Not your same old make a movie topic

[Red States Rule!]

"Who would be in a movie?" yadda yadda.

 

Nope, this one is why shouldn't there be a movie.

 

Too long a series, it would be too expensive to do it any justice, and not enough people know WoT.

 

Any others?

[Inara]

please refer to ALL my posts on the WOTmovie thread

 

i am all for a series, pref 1 or 2 books per series.

 

dissagreements?

[dagwall]

I think it'd make a better TV mini-series than a movie series. They can make a TV mini-series much longer than I think they'd ever make a movie series. Of course then there is the fear that it may not do well in ratings and never be finished. That would suck. Get all excited to see it and it is never finished.

[Jonn]

I think it'd make a better TV mini-series than a movie series. They can make a TV mini-series much longer than I think they'd ever make a movie series. Of course then there is the fear that it may not do well in ratings and never be finished. That would suck. Get all excited to see it and it is never finished.

 

I agree. It would be a good mini-series, but a lot of conventions would have to be challened. The time format and the overall format would have to be altered pretty drastically.

 

I like HBO's attention to character detail when doing a series, but I like Showtime's penchant for pushing the envelope in both scope and format. I remember watching a 2 hour episode of their show Huff and was thoroughly entertained.

 

Look, each book can be done in a series as long as there is a commitment to see each book to the end. Like some Spanish language teleserias, the series should have a fixed timeline of events featuring a beginning, middle and ending. Trick is, the episodes shouldn't be as fixed in time length.

 

I envision taking Showtime's more elastic approach to time for an episode. Sometimes have hour-long episodes, sometimes two hours or something in between. It's cable, but with a flexible budget.

[Andrew B.]

I agree with Red States. There is no way they can do a movie wihtout ripping apart the story. It would have to go so fast that even devoted fans who have read the series over and over, might get confused by the amount of skipping around, and cutting things out. Plus what about minor characters that have small roles in the eye of the world, but then become more important later. For example Bayle Domon he has a small role in the book, so small that the movie producers might cut him out, but then what happens the numerous times he appears later in the series. Elayne? She is one of Rand's lovers later, but the number of pages she has in the eye of the world areminicule. The movie would just get so complicated, that a devoted fan would be the only person who could really fully understand what is going on. How would they explain Lews Therin, the White Tower, Hero's of the horn,why the Seanchen technicly have a right to the land. All 13 of the forsaken. I must confess I can't name them all of the top of my head, even though I'm rereading the series. The only ones I'm fully familiar with are Mordin, Lanfear (cnydane isn't part of the action to much after her rebirth), and Mhogdien. Wow that was a longer post than I usually do, so anyway in short my vote is leave the to good to pass up books as they are and forget about ruining it with a movie

[Red States Rule!]

Good show, Andrew. Yes, the number of forsaken alone would put most people out. LOTR was hard enough with Saruman and Sauron.

 

Here's another one: the books aren't but a few years tops apart.

 

At the rate Potter is going, hopefully Radcliffe won't be 20 to 25 before they are done with book 7 in movie form.

 

Could you imagine two years between each movie for each book? The actor who started playing Rand would be friggin 40 years old by the time his blood was on the rocks.

 

I can see it now.... "Fresh off the heels of Raiders of the Lost Ark", here is Harrison Ford, starring as Rand Al Thor in Eye of the World.

 

and now "Fresh off the heels of Cocoon 6: the Return", here is Harrison Ford, starring as Rand al Thor in A Memory of Light!

[SinisterDeath]

It is entirely possible to condense the books into movie format, in a way that it wouldn't take 40 hours to do one book.

ONe thing people always forget is that 1 hour reading time does NOT EQUIL 1 hour film time.

Infact its more like 1 hour reading time = 1-20 minutes film time.

IT all depends on what is happening in the books.

DESCRIPTIONS can all be done through a simple panning of the camera.

And as WE all know, 60% of the book is descriptions.

I've went over this time in and time out. Book 1 can be done in 2-4 hours, depending on HOW close they want to stay to the books. NO Book to movie format, can ever, ever have Everything from the books, however it can cut out the "unimportant" scenes, or the "scenese" that have absolutely no revelance in movie format, but in book they do.

Some books could actually be combined into 1 movie.

While others. "amol" will probably be 2-3 movies :P

[ajfurst]

I'd go with several series. I'd split as follows.

