I’m going to go out on a limb and predict this is going to be horrid:
Atlas is finally shrugging towards theater screens. A few weeks ago we told you that producer John Aglialoro was going to get a feature version of Ayn Rand’s novel together come hell or high water. And, indeed, cameras started to roll on Atlas Shrugged Part One over the weekend. Who are the star and director? Same guy: Paul Johansson, of the TV show One Tree Hill.
Will it outperform an American Carol?
*** Update ***
Has anyone seen The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus? Going to rent a movie from pay per view, and it is down to that or Avatar, which I have also never seen.
D0n Camillo
If this doesn’t help us differentiate between parasites and producers, nothing will.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
Someone brought up An American Carol a few threads back and I thought they were talking about some Christmas flick. Had never heard of it till now. I see it was about some pinko libtard out to get rid of the July 4 celebration – the war on independence, I guess. Wingnuts are weird, ain’t they?
Incertus (Brian)
Oh, it’ll probably do fairly well. The Jesus Chainsaw Massacre was a blockbuster, and the Randroids are at least as psycho as fundy Christians. Plus, most Randroids have money to go to the movies, since they’re still living at home.
ellaesther
I love it when you take a risky stance, John Cole.
ellaesther
@Incertus (Brian): With the understanding that “do well” and “be good” are not, necessarily, synonymous phrases.
malraux
I really think Battlefield Earth is a much better comparison. Both are bad novels that have a weird cult following.
Incertus (Brian)
@ellaesther: I’d say they’re often at odds. I’m not a complete film snob, one who argues that financial success and artistic quality are mutually exclusive, but there is often a strong negative correlation between the two.
Sentient Puddle
Wait, Atlas Shrugged, Part One?
middlewest
I’ll be optimistic here. Maybe it will be just successful enough to finally clue people into the fact that Rand’s heroes are rapists.
Mark S.
Um, okay. The final product is probably going to look like something Ed Wood might’ve made.
tomjones
@ellaesther: I think you meant wide stance.
Mnemosyne
I looked at his photos on IMDb and he looks like exactly the kind of douchebag who would be straining at the bit to adapt an Ayn Rand novel.
Just sayin’.
trollhattan
“Battlefield Earth Two” bitchez. John Galt meets Xenu, now with orks.
beltane
Are they trying to force people to take up pot smoking again? I could watch this movie, I think, but only under the influence of something strong.
Perry Como
@Mark S.: I was thinking Uwe Boll.
lamh32
OT, but not surprisingly TNC over at the Atlantic has a great response to GOP Rep King’s “Obama favors Black People” remarks:
Because There Are No Racists…
Tom Hilton
Not much info on the IMDb page. No question that it’ll be terrible, and it’ll probably do terrible business as well. For me the question is whether they’ll put audiences to sleep by filming Galt’s speech in its entirety, or incur the wrath of the Randroids by abridging it.
jl
@Sentient Puddle:
Of course, part one. It figures.
Anyone know how many parts this thing will have?
Will they stuff the remaining parts into a improvised conclusion after the first parts bomb, of just shut it down?
This thing might make for some interesting and very obscure cinematic historical trivia.
El Cid
Coming soon to a Wal-Mart checkout line discounted DVD shelf near you.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
Maybe they can get this nutbug to make a tea party movie
jl
To bad Klaus Kinski is gone, he could make this thing work, danggummit.
Midnight Marauder
Seems rather appropriate.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
deleted due to author being an idiot.
maus
@middlewest: Uh, the Teabaggers already don’t care that Rand was pro-choice with a fondness for axe murderers. They worship power too, so I don’t think there are any “gotchas”.
@Mark S.: Yeah, but I think more idiot Beck-heads would see this. If they follow the “sell blocks of tickets to organizations” distribution that worked so well with Narnia, they could BANK on these flicks.
I mean, they’ll fuck it up somehow, but there’s the potential for these people to profit off the recent Randroid beatification.
@Tom Hilton:
Fairly certain that they’ll take liberties with abridgement.
