Philip K Dick's The Man in the High Castle

[Tabitha]

Philip K Dick's award winning book is to be made into a film. I find it an odd choice, as there is little in the way of action or effects or anything other than an alternate timeline since WW2 that could really drag the average moviegoer in.

Here is the synopsis from Amazon:

Synopsis:
Imagine the world if the Allies had lost World War II - this book provides a vision of what such a world might be like. The African continent virtually wiped out, the Mediterranean drained to make farmland and the US divided between Japan and the Nazis. Is it real or fantasy?

From you can read more at http://www.aintitcool.com/display.cgi?id=14187
I am off to shake off my dusty copy of the book and figure out exactly how they might want to adapt such an interesting, but hardly filmic, novel.

 

[Dave]

Having read the book, which is excellent, I would tend to agree with you.

I think that they would need to modernise it quite a bit, so that it would become unrecognisable. It is meant to be set in the '60's or '70's, so to have it set now with old '50's scifi-like rocket ships would be odd. The idea is that Germany and Japan would have moved that technology ahead faster if they had won. Hitler is meant to have recently died, but he would be almost 100 if alive today.

I think it could be made more exciting with more action. It is really a 'road' or 'journey' book. It's back to that Joseph Campbell idea of the heros journey again. There are things that occur along the way that could be added too, and in the end the alternative reality part could be enlarged into a 'total recall' or 'minority report' is it or is it not ending.

There is also a great deal about 'I Ching' which could be expanded. That kind of oriental mysticism is popular today, and I don't know of other movies that deal with that, so that would make it original. On the other hand they may cut that out completely, and just go for an action packed movie.

 

[Tabitha]

I would hope that they explore the I Ching angle, and also the Japanese obsession (in the book! Don't flame me!) with honor. I found that to be a real hook.

 

[BAYLOR]

And Instead one end up a magnificent tv series.