Favorite Book into Film, Not Yet Done?

POSTED BY: Indigo
UPDATED: Tuesday, September 4, 2007 17:39
VIEWED: 57073
PAGE 3 of 19

One of my favorite series is the Dark Tower by Stephen King. On one hand, I'd love to see it as a movie. BUT, I dunno if Hollywood could pull it off.

The current series I'm reading is The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan. Its a 12 book series that I'm really enjoying. Time moves slow and lots of plots going on but it keeps it interesting.

I'm not sure who would star or direct these movies but it would be fun to see if they could be done

--Andy--

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GLADIATOR by Philip Wylie.

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Originally posted by TheSomnambulist:
Notre Dame by Victor Hugo.
Although there are two versions of this book, and a Disney animated
movie, none of them have stuck to the real tragedy of the original
story. Plus none of them explored 'Notre Dame' Cathedral as a
character. So I'd love to see this made into a film. When I was
younger and dreaming of being a director this was my pet project, I
even started doodling a graphic novel of it. So this is very much top
of my list of Books into films.
In terms of cast and crew :
Director: Tim Burton
Music: Danny Elfman
Cinematographer: Stephan Czapsky
Adaptation: Richard Gravanese(sp) (He wrote Fisher King)
Cast:
Quasimodo - Ron Perlman
Frodo - Gerard Depardieu
Phoebus - Jude Law
Esmeralda - Morena Bacarin or Lenor Varela

...

Lastly a concise TV show about :
On Thousand and one Nights. With a new cast and crew every week. Telling these great fantasy tales. Some great directors could have a go at directing a show every week. That'd be fun.

Those are my choices for now. :)

TheSomnambulist

www.cirqus.com

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i third the notre dame de paris nomination! one of my very favorite books of all time. the disney version is fun in its own right, but when lined up with the movie..well..you can't. who's brilliant idea was it to make a disney movie out of that kind of tragedy, anyway?

have you seen the musical notre dame de paris? i didn't see the english version (which i heard was pretty bad) but the french version was frelling brilliant. i think up to date it is the best adaptation of that book (although i haven't seen the early 20s/30s films).

i'd been searching for an esmeralda forever and then i saw firefly and was like damn, here she is. morena baccarin would be absolutely perfect. to quote joss: "hmm..where am i going to find an olive-skinned beauty (ahemmorenaahem)?" i think summer glau would also be brilliant, especially with her dancing skills. actually, now that i'm think about it, i think i like the idea of summer even better..esmeralda was so free and innocent in the beginning.

i know nothing at all about directors so i couldn't tell you anything, but i think joss would do great with the tragedy/comedy aspect. well, not so much comedy per se, but there is a lot of humor in nddp.

gonna have to research casting a bit...i haven't thought the other characters out so much yet. who would be gringoire? easily my favorite character...casting is crucial. but for frollo, i think daneil lavoie or michel pascal would be really great. and garou for quasimodo. but then, i'm really partial to the musical casts. in fact, put richard charest and patrick fiori in there somewhere as gringoire and phoebus.

i absolute love your 1001 nights idea. i think that would be so much fun, if done correctly.

my other favorite books would be el alquimista by paulo coleho and the outsiders by s.e. hinton. i love the film version of the outsiders, although a new one would be beautiful as well. i could see james franco as dally, even though he isn't bleach blonde.

el alquimista (or the alchemist) is apparently going to be made in reality, but i haven't heard any solid plans on it yet, so i don't really know. the only thing about alquimista would be that it would seem to be actually a very slow film, since it's all about this one boy whose name is referred to about once in the entire book. some young, olive-skinned, talented (and preferably pretty) boy, a newcomer...any ideas?

wow. that was long. i apologize. i have some kind of odd attachment to notre dame de paris. i think i'll post more later .

-----
I swallowed a bug.

www.cafepress.com/airylli

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There have been many great suggestions on this thread, but here's a couple that haven't been seen yet:

Dan Simmons' Hyperion Cantos series (Hyperion, The Fall of Hyperion, Endymion and The Rise of Endymion). If you haven't read Simmons, by all means do; he's awesome.