@trollhattan:
Oh man, I hope this gets a Rifftrax too.
Shawn in ShowMe
With deep-pocket devotees like Alan Greenspan, you’d think the big screen version of Going Galt could attract a bigger budget than Clerks 2.
jwb
@Incertus (Brian): I’m guessing this will bomb in both areas, especially if the film is at all faithful to the book: too much talk, not enough things blowing up.
Riggsveda
John, both movies are great eye candy. I have a soft spot for Gilliam, and thought Imaginarium was wonderful, although the story kind of peters out toward the end. But if I was recommending anything lately it would probably be Big Fan.
Mark S.
Battlefield Earth and The Passion at least had budgets. They’re just rushing it out because some dude is about to lose his rights to the film.
The same thing happened with the Fantastic Four. Somebody didn’t want to lose their rights to the movie so they put out some movie that cost about $50 to make.
Martin
The best part will be when it bombs terribly, it’ll all be the fault of a conspiracy of Hollywood liberals who refused to fund it, promote it, critics who panned it, etc. No mention that in the free market, it might have just sucked porcupine balls.
maus
@Martin: Can’t wait for Breitbart’s upcoming knob-slob feast with the director.
middlewest
@lamh32: The most telling part is that King interpreted Holder’s “we average Americans” to mean “white people”.
Mark S.
I used to have permission to edit my comments.
jwb
@Riggsveda: I also liked Imaginarium quite a lot.
SiubhanDuinne
@Mark S.:
Arguably, Ed Wood’s involvement might make it a better film.
But last I heard, I thought Brad Pitt and Angelia Jolie were all set to produce/direct/star in Atlas. Wonder what happened to that, ’cause a couple of years ago it was being talked about as pretty much a done deal.
Malron
Maybe, but it’ll never be as good as Fahrenhype 911.
Parnassus was a good movie. Its pretty interesting watching Jude Law, Johnny Depp and Colin Farrell sub for Heath Ledger due to his untimely death during the making of the film.
Mnemosyne
@SiubhanDuinne:
Somebody forced them to sit down and actually read the book?
joe from Lowell
@Middlewest,
My thoughts exactly. Are they really going to have the hero stand back and enjoy the killing of everyone on the train?
jwb
@Martin: No, I’m pretty sure they’ll deploy for the “it’s too deep to be filmed” defense.
Mark S.
@SiubhanDuinne:
He would, but objectivists might get confused when John Galt develops a penchant for cross-dressing.
Martin
@Mark S.: Your edits sucked. We’re giving editorial control of your posts to Mnemosyne. Your pay will hereby be reduced by 20%.
N M
@jl: @Tom Hilton:
See this is why it’s Part One — the Galt speech is part Two and drifts into Part Three a little, only broken up by a rape flashback or two (the speech audio is actually overlaid on the flashbacks). I kid, I kid.
The Galt speech is just the first half of Part Two and there is a 10 minute intermission. Then the rapes.
Martin
@Mnemosyne: I think someone mentioned it would be the complete end of both of their careers.
SiubhanDuinne
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
Good lord, where did you find that?!
Fits right in with DougJ’s thread on the South, dunnit?
Martin
@jwb: Ah, yes. I forgot about that one. Funny how that’s true of every ‘conservative’ film.
Kyle
I predict that after it bombs financially, they’ll find all manner of “government interventions” and “market distortions” to explain it away. Because something so fucking awesome couldn’t possibly fail in a free market.
It’s what they do every time their tard-tastic “free market” political “philosophy” dishes up yet another greed-fueled disaster.
middlewest
@maus: Not teabaggers, I meant real people. Most people really don’t know how bad this shit is, and that’s why it festers.
malraux
Imaginarium is a Terry Gilliam film, which is to say that its a glorious failure. IMO, his films never come together exactly right, and I love them both in spite of and because of that. Except for Time Bandits, that was the perfect film.