 

Book 1 - Series 1 - first 10 or 11 episodes. Mid-season break of two weeks before -

Book 2 - Series 1 - last 10 or 11 episodes of series 1. End of book 2 is end of series finale.

 

Book 3 - Series 2 - part 1 - ends with taking of stone.

Book 4 - Series 2 - part 2 - series finale is 2 hour finale of Rand battling Asmodean and Perrin saving Two Rivers.

 

Between Series 2 and 3 there is a 'New Spring' mini-series.

 

Books 5, 6 & 7 - Series 3. Three books make up this series as this is where it starts to slow down.

 

Between series 3 and 4 a mini-series of the second (yet to be written) prequel.

 

Book 8, 9, 10 & 11 - Series 4. The whole Andor storyline is cut, EXCEPT where it intersects others (eg. when Rand visits Elayne).

 

Between series 4 and 5 two mini-series. One the last prequel (just before Moraine enters the Two Rivers). The other 'The Lion Throne' - covering Elayne's quest for the throne, so all this political 'thriller' is confined to one spot.

 

Series 5 - A memory of Light.

 

That's how I'd break it down anyway. 5 series plus 4 mini-series/telemovies. And the way I've set it out there's enough action for each series, without cutting it too heavily and alienating fans.

[Inara]

sinister, its not so much a question of what is possible, only what we, as fans (in the literal sense) would prefer to see.

in that case, i would take a med budget series (24 1h episoses) for each book over one 3h movie any day. there is just something about sitting down and watching hours and hours of something...

the books are epic and far reaching, and id love that to be reflected in the visual medium.

[Llewin]

I think a series is definitely the way to go.

 

I think Eye of the World is consise enough to be made as a 3 or 4 part (2 hours per part) miniseries to gauge reaction from the watchers out there in TV land, after that 1 season of full year series per book (though I kindof agree with blending some of the middle books where things start to drag...)

 

I think, especially with them already doing more and more miniseries, especially of the fantasy variety, that it should be done by Scifi Network...and more specifically by Henson's Creatureshop and the rest of the producer/director/etc crew that did Farscape...

[Leafburner]

I agree with Inara. I've heard SD's POV before and not just from him. There is no way to make a film of TEotW that runs for less than three hours that will satisfy me.

 

I like the idea of a TV series, but the more everyone talks about it, the more I think I'm all for sitting at home on a rainy day and reading.

[kittydesmond]

I rent movies...I have no cable or dish (cable not available) its highly expensive. So. I of course think a series of movies with all of the plot lines that endup not wrapped in final jordan book being cut.What i like about this is that ...the characters taken from discriptions (this is the key) MUST BE Wearing and Acting as the book designates in THAT Scene *Wials* Must be accurate. because! then I will know WHO once and for all time Messaana IS :twisted: !!!!!!

 

 

Sorry . Tangent but I liked it!

:D

[ryan707]

Hey now that you have talked about a series, and Inara mentioned the something good about sitting and watching hours of tv (that's what I did w/ Smallville to catch up), it would be great to have a tv series. I would subscribe to HBO or Showtime just to watch it. My cast still stands from the movie thread :)

[Jonn]

I'd like to see Alex Proyas take a crack at the series, wither in movie or episodic form through big budget television.

I'm a big fan of his 1998 film Dark City, expecially how he depicted characters using mental powers to manipulate elements of reality.

I really think Brett Ratner did a good job monitoring such special effects at the helm of X-Men 3, but I can't be entirely sure he didn't just leave that mostly to the post production crew.

 

I'm sure a lot of people would pick Peter Jackson up for the project, but I think that maybe he would be a bit tired of working the genre. Besides, he has said that he really isn't into "magic" on the screen, and I think the series needs a director who is going to treat the act of chanelling with some reverence.

Gore Verbinski would be pretty good.

 

One of my favorite childhood memories was obsessing over the movie "Willow" by Ron Howard. It's one of the great adventure movies in a generation, but still sort of underrated. I wouldn't say no to Ron Howard if he wanted to helm the series though.

 

Steven Spielberg I think would find this project interesting as well. It's been a while since he's gotten to really work high adventure and fantasy. Something as epic as this series should at the least get his attention as something he would want to produce even.

 

Anyhow, what do you guys think? Directors...