *will* get the [expletive] kicked out of them--but try doing that to someone who *is* elite. It's an invitation to try it... and a declaration of the ability to back up the implication. Sort of like kilts. (But no, as far as the book goes, I don't recall them ever being mentioned as wearing berets. I seem to recall "helmets" were the typical military headgear.)

As far as authors retaining control of their material once it's optioned: basically, it doesn't happen. Straczynski was a *notable* exception with B5--a lot of other authors would like to know how he pulled it off. And even then, he didn't have complete control. Pretty much, once something is optioned under a normal contract, the studio has complete control over it: they can change it any way they like. Doesn't matter if the author is still alive or if the heirs sell it... though I agree that the heirs seem somewhat less scrupulous when it comes to "creative control." Usually, they just want the money. Writing a contract that says otherwise would be tricky... and probably would be unacceptable to the studio. You would indeed have to "do it yourself," a la Lucas and Star Wars--easier said than done. (Where's the money coming from? Are you going to be able to hire Hollywood directors, actors, production personnel, etc.? What about *their* contracts? Who's going to distribute it? Promote it? etc.) And remember, he was producing his *own* material, so there was no conflict between what the author and the studio wanted.

What *would* I do? I like the idea of Bester, though I would have chosen The Demolished Man rather than Stars. Heinlein's The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress; that one took too long to show up on this list--I'd've started with it. Clarke's Rama, definitely; Childhood would work fine as well, but I'd be more interested in seeing the former.

Things that haven't been mentioned yet: C. J. Cherryh's entire "merchanter space" universe; begin at the beginning with Downbelow Station (the first published, though there have been "prequels" since then). In my opinion, this book stands second only to Dune in terms of traditional "space opera" and universe building--possibly even outdoes it on the latter. It would also require only minimal effects, compared to many other ideas at least--well within the range of what was done with Star Wars, now coming up on thirty years old. (Yeesh! Can anyone believe that?) The concurrent series, the Chanur series, would require more CGI, but would be just as good for adaptation.

With *extensive* use of CGI, one could also do at least some of David Brin's Uplift universe, particularly Sundiver. I'm not sure how well the rest would come off; it would depend on the graphics budget... but I'd love to see Startide Rising done properly.

Speaking of things that would be great to see but which would probably have little appeal to the mass of viewers: Samuel R. Delany. I'd pick Nova to start with, or the novella "The Star Pit" or the novelette "We, In Some Strange Power's Employ, Move on a Rigorous Line"; if those worked, you could move up to The Einstein Intersection and others. I'd *love* to see a miniseries adaptation of Dhalgren, but again I doubt if the full scope and effect of the novel could be captured properly, no matter what format it was in.

One other good one, but which would require special effects: Walter John Williams' Angel Station. Outstanding first contact story. His Hardwired and Voice of the Whirlwind would make good cyberpunk movies as well.

Straczynski says he was an executive producer on B5 for just that reason - he had to get to that level of authority to be able to get his work filmed as written. In the US TV industry, at least, nothing less is good enough.

(Incidentally, this seems to be a US phenomenon. One of the reasons British television has historically been so good is that, as a rule, what the writers write is what gets filmed - it's not run through committee and homogenized.)

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Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.

Originally Clarke's Songs of Distant Earth was intended to become a movie based on completely realistic sci-fi. Think about it, no bad astronomy in the WHOLE THING!!!
Plus the plot wasn't too bad, albeit it'd be a touch too intellectual probably to explain all those relativistic effects. But I would've shelled out my ten bucks to see it!

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Yes, I have a life. It's quite different from yours.

I guess the question, ToSeek, should be more along the lines of "How did he convince them to allow him to be an executive producer?" I can't see most writers pulling this off.

He seems to insist on that level of control.
He is currently writing 2 comic books for Marvel Comics, 'Amazing Spider-Man' and 'Supreme Power'. And he, not the editor, has final say on what gets published.
They are quite good, in Spider-Man he is treating Peter Parker as being intelligent, and science oriented.
Supreme Power is a realistic look on Superman. But be warned, it is a 'Mature Readers' book, with quite a lot of nudity and very graphic violence.

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...and they even fly the flag from the food on cocktail-sticks.
There is nothing threatening about this nationalism. As a nation, the Danes have not been a threat to anyone for hundreds of years.
- Xenophobe's Guide to the Danes

Yeah, I'm following Supreme Power myself.

Actually, it's not a take on Superman... directly. It's JMS doing over the Squadron Supreme... which is Marvel's copycat version of the JLA, originally created to be a nemesis for the Avengers. So he had a little more flex room. Not that it would have stopped him from doing the same thing anyway, I think.

"Insisting" on creative control and getting it are two different things. He can do it now, to some extent, thanks to B5; he must've had some clout beforehand to get as much control as he did over the series. I know, he wasn't an unknown; more importantly, he was already a screenwriter, not just a book writer. But most writers don't have that luxury. I can't see a studio handing complete creative control over a movie or TV series to any SF writer I can think of, living or dead. And, as I said, even with what JMS did have, his control wasn't complete.

By the way, did you read JMS's Midnight Nation comic series? Interesting.

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I've gotta get me a sig line.

(And, to get back to the topic of the forum, it would make an interesting TV miniseries as well. Not on my "best" list, but... interesting.)

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I've gotta get me a sig line.

I know that it was based on Squadron Supreme, I have most of their appearances also. Just thought it meade more sense to those who have never heard about the Squadron.

I haven't read Midnight Nation, but heard good things about it.
Too much to buy, not enough money or time. But it is on the list of things to get.

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...and they even fly the flag from the food on cocktail-sticks.
There is nothing threatening about this nationalism. As a nation, the Danes have not been a threat to anyone for hundreds of years.
- Xenophobe's Guide to the Danes

Most of the books I was thinking about -Nightfall!! *ahem*- have already been said, but I don't think this one has, but it would be difficult to make into a good movie...
A Deepness in the sky by Vernor Vinge

The Night's dawn trilogy by Peter F Hamilton would be an awesome movie (or since it is over 3000 pages long and has about 10 story threads maybe a mini-series). For practical length mabye Nano Flower or A second Chance at Eden also by PFH.

Agree Neuromancer would make a fantastic movie, the script that's on the web is close enough to the novel and with the sucess of Matrix and Blade Runner should go well.

One that I haven't seen mentioned yet is Forever Peace by Haldemann or my all time favorite sci-fi novel Saucer by Coonts (yes that last one is a joke)

Knowing most of what Hollywood is putting out though, maybe Saucer has the best chance of being made . :roll:

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Note to self; add witty comment

Just as long as they do not do Forever Free. Im seriopusly wondering why he wrote that novel. Its just plain bad. Especially considereing the previous two were so good.

I agree that Night's Dawn could make a stunning film/series [regulars may have heard me go on about it before], but it will never happen.

1. It is simply too long. Each book would need two or three films to cover everything, and a six-film series is too long to commit to in advance. A TV series could work, but see 3.

2. It would probably get a very restrictive certificate (18 in the UK), if it is allowed to be released at all. Not only is it full of sex, and even fuller of violence, it contains sexual violence too, which is the worst of all. You could try to edit it out, but I think it is too central to the storyline to remove.

3. It would need an astronomical CGI budget.

Perhaps we shouldn't be too disappointed that there will be no film - it's perfectly good on the page, and Hollywood would surely mess it up somehow.

I think you could remove the sexual violence, don't really think it would be that big a problem. Of course, I think the series as a whole would be... cleaner when adapted for the screen.
I lost the last book when I was something like 150 pages from the end ](*,)