Avatar is pretty much exactly what Imaginarium isn’t. It’s eye candy, pure and simple. The bad guy is bad and does bad things. The good guys have a pretty cookie cutter good guy story arc. That said, it was technically very well done. By that, I mean that it goes for the show don’t tell route, pacing was about right, etc. Cameron shows a high degree of getting most of the stuff right about film making.
If you just want to go for a night of alcohol++, Avatar is the right choice. If you want something that will be unlike anything you’ve seen before, go for Imaginarium, but don’t have high expectations.
SiubhanDuinne
@Mark S.: Oh Noez! The Cashmere Sweater Manufacturing Barons have gone on strike!!
Splitting Image
@Incertus (Brian):
I’d say the main difference is how much money they make over time, not the gross overall take. For example, Dark Side of the Moon and Saturday Night Fever have sold similar numbers of records, but one did it in a massive burst of activity in the late 1970s and the other did it through a decades-long drive fueled by word of mouth. It is unsurprising that one is regarded as better than the other.
Movies are the same. Many “blockbusters” produced over half of their eventual sales in the first weekend. They are almost uniformly forgotten by the next year. Other movies which did poorly at first were able to develop a strong following and are now regarded as classics. Many of Terry Gilliam’s movies, for example.
Good movies will find a market and eventually make money. Quality doesn’t suffer because investors demand a return on their money, but because they demand an immediate return on it. Hence the push for the big opening weekend.
jwb
@General Egali Tarian Stuck: The Onion couldn’t do better—probably means he’ll win.
middlewest
Wait. I get why they would make an Atlas Shrugged film. But why release it? Shouldn’t they be withholding it from the undeserving masses?
nicteis
True, Malraux. But I’d say Imaginarium gets closer to coming together than any other Gilliam but Time Bandits and Brazil. It has a consistent emotional core.
Anne Laurie
John, go with Imaginarium. Not a perfect movie, but how can you not watch a feature performance by the adorable Lily Cole?
WereBear
Just goes to show that unfilmable has multiple meanings.
Crusty Dem
Atlas Shrugged? I’ll watch if for Pam Geller. She always brings the craazzzzzzzzzzy*.
* extra z’s for extra crazy
Ab_Normal
Be sure and sit through the end credits?!? Bah, the indie theater we saw Imaginarium at cut off the credits as they were late to switch to the next movie… crap!
QuaintIrene
Leonard Part Six
malraux
The other movie consideration is if you plan on upgrading your home theater significantly any time soon, you should watch Avatar after that point.
TR
If you want to get a real taste of the suckitude potential of this movie, check out this short clip of the star/director’s previous work.
suzanne
@SiubhanDuinne:
Given their politics and humanitarianism, that strikes me as very weird.
But if the movie bombs, ruins their careers, and thereby gets “Brangelina” out of the public consciousness, then I say they should do it. Are there two more annoying people on earth?
FlipYrWhig
“The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus” will forever be hampered by its title’s similarity to the Troy McClure comeback vehicle The Contrabulous Fabtraption of Professor Horatio Hufnagel. To me at least.
FlipYrWhig
@suzanne:
Yes, very many.
ed
Haven’t seen Imaginarium, but if it’s as unspeakably horrible as Tideland, it still won’t be as bad as Avatar. Cheez Ball Central.
slag
@Anne Laurie: Haha! I was wondering if anyone was going to bring up that link. Obligatory “John Cole doesn’t read this blog; he finds it smug” comments to follow.
stevie314159
Let’s have a Atlas Shrugged/Red Dawn remake double feature.
Then let’s lock the movie theatre doors and re-enact the scene from Carrie.
THAT’S ENTERTAINMENT!
Lurking Canadian
Dan Scott is John Galt? Tee Hee! The man is good at playing Snidely Whiplash way over the top (he’s the only thing tolerable about the second season of One Tree Hill), but he can’t do anything else. Resolute hero, he’s not.
Unless this is a piss-take on Atlas Shrugged, he’s going to be absolutely terrible. I can’t wait!
