That article has everything about the issue as well as speculation by insiders that the film has been dead for a number of months prior to failure of Mars Needs Moms.
How this will affect Zemeckis and his obsession with mo-cap has yet to be seen. If a Roger Rabbit film is truly in the works, will he employ methods used on his films from the past decade or go the route he took that made the film so popular in the 80s?
I think it was already confirmed he’s going with live-action/2D animation for Roger Rabbit. I seem to remember his wife had something to do with convincing him that mo-cap didn’t makes sense for it.
And on the Submarine remake? It’s a huge relief its not being made.
Honestly, I didn’t even GET this project. The charm and point of the original (a cult classic, and one of my favorite movies) was to expand upon the Beatlemania going on at the time and exaggerate the psychedelic “stoner” culture of the 60s. Obviously there are still lots of fans of The Beatles, but finding a mainstream audience today for this kind of movie wouldn’t work. It was a hit in the 60s, but it couldn’t be today, sadly. And digitally updating a movie that SHOULD feel dated and of-the-time seems weird.
I just don’t really understand the recent obsession with remaking older movies that were perfectly fine the way they were. Can’t we make our own material?
Can I say something? First of all, the project isn’t dead just yet. All the articles I’ve read state that fact. Zemeckis could take it to another studio.
Second, I understand that some film fans don’t like Zemeckis’ current use of motion capture. I have to say, though, that the amount of sheer venom coming from people about Zemeckis and his use of this medium is really going too far. I’m surprised at members of these forums as well as other commenters on film sites, who blast Zemeckis and his motion capture films. It’s almost like you want his head delivered on a platter.
Sure, some mo-cap has been terrible (Mars Needs Moms being the most recent example), but I thought the medium and Zemeckis’ use of it was vastly improving. A Christmas Carol looks stunning compared to The Polar Express.
Let’s not forget Avatar, Andy Serkis’ Gollum and King Kong, and others.
I have supported Bob and ImageMovers Digital from the beginning, and I am heartbroken by the criticism of him and motion capture in general.
My apologies if it seems like I’m badmouthing members of this board for having strong opinions. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. Sometimes I just am rocked to my knees by how much hate there is for this medium, and of the director who has really pioneered it.
Case in point, I will always support Bob and his usage of the art form.
I actually completely agree with you there, Bill. I’ve been saying something to similar effect on many forums and comment pages. Though it’s mostly fallen on deaf ears.
I don’t really like how Cameron is continually given sole credit for not only 3D but mo-cap as well, simply because he did it “right”. The man has gone on record saying that he had to wait nearly a decade and a half for technology to catch up to his ideas. So, yeah, even if he did do things “correctly”, he’d still be playing the waiting game if folks like Jackson, Zemeckis and a host of others who’ve dabbled in mo-cap AND 3D didn’t “mess up” to begin with. That’s not to say he didn’t work hard or pioneer new things. It’s just as silly as saying that Edison invented the light bulb or that Bell invented the phone. Or for a more fitting analogy, like saying Disney invented the cartoon.
Though I wasn’t particularly excited for Yellow Submarine, I did want to see where Zemeckis would take the technology next.
I have a whole thing about remakes to go on about. But as of right now I’ll just leave that thought in my head and post it in a more relevant thread. Possibly the movies thread.
Hey, thanks, aerostarmonk. Like I’ve said before, the project isn’t dead yet. Bob could take it to another studio, if one shows interest.
Just because Disney shut down ImageMovers Digital, I’m hoping it’s not the end for the studio. Perhaps another place will want it, and Bob will relocate.
I wasn’t happy for the cancel because of the mo-cap; I was displeased with this idea because I’m against not so great remakes of classics. I mean, the whole Yellow Submarine thing was appropriate in the 60s, but now The Beatles aren’t living gods like they were then. They still have a huge fanbase, don’t misunderstand me. But they’re not the front of culture anymore, and another movie of YS now would be weird.
It’s worth mentioning that the folks at Square Pictures (Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within) and even Mainframe (Barbie films) produced mo-cap features before Zemeckis or anyone else. In both cases, use of the technology in features was a logical outgrowth from its use in video games.
The surprising thing about mo-cap in film commentary is the relatively low number of folks who can spot it (including professional reviewers in print, but especially general commentators on the internet). They’ll use terms like “creepy” or lump it in with examples of “true” animation.
As for Zemeckis’ Yellow Submarine, it has never sounded promising, but like anything else, it deserves a fair shake if it gets produced. It could be that with the upcoming Tintin film, the Amblin/Weta partnership uses mo-cap in a way that brings the form some respect by making the characters look sufficiently non-real (or cartoon-ized) that the viewer never makes it to the uncanny valley. Stay tuned, we shall see…
I don’t dislike the medium. I love The Polar Express. I just thought this particular film was a bad idea. Remakes = failure, and redoing The Beatles is failure x 2. I’ve been working on my math. Can you tell? But, anyway, I probably would have seen this eventually, but had no interest in it.
I usually mention Square Pictures among others who helped pioneer the technology. Though I think it’s safe to say that before Cameron, it was Zemeckis, and Jackson to a lesser extent, who pushed the it the hardest and the farthest in cinema. But Zemeckis always takes a beating for it, and I just don’t think that’s fair.
Spielberg and Jackson’s Tintin is getting a lot of knee-jerk reactions, too. I even argued about it on some forums only for people to dismiss my comments out of hand because it didn’t link up with their views or the always offensive and never funny or cute “TL;DR”.
As for your assertion that remakes = failure, IV, I submit the following examples: The Wizard of Oz, The Maltese Falcon, The Fly, The Thing, Heaven Can Wait, Casino Royale, The Magnificent Seven, Three Men and a Baby, Let Me In, True Grit - well, I think you get the point…
Yes, there is a lot of suckage to be found in remakes. The same can be said, though, for original film. They both have about the same success rate.
There’s an Oz remake? I personally don’t consider True Grit (2010) a remake, because the directors claimed it was based on the book, not the other film. I can be way too assertive sometimes, though. Sorry.
There are several as well as a couple of prequels, sequels and other things. And that’s just one. There’s five Peter Pan movies in the works and at least three versions of Snow White.
That wasn’t what I was trying to say. I was talking about how the “original” film was itself a remake. I believe the second or third. The first of which had a screenplay written by Baum himself. Now, I know that most people would like to discount silent to sound remakes, but they’re still remakes. And if we’re going to have to class them as re-adaptations, then we might as well put a lot of very hated remakes and reboots on there as well.
There’s also a Little Mermaid live-action film in the works as well as several other famous fairy tales. This isn’t new, though. This always happens. You’re just more aware of it now.
But, anyway, I probably would have seen this eventually, but had no interest in it.
Sorry.