Odds & Ends
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Franchising
This year is shaping up as a particularly big year for what you might call the "mega-franchises": the really big, big franchises that are particularly prestigious and long-running: there are new installments scheduled in the Batman, Indiana Jones, Star Trek and James Bond series. The last few days have seen interesting developments on all of these properties, so I thought I'd do a quick run down on all of them. The Dark Knight Heath Ledger's tragic death death was immensely sad, obviously on its own terms but also for film fans: to take just a single example, Brokeback Mountain is one of the best films I've seen in recent years, and Ledger was vital to that success. But nerds (not to mention Hollywood execs) are a ruthless bunch, and the attention of the online film sites very quickly turned to what this meant for the latest Batman movie, The Dark Knight. (The Digital Bits also had a thought for Terry Gilliam, who was making The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus with Ledger: "Man, Terry Gilliam just can't catch a break.") The answer is it won't appreciably affect the movie: Ledger's role was complete. But it creates some trickiness in the marketing. In one sense, its a plus... there was already a lot of buzz about Ledger's performance, and if it is indeed a good one, the fact that they are releasing it posthumously just makes it more iconic. I don't think the trailer we've seen so far will be seen as in poor taste; it shows the Joker but it doesn't seem "wrong" in any way. If you haven't seen it already, it's in YouTube form below (and in much better quality here). But as some have noted, it's going to seem in poor taste if we start having Ledger's face grinning down from bus stops. My hunch is that the solution will be to run with the more oblique approach of the early posters, which still highlight the Joker (the film's main drawcard, after all) but don't hit us over the head with Ledger's presence.   Indiana Jones The trailer's coming on the 15th of February, and Ain't It Cool have a totally unverified but fairly convincing description of it here. Spoiler alerts apply. I'm excited about this... but I don't know. The pulp science fiction elements (to put it delicately for the spoiler shy) of the plot sort of make sense given the 50s setting, but still don't feel right for Indiana Jones. But we'll see. Star Trek Here's the trailer for the re-launched Star Trek: (Clearer and in the correct proportions here). For those who haven't been following this, this is a re-launch by J.J. Abrams that gives us young Kirk and Spock - hence the Enterprise being built in the trailer (why are they building it on Earth, not in orbit?). I could be wrong, but that doesn't quite look like the original series' version of the ship in the trailer; perhaps the venerable design has again been given a subtle reworking? (The lines generally seem a little closer to the first re-jigged version from the movies, but then the warp nacelles look like more like the TV series version). James Bond The new Bond film has been confirmed to be called Quantum of Solace. Along with Risico and The Property of a Lady (both popular rumoured titles for the new movie) it's one of the few unused Fleming titles left. You can see why they kept away from it - you don;t want a three word title where many people will struggle with two of the words - but it has grown on me and certainly seems thematically apt given it will apparently centre on the fall out from the events of the last film. (Semi-serialized Bond films, just like the 60s. Awesome). The reaction to it has generally been pretty ignorant, largely ignoring the fact that the title has its roots in Fleming and misrepresenting the generally positive fan reaction. For a spirited defense of the title, see CommanderBond.Net here. Here's the official plot summary, also courtesy CommanderBond.Net: QUANTUM OF SOLACE continues the high octane adventures of James Bond (DANIEL CRAIG) in CASINO ROYALE. Sounds good to me. Labels: batman, indiana jones, rumours, spielberg, star trek, superheroes, trailers Posted by Stephen Rowley @ 26.1.08  
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