Larry Niven's The Smoke Ring and The Integral Trees. (or any part of the Man'Kzin Wars system).

Stephen Stirling's Island in the Sea of Time series.

Well, that's more than a couple. Plus, I maintain that Dune has still not been done decently. A tough nut to crack, but surely some cinematographer could do it.

Oh, and I certainly second nominations above for the work of Heinlein, McCaffrey, and many others.

Lastly, I haven't yet seen the recent Wizard of Earthsea. Was it any good? I'm a longtime fan of Ursula LeGuin.

perfessergee

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Glory Road by Robert A. Heinlein. It starts as a war story, segues into a wonderfully witty sword-and-sorcery adventure, and finishes strong with a final third that's pure sociological Science Fiction. This is a film that I've kept casting and re-casting in my head for nearly thirty years.

Also, Laurel K. Hamilton's Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter series has massive untapped movie potential. My wife and I spend hours debating casting call for this one (So far Kevin Sorbo has the inside track for Richard).

H. Beam Piper's Lone Star Planet (AKA A Planet for Texans)could make a wonderful comedy. I see Jim Carrey as Ambassador Stephen Silk, an up-and-comer in the Terran Diplomatic Corps who finds himself assigned to the unalligned colony of New Texas, which has a rather... unique political system -- killing a practicing politician isn't considered a crime, except to the extent that the deceased polecat didn't deserve it. The trial of the killer becomes a de facto trial of the late politician's public record. Sounds like an idea whose time has come to me... Lots of room for timely satire here.

"Do you know what the definition of a hero is? It's somebody who gets somebody else killed." -- Zoë Warren

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Originally posted by airylli:

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i third the notre dame de paris nomination! one of my very favorite books of all time. the disney version is fun in its own right, but when lined up with the movie..well..you can't. who's brilliant idea was it to make a disney movie out of that kind of tragedy, anyway?

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In fairness to Disney all of the versions tend to end on a light note.

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have you seen the musical notre dame de paris? i didn't see the english version (which i heard was pretty bad) but the french version was frelling brilliant. i think up to date it is the best adaptation of that book (although i haven't seen the early 20s/30s films).

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I haven't no, I have to admit the idea of a musical version doesn't appeal to me straight away, but then I could be swayed if it really is that good. I'm just not into musicals particularly. The early 20's film, which I saw when I was young I remember as being engaging but I've forgotten about the specifics, and I'm not sure how accurate to the book it was.

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i'd been searching for an esmeralda forever and then i saw firefly and was like damn, here she is.

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Hey I thought that too!!! Although it crossed my mind that for the role she may now be too old. Esmeralda was supposed to be sixteen wasn't she? Or in her teens I think.... So it may require an entirely new face, but certainly I saw Morena and thought how pefect she is for Esmeralda.

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i think summer glau would also be brilliant, especially with her dancing skills. actually, now that i'm think about it, i think i like the idea of summer even better..esmeralda was so free and innocent in the beginning.

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That's a fair point, her free spirit is in tune with Summer, and she would seem more like a person who would have a pet goat.

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i know nothing at all about directors so i couldn't tell you anything, but i think joss would do great with the tragedy/comedy aspect. well, not so much comedy per se, but there is a lot of humor in nddp.

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You know I wondered about Joss and how he may interpret it, I'm not sure though... I think Burton is more in tune with the kind of character Quasimodo is, I mean look at Edward Scissorhands, he's not too far off the Quasimodo character. They're both handicapped, both loners, and both live in a gothic retreat... I'm sure Burton drew upon the great Gothic characters to find Edward Scissorhands so I think he's just there to start with.

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gonna have to research casting a bit...i haven't thought the other characters out so much yet. who would be gringoire?

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Yeah I totally forgot about Gringoire. Hmmm Yeah I may have to come back to you on that one, I'll give it some thought. Wait actually now I think of it Dominique Pinon from Delicatessen, and Alien4 would be superb.

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easily my favorite character...casting is crucial. but for frollo, i think daneil lavoie or michel pascal would be really great. and garou for quasimodo. but then, i'm really partial to the musical casts. in fact, put richard charest and patrick fiori in there somewhere as gringoire and phoebus.