Henry
I really liked Avatar, but I’m not sure there’s much point in seeing it without 3D. So unless you recently picked up one of those snazzy new 3D tvs, i would go with… something else*. If, on the other hand, you did get that tv, then Avatar all the way.
*have you seen District B13? It’s about awesome french ninjas, starring the founder of parkour. Don’t get it for the acting or the plot. Do get it for the amazing parkour and fight choreography.
Uloborus
I saw Avatar. It is… epic science fiction eye candy. If you like epic science fiction eye candy, it is fabulous epic science fiction eye candy. If you want a deep plot, or characters, or don’t think panoramas of lush CGI jungles are enough to fill an hour, avoid it like the plague.
I haven’t seen Imaginarium. It is sitting in its DVD case right now waiting for me to recover enoguh from my weekend to enjoy it.
maus
@stevie314159:
I don’t have telekinesis, but I have seen Inglourious Basterds.
Also, for the love of god, stay away from Avatar. It was bad enough getting dragged to it the first time, the plot is so very much more naked and ugly without the visual thrill.
@Uloborus:
Alternate suggestion:
Rent Sunshine on Blu-Ray.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@Anne Laurie: Yes. Anything with Lily Cole is well worth watching.
Even St. Trinian’s.
dm
John: The Imaginarium has Tom Waits playing the Devil. What more do you need to know?
elmo
@middlewest:
So.
Much.
Love.
YellowJournalism
You’ve most likely picked your movie by now, but I would say go for Imaginarium. Blue smurfs recreating Dances with Wolves in a futuristic setting just doesn’t do it for me.
@FlipYrWhig: I would say that a better comparison would be this Dustin Hoffman flick for similar title absurdity.
elmo
Remember the video game Myst?
If you liked Myst, you’ll probably like Avatar. No plot. Lots of pretty.
Alternatively, you could spend three fucking hours staring at pictures of leaves in HD. Pretty much the same effect, without being annoyed at the plot holes or annoying characters.
planetjanet
It is hard to pick between The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus and Avatar. Both are incredible visual creations. If you want to be awed by the ability of the human mind to create complete new realities, full of colors and smells and vivid living textures, you need to see them both.
Both have flawed plots. I would say Avatar’s plot is a bit more predictable. It will also be around and accessible for the rest of your natural life. Not so for the dear Dr. I will also be a techno-geek and say that 50% of the thrill of Avatar is seeing it in a full size theater in IMAX 3D so you can walk through the tree of life and fly on the back of the banshee. If a DVD is all you have, curl up with the Imaginarium.
YellowJournalism
@maus: Did you find Inglorious Basterds to be underwhelming? I thought the first half was excellent, on its way to being a “grown up, respectable” Tarantino. Then the second half fell apart for me, almost the result of what a 14-year-old Tarantino copy-cat would daydream in history class rather than even the fun Tarantino of Kill Bill or Jackie Brown
.
BTW, Kill Bill Volume 3 has been announced for 2014.
suzanne
@planetjanet:
Understatement of the month.
QuaintIrene
I hear there’s a remake of ‘Motel Hell’ in the works.
Quaker in a Basement
Has anyone seen The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus?
I saw it in the theater. Recommend!Tom Waits is Satan–ha! And ditto whoever said that anything in which young Miss Cole appears is worth watching. She’s a beauty!
Phoebe
I hated both, but Imaginarium much much less.
Southern Beale
This should soften the blow now that it appears the release of the new “Red Dawn” has been indefinitely shelved. Wolverines!
FlipYrWhig
@YellowJournalism: Ha! I hadn’t heard of that one! Hoffman’s Magorium/Emporium has to be a tribute to McClure’s Fabtraption.
Batocchio
Imaginarium is all right, more interesting if you’re a Gilliam fan. There are flashes of the real Gilliam at times, and those are great – some fantastic images, exciting ideas and interesting character moments. However, Ledger died during production and they had to stop and rewrite the script for about two months. Their fix is quite clever, but still, it’s a salvage job, uneven and a bit incoherent at times. Tom Waits rocks as the Devil, though. (Also, the story behind the film, of Depp, Farrell and Law donating their salaries to Ledger’s daughter, is pretty cool.)
