Why are filmakers stuck in the past? (Soylent Green remake)

[Dave]

There is going to be a sequel to 'Soylent Green'...

from SciFi Wire

Soylent Picks Up Story

Blade: Trinity writer/director David Goyer told SCI FI Wire that his proposed remake and update of the classic 1973 SF movie Soylent Green will pick up where the original film left off: with the well-known revelation that "Soylent Green is people!" "I will say that the reveal at the end of the first movie happened at the end of our first act," Goyer said in an interview. "So the first movie is kind of the first act of our film, and then it's about what happens afterwards."

The first movie, set in a dystopian future, centers on a cop (Charlton Heston) who investigates a murder, leading to the gruesome discovery about the principal food source of the overburdened population. The film's surprise ending is by now familiar to audiences, "of course, which is why you can't have that be the punch line anymore," Goyer said.

Goyer added that he won't write or direct the remake, but will instead act as producer under his just-signed one-year first-look deal with Warner Brothers. Goyer also wrote the script for the upcoming Batman Begins for Warner, which Christopher Nolan is directing. Blade: Trinity, the third movie in the vampire franchise, is being released by Warner's sister company, New Line, on Dec. 8.

I'm not sure about this one. I think they should make the original book 'Make Room, Make Room' properly before they start making any sequels. The book was more of a murder-detective story, and it didn't have that punch-line, but the dystopian future was the same, and it is a future that is still possible. The book was set at the turn of the Millennium, with Earth's population reaching 7 billion, using 100% of the Earth's natural resources, and global warming an everyday reality. Only the timescale has changed because of the birth control that began in the 1960's. Harry Harrison made political and environmental points that at the time of writing were largely dismissed.

The 'Soylent Green' solution I don't think would ever be acceptable, or workable, even if it wasn't distasteful, and immoral. Even less so since 'Mad Cow Disease'. It would be a Public Health disaster.

I think this sequel will be another 'Rollerball'. They think they can update a classic old scifi film with modern special effects, but it doesn't work, because the generally miss the whole point of the film, and that crucial intent has be reduced with time anyway. In 'Rollerball' it was the future power of Corporations. Today, it is called 'Globalisation'.

Why are film makers stuck in the past?

Look at the recent scifi films that aren't franchises like Star Trek, Star Wars and LOTRs. They've used P K Dick, Stanislaw Lem, and remade 'Planet of the Apes'. Hardly cutting edge stuff.

With the success of 'The Matrix' why hasn't there instead been a rush to sign deals on new books and more Cyberpunk?

 

[ray gower]

I can offer several ideas as to why filmmakers are still dredging up fifties and sixties works in preference to newer stories, if it is indeed, true:-

Older books and stories are cheaper to rip off and I suggest dead writers complain less about what the film maker does with his/her story.

Something we have debated in Books is that there is a comparitive dearth of original science fiction being published, let alone ones that would make a strong showing as a film.

By and large, film goers are a pedestrian crowd and are not generally enthused by pure fantasy, preferring at least a toehold with the present. Now our technologies are at the state where we can feasibly achieve what authors of the fifties imagined, we are nolonger faced by something fanciful or fantastic.

Finally, those who are putting their cash into Science Fiction films are generally going to be of an age where they have read and remember books from the 'Golden age' of science fiction. It is much easier to say 'Here is the money' to something you remember with rose tinted glasses than something you have to read and comprehend first.


But is the complaint actually that true?

Films like Independance Day, Day After Tomorrow, Predator and Alien do not make any form of nod to old stories, even if it is possible to pint at inumerable works that bare a relationship. Not that films aledgedly based on a book bare that much relationship either!

 

[Dave]

I guess I could be being a little harsh, and that may be because I personally don't want to see more remakes of these '60's and '70's 'classics'. I mean some of them weren't that good the first time around; they are unlikely to be better as a sequel or remake.

You quoted some films that weren't remakes or sequels, but I bet that for every one of yours, I can quote another -- 'Solaris' and 'The Stepford Wives' from this year, for instance. Arnie is rumoured to be remaking 'Westworld'. Remakes of 'War of the Worlds', 'Barbarella','Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea', and 'Logans Run' are well under way. They are even going to remake 'King Kong'! Why do we need a remake of 'King Kong'?

I agree with you about the copyrights issues, and the other points you made. You missed 'The Chronicles of Riddick' from your own list. I also just thought of Michael Crichton's books and how they get made into films fairly quickly. But he is fairly mainstream and there are others that don't -- there has been talk of a 'Ringworld' movie for at least the last ten years.

I think what I was getting at more is the lack of Cyberpunk. I think the ideas of William Gibson, Neal Stephenson, Jeff Noon and the Wachowski Brothers are a more realistic view of the future than those of 'The Golden Age' as you termed it.

The exponential increase in computing power, and the possibilities of interfacing with the human brain, the revolution in communications and information systems, these all point to a very different world of the future than, for example, a PK Dick one with Rocket Ships, Nuclear Wastelands and Simulacrum Androids. Much more likely that we can go 'virtually' anywhere we want without travelling, and will all be partly cyborgs ourselves.

And just as 'Lord of the Rings' could not be made properly until the special effects technology had reached the right level, I think that 'The Matrix' series shows we have reached the right level for these 'virtual reality'-depicting films to come of age.

Instead, we are still getting the Issac Azimov inspired 'I, Robot' set in a world which is really just the 1960's with androids.

On the otherhand, we did get 'Johnny Mnemonic' and 'Equilibrium' -- they just weren't very good!

And we did get 'Gattaca' with the gentically superior 'Valids' and challenged 'invalids', so there is some hope at least.