ford91exploder
Resident Curmudgeon
In the case of Dragons - perhaps thousands of years, There IS no comparison here, just Iger trying to chase some 'free' money from a film with a extremely unpleasant message
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- Thread starter Tim_4
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In the case of Dragons - perhaps thousands of years, There IS no comparison here, just Iger trying to chase some 'free' money from a film with a extremely unpleasant message
ToTBellHop
Well-Known Member
The donkey dressed as Buckbeak would have been a treat. They would have picked up a mutt from the humane society to play Sirius Black and a tabby cat for McGonagle.
Padraig
Well-Known Member
I agree entirely; but those points have been already made before.
Universal has apparently just greenlit their Jurassic Park expansion. As for progress on Avatar land..... nada.
AndyMagic
Well-Known Member
I remember reading about his trip when Everest was announced and thinking that such frivolity was probably partly responsible for the bloated attraction budgets and misplaced priorities coming out of WDI. So much care and time and money was spent to make sure the mountain and queue was "authentic" and the ride experience itself just seemed like an afterthought. "Show scenes? Who needs them! Look how pretty everything is!" Why should it matter that the inside of the mountain is filled with steel beams, or that the climax and main show scene happens too quickly to be worth the expense, we went on road trips and researched the proper font for the signage! Whoohooo!!!
PeterAlt
Well-Known Member
You know the Avatar screenplay leaked years before they started filming it. Screenplay experts called the leaked script at the time "the best movie never made."
Could it be that the reason people complain that it's not original is because the leaked script allowed plenty of time for other writers and film makers to be inspired by it. It's like saying Revenge of the Sith is not an original story because we heard it before told by the ghost of Obi Wan in Return of the Jedi. The story for Revenge of the Sith was outlined years before Return of the Jedi even. It just took a few decades to finally make it. The same is true with the movie Battle Angel Cameron has been planning to make way before production started on Avatar. Battle Angel is the next film planned after the three Avatar sequels. He will film all three Avatar sequels at the same time, so Battle Angel isn't that long of a wait... 2019 maybe?
SirLink
Well-Known Member
I don't think that is the case not when they overcharge on essential construction equipment. At some point if you want to have authenticity you have to visit the area. What were you expecting it has the same amount of show scenes on BTMR .... But I'm glad the outside fits and enhances the Asia section in the most beautiful park they built stateside...just a same TDO cut the cost.
danlb_2000
Premium Member
The basic story of Avatar and all these other movies has been around since the 1800's in the form of the Pocahontas legend.
PeterAlt
Well-Known Member
You can say the same about Star Wars. Movies where the hero saves the princess have been out for a while!
FrankLapidus
Well-Known Member
Captain Neo
Well-Known Member
That research could have been done on the internet it ate budget that could have been spent on making the ride better. Instead we just have a roller coaster ride through an empty warehouse building. Even the Matterhorn built at Disneyland in the 50s when the company barely had pennies to their name had themed indoor environments that they continued to improve and detail over the years.
PeterAlt
Well-Known Member
It was on the website of the author of my screenplay writing text book from my Advanced Screenplay Writng class at UCF. The name of the text book was How to Make a Good Screenplay Great. I don't know the name of the author... I can't even remember the name of my instructor...
SirLink
Well-Known Member
Nope a research trip doesn't eat in a budget like that ... its the BTMR for DAK and it looks beautiful in the most beautiful park in North America.
FrankLapidus
Well-Known Member
Linda Seger. So it was only one expert?
An early Avatar script leaked in 1994 so its perfectly conceivable that Cameron saw Dances with Wolves in 1990 and thought "I'll write that film and set in space", right?
PeterAlt
Well-Known Member
Anything is possible and that's around the year I took that class. It was more than just that one person who said that. If you do a search of websites about screenplay writing dated before Avatar was a known production, you will find similar statements. I'm looking right now for some.
