| |
|
I've done a couple of (non-comic book) adaptations - which you haven't seen - and it's a funny business.
Movie studios crave original, but more, they crave 'safe'. This kind of thing scares studios spitless. So it's just possible - for example - that you might get Constantine opposing Apocalyptic Christians and the Damnation Army. You will never get the moment when an angel says to him "my girlfriend's pregnant".
Sometimes, though, it's about expectations: I was once contracted to work on a children's story which dealt with, among other things, the real lives of the Bronte family. I wrote a draft, and delivered it to the producer.
Him: "Nick, this is awfully morbid. They all die young."
Me: "Um. Yes. They did."
Him: "Well, we can't use that."
Understand, this guy is far from stupid. He bought a property which I still think had the potential to be a stunning film - but he bought it without really considering what it was and what he wanted. We went through any number of variations on the theme, and finally it became clear that the good movies you could make out of that material weren't the movies he wanted to make, and we stopped. In a studio setting, we might well have continued...
The reason why so many adaptations - of all kinds - go wrong is this:
You (an exec at a studio) buy a comicbook property rather than an original screenplay about a new superhero, because you can show that it had a market. It was a best seller. It was a smart thing to buy.
In order to demonstrate that you have protected that investment (and in order actually to protect it) you need a star with name and face recognition who can open the movie - i.e. who can guarantee people will go. You need a director with a good track record, preferably with some experience of this kind of material. You need a writer with similar credits.
The star wants you to make the character more sympathetic before s/he comes on board. Less violent, more trustworthy, less promiscuous, more attractive... whatever. The director loves the idea but thinks it's out of date. The writer doesn't necessarily understand the material - s/he has had a short time to look into it and become an instant expert. Also, s/he may not have been so well-chosen - writing 'Smallville' won't necessarily set you up to write 'Doom Patrol' - but they're both comic books, right? So on paper, it's perfect. Together, you decide to use the first eight issues of the comic book as your template - because that way, you don't have to worry about backstory you have to explain to your supposed massive new audience.
All this is, on paper, perfect decision-making. Not one thing has been done imprudently, which will be vital if the movie doesn't work and you have to explain yourself.
Result: a movie where the main character - who was, by definition, a misanthropic sod who was 'good' only because he was, roughly, on our side - has become a paragon of virtue; where the world in which he lives has been updated and rendered less vile, more worth loving; where the moral ambiguity is gone. Strangely, the engine of the story has been ripped out - not deliberately, but by a filtering process where no one takes a stand for the original material - because what's important is not what the project was, but what it will become.
The only way to avoid this (within the studio system) is the exercise of raw power.
To return to Hellblazer by way of example: if Russell Crowe had announced he wanted to play Constantine and Spielberg were prepared to produce it with Stephen Gaghan writing and Alejandro Amenábar directing... you'd get a Constantine movie of quality.
Maybe. |
|
|
