213 replies to this topic

[Rory Abel]

It's been out in the US for a while now. It got generally positive reviews. It was favorable compared to the first, with a skin of gross out humor but a sentimental core.

[Nicholas Taggart]

This Disnjey deal for Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book keeps getting more interesting. I’ve learned that Henry Selick, who helmed Gaiman’s Coraline, is now attached to direct The Graveyard Book at Disney. Selick, best known for Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas and Roald Dahl’s James and the Giant Peach, is already working for Disney-based Pixar on a top secret film. But he’ll do this one after. Selick is repped by The Gotham Group. They are looking for a screenwriter now.

http://www.deadline....graveyard-book/


That is some great news. Hope it happens.

[Johnny Henning]

Strange. I read Neil Jordan was planning to adapt it.

As much as I like Selick, I sorta wish Dave McKean was directing.

[Paul F]

Strange. I read Neil Jordan was planning to adapt it.

That was a few years ago; I guess it fell apart? Selick would be great, though I guess it would probably be a long ways off it is true.

[Adam Wednesdays]

Proof that people will get way, way to upset over just about anything: Will Dial M For Murder Be Mauled By Fascists?

Alfred Hitchcock's Dial M For Murder may well have been composed so that 1.85 projections would look presentable, but that doesn't mean that a 1.78 or 1.85 version will look better than the basic and very pleasing boxy proportion that people have been watching for decades.


I've been examining Dial M for Murder all my life at 1.33 or 1.37. I saw it in 1.33 or 1.37 3D at the Eighth Street Playhouse in the West Village in the early '80s. And the compositions and framings were & are entirely satisfactory and didn't need to have their tops and buttons CHOPPED OFF WITH A MEAT CLEAVER.

If -- I say "if" -- a 1.78 or 1.85 a.r, is being favored on an upcoming Warner Home Video Bluray, it's because of one reason only -- because this a.r. conforms to the 16 x 9 aspect ratio of high-def flat panels. The people making this call, if in fact they've made such a call, are nothing but a FASCIST REVISIONIST GANG.

"We have a vision," their manifesto reads. 'A vision of all films shot from the early '50s to mid '60s with their tops and bottoms CHOPPED OFF, and we will stop at nothing to achieve that goal. Because of 16 x 9 high-def screens, we are committed to killing visual information. And we will succeed because we have the factual data and research to back up the assertion that these films were shot to be shown at 1.85, but could also be shown at 1.33 or 1.37 for purist film buff screenings and for television airings and VHS and DVD versions.

"Repeat after us: WE HAVE A VISION, and it is about KILLING VISUAL INFORMATION by slicing off the tops and bottoms of films."

These films look completely fine and have much more breathing space at 1.33 or 1.37 and in fact are VISUALLY PREFERRED this way by the Movie Godz and all good men of taste and conscience.

I feel like Gregory Peck's Captain Ahab at the end of Moby Dick: "Oh, damn thee, 1.85 aspect-ratio fascists! To the last I grapple with thee. From hell's heart I stab at thee. For hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee!"

I'm glad someone finally has the courage to make the comparison that so many moral cowards refuse to acknowledge: the similarity between fascist atrocities and the changing of aspect ratios of classic films.

NEVER FORGET!

[Christian U]

http://www.deadline....graveyard-book/


That is some great news. Hope it happens.

I love Selick, but I'd like to see a normal movie version of it, not an animated one, really (which I guess a Selick version would be?).

[steveuk]

I love Selick, but I'd like to see a normal movie version of it, not an animated one, really (which I guess a Selick version would be?).

Maybe it will be live action, they let animation directors switch over sometimes. What's the worse that could happen?



Oh...

[Paul F]

Maybe it will be live action, they let animation directors switch over sometimes. What's the worse that could happen?



Oh...

Though 21 Jump Street and Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol were both directed by animation directors too, and those both did great.

[Christian U]

Yeah, but I don't know if Selick would even want to direct a live action movie?

[steveuk]

Though 21 Jump Street and Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol were both directed by animation directors too, and those both did great.

Joke sir, joke.

Yeah, but I don't know if Selick would even want to direct a live action movie?

He directed live action sections in 'James and the Giant Peach'. He might mix it up again?

[Christian U]

He directed live action sections in 'James and the Giant Peach'. He might mix it up again?

Monkeybone was live action, too, wasn't it? I never saw that one.

[Steve Sensible]

Monkeybone is one of those movies that just makes you go

[Christian U]

It wasn't very well received, was it? I remember holding the DVD in my hand in the video rental store and thinking, weeeeeell... maybe some other time.

[steveuk]

I'm inclined to blame the story for why people don't like 'Monkeybone', not the techniques used to make it.