FrankLapidus
Well-Known Member
So am I but I can't find anything about a leaked Avatar script being labelled the "greatest film never made" by anyone who could be labelled a "screenplay expert". If you can find a screenplay expert who said that then I'd been interested to read it.
When all is said and done it is the final script that counts. Personally, I thought Avatar's was dull, predictable and derivative of other well-known stories. But that's just my opinion.
PeterAlt
Well-Known Member
Look in sites about screenplay writing... Still looking... They're there. I've seen them.
FrankLapidus
Well-Known Member
I have, I've even Googled "leaked Avatar script the greatest film never made" and still got nothing.
PeterAlt
Well-Known Member
PeterAlt
Well-Known Member
I used "best screenplays never produced avatar" as the search terms.
FrankLapidus
Well-Known Member
So its basically the script that was pretty much the one we saw in the film that was heavily influenced (some might say a rip-off) of the Pocahontas legend and Dances with Wolves?
I found this critique of the leaked script:
http://www.cinemablend.com/new/Script-Review-James-Cameron-s-Avatar-7074.html
Some excerpts that give an idea of the writer's take on the leaked script:
"James Cameron’s Avatar is like Aliens meets Lord of the Rings if it were written by Al Gore, with the battle of Endor thrown in for good measure. It’s preachy, it’s repetitive, it’s derivative, and in spite of that when you see it up on a movie screen there’s a pretty good chance it’ll be the coolest thing you’ve ever seen."
"The early draft of Cameron’s script that this review is based upon, includes almost no actual lines of dialogue. Instead it’s pages are filled with lavish descriptions of places, creatures, and events. When characters must speak, the focus in the script is more on what their thinking, than in coming up with clever lines. If someone gives an impassioned speech, the script simply says “he gave an impassioned speech”, rather than telling you what he said. By contrast, Cameron has written volumes describing complicated visual sequences. It’s pretty clear he had special effects on the brain when he wrote it."
"So what the heck is this movie about? It’s pretty standard stuff really. A distant future where man has spoiled and overpopulated the Earth so badly that we’ve gone out into the cosmos searching for other planets to rape. The human race’s prime candidate is Pandora, a planet in a nearby star system inhabited by intelligent, bipedal natives."
"Once Josh gets to the planet, the script’s first 90 of its 166 pages are spent almost entirely repeating this sequence: Josh or some other humans are attacked by the vicious alien animal and plant life on Pandora. They repel/escape/die from the attack. Repeat a few times. Take a break to tell us something about the human settlement on Pandora and the horrible way in which dumb, stupid, humans are raping the planet’s environment. Another attack by the planet’s much lauded environment. More preaching about how awful the humans are for shooting everything in sight. Keep repeating this until your eyes roll back in your head."
"This will probably work better on screen, since we’ll all be much too busy being wowed by whatever amazing beasties Cameron has dreamed up to notice all the over the top (and frankly illogical in light of the planet’s hellish, anti-human nature) environmental messages we’re being clubbed to death with, or to realize that basically the movie’s just doing the same thing over and over again. At least I hope so. Otherwise, Cameron needs to step down off his soap box and then cut about 40 or 50 pages out of his script."
"The whole thing culminates quite literally in an Ewoks versus Empire style super-battle, with the natives using such familiar Ewok battle tactics such as falling rocks, log battering rams, giant nets, and bolos to fight a desperate war against the encroaching death machines of Earth’s military industrial complex."
"Avatar doesn’t turn into Quigley Down Under, it absolutely is Quigley Down Under right from the start. Cameron has just copy/pasted the entire script onto an alien planet, removed its sense of humor, and added more action sequences."
"It’s just not much of a read. The real focus of Avatar’s script is in stunning, massive, over-sized, awe-inspiring visuals and I expect the movie to deliver those in such massive quantities that the stupidity of the pages on which its based on will go almost entirely unnoticed. I think the word I’m looking for here is “spectacle”."
Clearly the leaked script is just as divisive as one we saw on screen
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