Cassidy
Skip the Gilliam schlock and watch Pandorum, if you’re wanting to see sci fi.
El Cid
Imaginarium was okay. Pretty good.
Califlander
Saw them both. Go with Avatar.
delosgatos
@Sentient Puddle:
Atlas Shrugged, episode 1: Atlas Hunched His Shoulders!
Daddy-O
@YellowJournalism: I had to come to an understanding that Inglourious Basterds is not your run-of-the-mill WW II Nazi story, but a FANTASY. Especially the ending. Then it does more than just work–it’s sublime.
Not since I was a kid have I actively rooted for GIs to kill Nazis in a movie. It took Tarantino to bring that out in me–and I have no neocon bad taste of shame in my mouth as a result, either.
This was just one more underrated Brad Pitt role. Because of supermarket tabloids and his marriage to Angelina, he will never be nominated, much less win an Oscar, but he certainly deserved it for The Assassination of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford, one of the best films I’ve seen in the last ten years.
I can’t honestly think why anyone would watch Avatar WITHOUT 3D, on a big screen, but there you go…I vote for Imaginarium. Heath Ledger’s last film shows us why, perhaps, he was so out of it that he ended up dead…every scene, he’s sweating profusely, hair dirty and awry, bearded and suspicious. I thought it was tremendously satisfying, especially for a Gilliam film.
Some found the addition of the extra actors to finish it a bad decision, but it honestly didn’t seem to make much difference to me. It COULD have been written as such, anyway, if Gilliam’d had the budget. But since they filmed the ending WITH Ledger, by some miracle coincidence, it all comes together.
Tom Waits–best FILM Devil, EVER.
Daddy-O
@Anne Laurie: Hey, Anne Laurie, I have a question about that cookie at the end of “Imaginarium”: I ‘saw’ it on the big screen, but I just wondered how they could pull it off on a DVD…? It doesn’t seem to me that it could be quite the same as what I went through when I…in an attempt to avoid a spoiler, I’ll say ‘experienced’ it.
I was the only one left in the theater when it happened, and I was completely fooled. The lights were up! The screen was dark! Hell, I work in a movie theater…I know when the movie is over, or I sure thought I did!
I was looking around in the front rows for…you know. Then…I realized the film wasn’t over yet.
I was flabbergasted and outright snookered. I had no conclusion left but this: that trick was wonderful!
malraux
One of the problems Nazis have had in various fictions recently is that most works just assume the Nazis are evil. Basterds took the time to really show the Nazis being evil. The whole opening in the farmhouse is really key to the whole film. Waltz really played up his part perfectly.
Laff
Avatar if you don’t want to do too much thinking. I actually prefer it in “2-D”. Much brighter picture and I don’t need to look away every ten minutes. It’s a great movie.
Imaginariam if you feel like watching a great film.
YellowJournalism
@malraux: Daddy-O just put the thought in my head that the entire thing may be a fantasy in the mind of the girl as she runs from the farmhouse. I can even accept a fantasy, whether it’s in the girl’s mind or just from Tarantino’s, but for some reason it just didn’t hold solid for me.
I will say, though, that I entirely agree that Brad Pitt was overlooked come Oscar nom time. (Like many people, sadly.) The acting in the movie was wonderful, even Eli Roth. (He should stick with the acting.) The writing was excellent. The final half hour of the film just felt incomplete somehow, save for the final iconic shot. The final act of the film felt rushed and sloppy compared to the first two.
Anton Sirius
The Fountainhead + The Room = Paul Johansson’s Atlas Shrugged.
That’s a formula for absolute comedy gold. This thing will play midnight screenings for the rest of eternity… or at least until the first Objectivist shoots up a theater to try and get people to stop laughing at it.
Hob
I liked Imaginarium a lot. It sure is a mess, but in a good way. I wrote some stuff about it on a blog (slightly spoilery I guess).