---

Sadly I don't know these guys. I wish I did as I'd love to see how you're visualising this. Oh and apologies for spelling Frodo, in my original post, too much Lord of the Rings these days! I mixed 'em up.

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i absolute love your 1001 nights idea. i think that would be so much fun, if done correctly.

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Why thank you :) I'm often surprised that nobody in hollywood has tapped into these tales. I'd love to do these also.

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el alquimista (or the alchemist) is apparently going to be made in reality, but i haven't heard any solid plans on it yet, so i don't really know. the only thing about alquimista would be that it would seem to be actually a very slow film, since it's all about this one boy whose name is referred to about once in the entire book. some young, olive-skinned, talented (and preferably pretty) boy, a newcomer...any ideas?

---

Yeah read this a while back now, it didn't ma

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Quote:

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Originally posted by TheSomnambulist:
In fairness to Disney all of the versions tend to end on a light note.

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Haha yes, I guess they do. It's just so funny to see sometimes.

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I haven't no, I have to admit the idea of a musical version doesn't appeal to me straight away, but then I could be swayed if it really is that good. I'm just not into musicals particularly. The early 20's film, which I saw when I was young I remember as being engaging but I've forgotten about the specifics, and I'm not sure how accurate to the book it was.

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I must admit, I'm the type that comes down favorably on the side of musicals. But only if they've got a crazy good story line and involve some type of tragedy...Mamma Mia!, for example, bored me to death. The thing about Notre-Dame de Paris, though, is that there isn't a single line of spoken dialogue. Everything is sung beautifully in French. I'd recommend listing to clips of the Original Cast Recording (I think they've got them on Amazon). For starters, "Les temps de cathédrales" and "Belle" are gorgeous songs in their own right. My personal favorite is "Lune", I think. But then you could end up hating it..a lot of my friends just look at me funny when I tell them how amazing it is .

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Hey I thought that too!!! Although it crossed my mind that for the role she may now be too old. Esmeralda was supposed to be sixteen wasn't she? Or in her teens I think.... So it may require an entirely new face, but certainly I saw Morena and thought how pefect she is for Esmeralda.

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Cool, I'm not crazy! Or maybe we both are. Hee. Yeah, Morena's age is the only thing I had against her playing Esmeralda, and that's where I originally got the idea for Summer playing her instead. Although Morena has the absolute perfect look and "undefinable allure", she's not quite as carefree as Summer can be. Or maybe one day she'll do a part as Esmeralda and blow us all away. Who knows?

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That's a fair point, her free spirit is in tune with Summer, and she would seem more like a person who would have a pet goat.

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Hahahaha. I think I'm going to have to go rewatch the cow scene in "Safe".

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You know I wondered about Joss and how he may interpret it, I'm not sure though... I think Burton is more in tune with the kind of character Quasimodo is, I mean look at Edward Scissorhands, he's not too far off the Quasimodo character. They're both handicapped, both loners, and both live in a gothic retreat... I'm sure Burton drew upon the great Gothic characters to find Edward Scissorhands so I think he's just there to start with.

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You know, that's actually a really good point. I think Burton is great with the gothicism. The only thing I have with that is that a.) I'm afraid Burton will make it all wacky-like (not that I've got anything against wacky, but I don't know how that would play out with this material) and b.) I don't know how he would deal with the gothicism, whether he would actually put a focus on the cathedral, which would probably be a first, or whether he'd make all the human characters different. Man, I really want to see this film made now.

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Yeah I totally forgot about Gringoire. Hmmm Yeah I may have to come back to you on that one, I'll give it some thought. Wait actually now I think of it Dominique Pinon from Delicatessen, and Alien4 would be superb.

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Hmm..I don't think I know him. The problem I have with coming up with good casting ideas is that I seem to be physically incapable of remembering people outside of what I'm currently watching/thinking about. So right now all I can see is the Firefly cast and, for some reason, the League of Extraordinary gentlemen (). Hee and I don't think either fit all that well, outside of a few select actresses.

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Sadly I don't know these guys. I wish I did as I'd love to see how you're visualising this. Oh and apologies for spelling Frodo, in my original post, too much Lord of the Rings these days! I mixed 'em up.[/QUOTE

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