What Could Have Been

There are certain iconic characters from movies that everyone knows.  Harrison Ford IS Han Solo and basically created one of the best movie lines of all time when he ad-libbed “I know” as a response to Leah’s “I love you”.  Arnold Schwarzenegger IS the Terminator (heck he even became the Governator).  Bruce Willis IS John McLean from Die Hard “Yippi-Ki-yay M*ther F*cker”.   However, things could have been so much different if the decisions made in the casting process (either by the film or by the actors) were slightly different.

• “I’ll Be Back” which was said in that distinct Schwarzenegger accent could just have easily been said in a more gravelly voice and without the accent by Lance Henriksen (from Millennium fame) who was the first choice for the role of the Terminator.
• People have come to see Daniel Radcliff as the quintessential Harry Potter.  However, if the film has gone as Steven Spielberg planned, the kid from AI and the 6^th sense (Haley Joel Osmet) would have been Harry Potter.   Can you imagine the scene when Harry first sees’s nearly headless nick being rewritten for this American born actor?  It would have gone something like this:  Harry enters the room; see’s the Ghost of Nearly Headless Nick and says “I see Dead People”.  That would become Osmet’s “I’ll be back” line.  As a side note, Tim Roth turned down the role of Severus Snape to play General Thade in Planet of the Apes with Marky Mark.  Nice decision Tim.
• Even the great Sean Connery has made several questionable decisions.
• He was offered the role Gandalf in the Lord of the Rings and turned it down because he didn’t get it.  New Line was offering Connery 15% of the worldwide box office, which would have made Mr. Connery around US$400 million.
• He also turned down a role of “The Architect” in the Matrix.
• He accepted the role of Allan Quatermain in the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen because “Although I didn’t get it, I saw the success of the other roles I didn’t get and figured it must be good” (Paraphrasing here a bit).
• I can’t be too hard on Connery though, he got the role of James Bond only after Carey Grant turned it down.
• Paul Hogan turned down the Patrick Swayze role in Ghost.  I could just see the dialogue from the Crocodile Dundee actor now…”You call that a Ghost? NOW This is a Ghost”
• Speaking of Ghost, Bruce Willis turned down the role of Sam Wheat in Ghost as well because he didn’t think the plot would work and that playing a ghost would be detrimental to his career.  Uh, yeah, years later the 6^th Sense would ruin him.  Interestingly enough, the role of John McLean was at one point targeted for Richard Gere.  I guess if John McLean was saving Beverly Hills Prostitutes from that building it would make more sense.
• Eddie Murphy turned down a role in Ghost Busters, yet ironically would end up doing Haunted Mansion
• Can you imagine...

• Kurt Russell Christopher Walken, Richard Dryfus, Nick Nolte or Burt Reynolds as Han Solo
• Stephen Baldwin in Speed
• Dustin Hoffman as Michael Corleon in Godfather
• Ewan McGregor or Will Smith as NEO in the Matrix
• Tom Selleck as Indiana Jones (Actually I could)
• Ryan O’Neil or Burt Reynolds for Rocky

I guess you never know how it would work out and if it was different, would we be saying something like “OMG could you imagine that guy from Regarding Henry playing Han Solo!”

This One Time At Band Camp...or How The Entertainment World Has Changed My Life

Whether its movies, TV shows, books or music, the entertainment world has changed my life is ways I could not predict. Let’s see if anyone else gets these references. For example:

Anytime someone says “STOP”, I say "Hammer Time"…

Although this one time, someone said “STOP” & I said "collaborate & listen"

Then again, anytime someone says "This One Time"... I say "at Band Camp"

I could go on and on here...

There are some actors and actresses who will always be known for their iconic character and it has impacted how I see them in new shows or movies.

Now when I watch Die Hard, I wonder why Hans Gruber doesn't cast an Avada Kedavra spell at Bruce Willis

I didn’t know they had vampires on All My Children? How else can you explain to me why Buffy was on that show for 2 years

Recently I referred to an old TV show as “That Sipowitz” show because I couldn’t remember the name of it. Of course I also mentioned the “red-headed guy” who left it to be a movie star so obviously that didn’t happen either. So for those two actors (Sipowitz & David Caruso) they will always be the cops from NYPD Blue (I had to google “that Sipowitz show” to get the name)

Anytime I see Dennis Haskins in something, I say “Its Mr. Belding”. Of course I say the same thing about that whole cast from Saved by the Bell. True story, actually saw Mario Lopez at a bar in Las Vegas and what do you think I and others said? Yep “Hey Slater”. (If you’re wondering, I also had to Google “Slater from Saved by the Bell” to find out his name was Mario Lopez)

Who doesn’t call Verne Troyer Mini-Me? I think that was even the name that came up on the screen when he was on the Surreal Life reality TV show. If not, it should have been.

Classic Lines from Movies & TV also make their way into my every day conversations:

Who hasn’t said “I’ll be back”. It doesn’t matter if I am going to another meeting at work, going to the gym, going grocery shopping or just going to the bathroom. Either way, every time the words I’ll be back leave my mouth, it is always in the voice of the Terminator

Actually, there is a movie or TV line for everything that will ever happen to you in your life. You don’t think so. Check it out

If someone says something you don’t understand:
“Watcha talking about Willis” (Different Strokes)

If someone makes a mistake during an important business transaction:
“10 points from Slytherin” (Do I really need to quote this one?)

