Don't know if its already been posted, but there is a remake of the classic sci-fi film (one of my all time favorites) with Keanu Reeves coming in December '08.a

See the trailer here"

Yeah, we've been bemoaning our fate in a couple of different threads. Search the forum for keanu.

Fred

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-- John Dryden, "The Vindication of The Duke of Guise" 1684

Yeah, I figured I was late to the party as I usually never browse this forum.

(mods if you want to merge this thread with another - feel free - not much of a thread right now, though)

I don't care for modern remakes of classic old films.

Too many modern "disaster" and "invasion" films look exactly alike. Bright lights in cities, either New York or Washington, running cops, army guys with guns running, lots of helicopter shots, quick cutting, guys in hasmat suits. It's the same stuff over and over again.

But watching the original of this film has more of a "documentary" feel to it, and watching it makes me feel like it actually did happen back in the past.

This is one film in particular I wish they had left alone. I don't believe it can be improved upon. I can't recall off hand the title of the original Sci-fi short story this film was based on. It's a good story, but barely recognizable, though Gort is hard to miss.

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Time is a great teacher, but unfortunately, it kills all its pupils. Hector Berlioz

"To complete the picture all the photons can be seen to be synchronising friction on and off throughout the overall cone which itself is synchronised to the equal and opposite reaction of equilateral triangulation"... by a scientificator in ATM, too priceless to be lost to posterity.

As far as remakes, I did like the remake of "War of the Worlds". It was a pretty good film, although I remember how shocking it was in the original, when the aliens disentegrated the priest. Back in them days that was unthinkable.

I would only watch a remake of War of the Worlds if they set it in the 1890s. It is a period piece of a story anyway and the inspiration for all the other alien invasion stories that have come along since. So why not take it back to its roots. The trouble with any alien invasion story set in the present day or near future is that the entire population of the Western World is already mentally primed for such an idea so whilst shocking it is not incomprehensible to them. But people living in the 1890s had no such preconceptions. To them the idea of creatures from another planet trying to take over and exterminate humans would have have been completely outside the box, even though we all know Wells based his story on the Euopean rush to colonise Africa few Europeans experiencing a Martian invasion would have made the connection.

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There was this version;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._G._W...ds_(2005_film)
I haven't seen it, and by most accounts it isn't much good .

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Keanu Reeves plays Gort?

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If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about the answers.

Like in Johnny Mnemonic, they have picked the perfect actor for the part. Someone so dull, so drab, he has to be inhuman.

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I believe the original stpry was titled "Farewell to the Master"

It's online now: http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/bates.html

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Clear skies Maksutov.

Hmm - I had never heard of that version - though the link you gave suggests that I may not have missed all that much. At least someone tried to tell the original story but it sounds like it was badly executed and not only in terms of SFX.

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Note 1. All requests for planetary demolition must now be submitted in quadruplicate on form UX-565/B4 and be counter-signed by the assistant administrative officer for interstellar traffic calming - department QG-7. Subject to approval by the chief planning officer and the infrastructure development coordination sub-committee.

I love that idea. wish they'd done that.

According to that, they turned it into a disaster or war type movie. What's this with the city being destroyed (or partially)?

The original was about the percieved fear, it was not about any kind of actual conflict. What was the damage? a couple of tanks in close proximity of the ship?

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Well that, and lots and lots of people being suffacated by the black gas.

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For some reason I don't remember the black gas.

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"One may picture too, the sudden shifting of attention, the swiftly spreading coils and bellyings of that blackness advancing headlong,toward heavenward, turning the twilight to palpable darkness, a strange and horrible antagonist of vapor striding among its victims, men and horses near it seen dimly, running,shrieking falling headlong,shouts of dismay, the guns suddenly abandoned, men choking and writhing on the ground, and the swift broadening out of the opaque cone of smoke. And then night and extinction -nothing but a silent mass of impenetrable vapor hiding its dead."
That black smoke. Or are we not talking about War of the Worlds? Sorry for any confusion.