Sly
@jl:
Galt’s 90-page radio speech would be a trilogy unto itself.
Geeno
@Phoebe: Now THERE’S some high praise.
Bubblegum Tate
@Crusty Dem:
Did you see that Atlas Pammy is a victim of the vicious PayPal jihad? I love it.
ks
Imaginarium! Avatar is fun, but I suspect a little less so w/o the 3D. Imaginarium is a bit of a mess, but it’s super-creative and fun.
soonergrunt
Who the fuck is Paul Johansson, of the TV show One Tree Hill?
maus
@Bubblegum Tate: Obviously the truly free market will provide her another reliable, trustworthy funding source.
mantis
If you enjoyed The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, you’ll probably like Imaginarium.
Tom Waits is great, and so is Heath Ledger for the parts he’s in. How Gilliam dealt with his absence for the rest of the film was interesting, and probably the best he could have done without reshooting the entire thing without Ledger.
asiangrrlMN
@soonergrunt: Ditto this. I had no clue who he was. Even when I looked him up on imdb.com, I had no clue.
@middlewest: Even more discouraging is that more than one of TNC’s commenters felt the same way. In reading the snippet, I did not. And, why is this coming up again? Holder made that speech ages ago.
@Martin: Heh. That’s funny. Mebbe she could edit mine as well.
Fwiffo
I liked Imaginarium. It’s full of Terry Gilliam conceits, which I think is good on balance. The way they worked around Heath Ledger’s death worked so well with his character and the story, it’s actually kinda creepy.
GlenInBrooklyn
Thanks, John,
I just e-mailed everyone I know who I know who read Atlas Shrugged (and to whom I’m still speaking).
Part One? Galt’s speech could be parts 15-25.
CaseyL
The Imaginarium of Dr Parnassus is prettier than it is interesting. I agree with Fwiffo that the way they dealt with Ledger’s death was ingenious to the point of eerie. Unfortunately, IMO, the story was very slight, so in order to fill the time the plot/action dragged a good bit, and I thought there was a lot of filler.
Definitely worth seeing for the visuals alone, which are truly stunning; and much of the acting is wonderful. It’s just not something you’ll think a lot about, afterward.
Ash Can
I predict they’ll keep rolling until the enterprise runs out of money halfway through some almighty stupid, fucking interminable speech, at which point the editors will scramble to hammer something together from the hot mess that’s already in the can, and put it out on DVD. They’ll sell about 22 copies, and everyone involved in this misbegotten project will be working at chair joints and car washes by the end of the year.
Ecks
As everyone says, Avatar is an audaciously pretty film, and the plot is actually pretty good by James Cameron standards (compare to titanic… [wince]). The characters are 2D, but they aren’t really the point.
As for “The Assassination of Jesse James”… a very well acted and extremely dull film IMHO. Or maybe I wasn’t in a grim enough mood to get into it. meh.
Anne Laurie
@Daddy-O:
I’m curious about this myself — haven’t had the chance to watch the DVD version yet. It was a great way to send you out of the theatre with a smile on your face, yes?
maus
@YellowJournalism:
I found it at first utterly enveloping, and then slapstick retarded. Just “holy shit are they going to oh goodness they are”. It was an excellent rush, and the homages just get better as he goes along.
I also loved Grindhouse, for what it’s worth. APPARENTLY NOT ENOUGH OTHERS DID.
Michael
I’d rather see the star be David Johansen. He could play Henry Reardon as Buster Poindexter.
That’s about as serious as Atlas Shrugged deserved.
mutt
SLICE! Its Hilarious! If you only see ONE “Family Movie” this year……see SLICE.
My wife is a biotech researcher- recombinant DNA, new life forms in petri dishes…..its her maddest deams made real……
If you like kittykats- what sane person dosnt?- youll love thier kid……
Dog is My Copilot
We saw Avatar this past weekend and thought it was great (not great enough to be nominated for an Oscar, though). The special effects are some of the best I’ve seen.