If someone who loves you and you love back but you’re not quite ready to say it says “I love you”:
“I know” (Empire Strikes Back)

If you walk into a bar filled with 3 foot albinos dressed as Furbies dancing to Menudo music?
“Were not in Kansas Anymore” (Wizard of Oz)

So, as you can see, the entertainment industry has changed and will continue to change my life. So until next time, “I’ll be Back”

From Book to Movies - The Good, The Bad & The Ugly

So with my excitement over seeing Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows Part 2 accompanied with just finishing the Hunger Games Trilogy it got me thinking, why do some book series succeed as movie franchises and others “fail”? Granted, my definition of “fail” is very much like Charlie Sheen’s definition of “winning” – very subjective. I have no training whatsoever in being an author (grammatically I struggle to use of good & well and their & there correctly) but I have flown over a million miles in my life (not exaggerating) & always have a book or 3 with me. I also wouldn’t know how to produce, direct or be a “key” grip on a movie, although I have watched more than my fair share; some good, some not, and some that star Lindsay Lohan. Anyway, it got me thinking about a couple of book series I enjoyed…and the accompanying movies.

The Good

The Lord of the Rings – I think this turned into one of the most visually appealing movie translations of a book series – as well as the only reason I put up with the endless “Who are you wearing” questions during the 2003 Academy Awards when Return of the King won best picture. In addition to the cinematography, special effects & action, there actually was some quite good acting (Éowyn’s “silent” love of Aragorn, and Sam carrying Frodo at the end of the movie come to mind). Funny, in retrospect, I went back and re-read the books, and found them less fun than I originally remembered (too many names to remember and those god-forsaken songs to sift through). However, I still believe that the movies were a masterpiece conversion, especially by (channeling the voice of Dolores Umbridge from Harry Potter) – “Omitting - that which should be omitted”

Harry Potter and the…(Insert cool book title here) –Speaking of Harry…The books have sold 450M copies. It is the highest grossing movie franchise of all time (seven films released grossing $6.3 billion worldwide). What more is there to say? Well, there is plenty more but since Pottermania is running wild right now, there is no need to repeat all the awesomeness that is Harry. Now excuse me while I go eat some Bertie Botts flavored beans.

Honorable Mention: James Bond

The Bad

The Chronicles of Narnia – I struggled with the placement of this one as I felt the first book/movie was excellent but that it went downhill from there. With worldwide box office receipts totaling almost 1.5B, it’s hard to label this series “bad”…yet I will. It may not be fair to just say the movies went downhill after the first one, because I also felt the books did as well. Part of that is due to the changing out of the main characters every 2 books or so. The reason I typically like book series is that I get attached to the characters and like to see them grow from book to book. So this may be less of an indictment of the translation of the book to a movie and more of the loss of characters I can stay connected with – which somehow became more irritating to me in the movie version. However, I can’t shake the feeing the loss of connectedness to the characters as the movies go on is also attributed to how the storytelling was converted to the screen – with a focus more on special effects than story. Two more movies have been signed with 1 more book still undecided. I also know that I will go see it, although I will hate myself for it, so it cancels itself out.

A Series of Unfortunate Events - Here we have a best-selling book series that sold over 60M copies, yet I found myself almost bored with the movie adaptation. The movie combined the first 3 books, understandable in a 13 short book series, but it seemed to play havoc with the timeline as well as the “feel” of the story. Jim Carey played an over the top, comical Olaf which was different than the serious and dour Olaf from the books. Granted, why hire (and pay) “Ace Ventura” if you don’t want that “over the top-ness”, but for me, it took away what was special about the books. Although the movie did gross 118M in US (210M worldwide), no sequels are currently being planned.

Honorable Mention: Cirque Du Freak

The Ugly

The Left Behind Series – How can a 16 book series that sold between 65- 100M copies (depending who you quote),had 4 books occupying the 4 top slots of NY times best seller list at the same time, have video game, graphic novel and a young kid book series tie-ins fail as a movie franchise? The easy answer could be “They cast Kirk Cameron in the star role, and Mike Seaver is no Buck Williams”. Yet Fireproof was an amazingly touching movie and that also starred the same guy who was on the cover of Teen Beat (I have a sister so it wasn’t me who got Teen Beat each week…Honest!). Some may say the topic is too “religious”, although I would refer them to Passion of the Christ & The Ten Commandments (plus Fireproof) as a counter point. With a built in audience and a story full of interesting characters, espionage and “stuff blowing up”, you would think the movie would be worth spending some decent cash on even if it doesn’t have a car that turns into a robot (OK Autobot – whatever!!). The movie was so full of cheese, it lost all semblances to the book – even though the plot lines were fairly close. Cloud Ten announced they plan to remake the series with increased production values – but my confidence is low.

Percy Jackson & the Olympians – I can’t stress how disappointed I was in the movie translation of the first book of this 5 book series (that at one point was on the NY Times Children’s Best Seller list for 177 weeks). Not that there weren’t some visually appealing scenes, but it just proves that special effects cannot save a movie, especially one that veered so far off the path of the book. Heck, the main “bad guys”, Ares & Kronos, were for all intents and purposes, left out of the movie. I don’t know if they thought it was too complicated for a movie, but I think anyone that read the books, must have had the same thing happen to them as they watched the movie…which was a constant inner voice that said “Wait, this wasn’t what happened” in almost every other scene.

Honorable Mention: The Seeker: The Dark Is Rising

So what does it take to successfully transition from print to video? Obviously a good book for starters. Staying true to the story (edit where appropriate but don’t massively rewrite!) Use Special Effects to enhance the written word – not to replace it. The right casting for sure (Thank you to Chris Columbus for casting Daniel Radcliff instead of Haley Joel Osment as our boy Wizard). And a bit of luck doesn’t hurt. What other book series did or did not succeed as a movie in your eyes?