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lol
No, that would be typecasting. He plays Klaatu.

I know. It's very interesting that the general public's entire idea of hostile ETI was inspired by a story that was a commentary on human relations on Earth!

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Of interest to some, perhaps, the screen writer of the 1951 original, intended a Klaatu-Christ allegory. He admitted so in a 1995 interview as explained in this Wiki article. I missed the connection completely in all of the 100 or so times I watched the film. I seriously doubt the remake will have such undertones.

That sounds familiar. Have it around here somewhere, but haven't managed to dig it out yet. Thanks. At least that gives me a better idea what I'm looking for.

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Time is a great teacher, but unfortunately, it kills all its pupils. Hector Berlioz

"To complete the picture all the photons can be seen to be synchronising friction on and off throughout the overall cone which itself is synchronised to the equal and opposite reaction of equilateral triangulation"... by a scientificator in ATM, too priceless to be lost to posterity.

Gemini is correct: "Farewell to the Master" by Harry Bates. It's in Adventures in Time and Space edited by Healy and McComas.

Fred

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"For shame, gentlemen, pack your evidence a little better against another time."
-- John Dryden, "The Vindication of The Duke of Guise" 1684

They made a movie like that, it was horrible...

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The last time I felt a warm fuzzy feeling, I was informed by my doctor that it was just gas.

Klaatu Barada Nichto....

I can hardly wait for Mr "Carpenter" and his little kiddy pal to tour modern day DC, without a gun......

Dale

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"Ad astra per aspera"

Hey, Hollywood! If you're gonna do YET ANOTHER remake, pick something that actually needs to be made over!

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"If this were play'd upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction."
Shakespeare, Twelfth Night
"The Mayan symbol for "book" looks a lot like a triple hamburger, but I've never seen them claiming it as proof the Mayans had Big Macs." - KaiYeves
"Distance doesn’t matter much in space, where if you just start a thing off with the right kind of shove, sooner or later it will get where you want it to go." -Frederik Pohl, Mining the Oort

My wife and her friend where watching Outer Limits this weekend and they did something like you were talking about. Other then the bad acting, it wasn't all that bad.

Yes but that does not mean the concept is wrong just that the execution of it might have been horrible.

The problem is to get it right you would need the money spent on good SFX to make it look good but at the same time you would need an intelligent script that allowed good actors to express the thoughts, fears and incomprehension that real 19th century people would express. It would be pointless if the actors just behaved and expressed attitudes of 20th or 21st century people wearing period costume. Therefore while the images would be important the whole project would live or die based on the quality of its writing.

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Note 1. All requests for planetary demolition must now be submitted in quadruplicate on form UX-565/B4 and be counter-signed by the assistant administrative officer for interstellar traffic calming - department QG-7. Subject to approval by the chief planning officer and the infrastructure development coordination sub-committee.

This is true of just about any film project. The problem is, most film executives (who are often crossovers from a different industry) don't think that way. They focus on copycatted premise and glitzy spectacle, figuring that if it made money once, doing it again with hotter actors and more explosions will make even more money.

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"If this were play'd upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction."
Shakespeare, Twelfth Night
"The Mayan symbol for "book" looks a lot like a triple hamburger, but I've never seen them claiming it as proof the Mayans had Big Macs." - KaiYeves
"Distance doesn’t matter much in space, where if you just start a thing off with the right kind of shove, sooner or later it will get where you want it to go." -Frederik Pohl, Mining the Oort

Really good movies should be remade.

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smile, and the Universe smiles with you

They were already done right the first time, that's why they're really good. The remakes rarely are. Why duplicate your efforts for less results?

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"If this were play'd upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction."
Shakespeare, Twelfth Night
"The Mayan symbol for "book" looks a lot like a triple hamburger, but I've never seen them claiming it as proof the Mayans had Big Macs." - KaiYeves
"Distance doesn’t matter much in space, where if you just start a thing off with the right kind of shove, sooner or later it will get where you want it to go." -Frederik Pohl, Mining the Oort