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"The Chronicles of Amber" and "The Forever War" For TV
DarkRabbit writes "i just noticed at the Futon Critic that the Sci-Fi channel announced April 2nd that amongst other popular pieces of fiction, Zelazney's "The Chronicles of Amber" and Haldeman's "The Forever War"
will be getting the mini-series treatment by them sometime in the next year. I'm sure their adaptions will be just as contentious here as was their version of "Dune." Oh, and "Tripping the Rift" arrives as an 'Edgy-South-Park-esque' half-hour cartoon series..."
Well I thought it was a great book, good story.
But I don't see how they could make it a miniseries.
You can't communicate the same sense of irrelevance on TV that you can in a book.
For me the fact that the characters felt so separated from the world, "They didn't know what they were fighting for".
This is a common concern in books & movies, and would be lost. (Enders game, he goes and spends a month in his boat, Armageddon, they go out for a wild party)
I just don't see it working.
They'll cut it out.
Forced sex & conscription? That will be good, might as well get the pleasure platoons out. (Moon has a harsh mistress - heinlein)
Star Ship Troopers was a decent book, but the movie just skipped all that "stuff" that didn't make a flashy movie.
Heck they didn't even have battle suits in it.
wasn't Forever Peace, but Forever Free.
Both very good books, IMHO.
Part of the feeling of irrelevance came from Joseph and Marygay's feeling of being stranded in time. ST:TNG touched on this topic one episode, though with a different treatment - the soldier who fought for a society, and is no longer able to return. In Forever War, the alienation is from cultural drift exaggerated by time dilation. In ST:TNG is was from the violence conditioning the people received in order to become soldiers.
Which brings us back to Forever Peace, in an odd way.
I also preferred the SciFi Dune miniseries to the old movie. I hope they do good treatments of both Forever War and Amber.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
In either case it will suck.
Compared to this one Lord of the Rings is a child's play. I just do not see how you can make the Courts of Chaos or the GhostWheel in a movie today. Even having the budget for all Star War flicks combined with the budget for Titanic and Independence Day.
I still get shudders remembering how did they vandalise Heinlein's "Starship Troupers". Dunno about Forever War but a miniseries on the Amber Chronicles will make that debacle seem like a work of high art by comparison...
Shudder... Shudder...
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"The Chronicles of Amber" is my favorite book series, hands-down. I've honestly feared the day that Hollywood or some TV producer finally got their hands on this series, because I have no doubt that they will completely ruin it like they have so many other of my favorites. I just can't stand having everyone's opinion of a book based off of some hack-job movie, like "Starship Troopers."
It's not like it would be hard to do the series right with modern moviemaking technology -- it is just completely unlikely. No good book gets made into a screenplay without something getting screwed. Parts will be cut out and minor scenes and characters will be made much more important, like Irulan in the new "Dune" mini-series. You can expect every sex scene Zelazny puts off to the side to get about 5 good minutes in each episode, while Corwin and Merlin's various solioquys will probably be cut.
I mean, why bother expecting continuity to the letter with the little details when they'll be too busy raping the spirit of the books like they do with everything else.
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I'm not sure about this one. I'm usually pretty skeptical when it comes to series/mini-series/movies based on books I've read and liked. I'm not saying thy are all worthless of course and some very decent adaptations have been made, yet I'm allways a little disappointed. I read a lot and love the way imagination is used when reading, something that is totally devoid in videos/TV etc...
Because of this, I'm dissapointed when I see a movie after reading the book and at the same time I'm usually not as enthralled when reading the book after seeing a movie (as it was the cas for Jurassic Park for example).
What I'm trying to get at is that these series are cool, yes but who are they targeted to? The readers who may be dissapointed? or the people who hav'nt read the books (lots of them running about) and that may be dissapointed if tey decide to do so after? Or probably your average viewer who hs'nt read the book, will like the series and will not read the book?
Who's a winner in this situation?
how does one change his
Imagine Amber as a 2-hour mini-series. It is enough to cover the first *book*, maybe. If anyone had the feeling that Lord of the Rings was rushed, this will be ten times worse.
Then 'Forever War'. One word: Battlesuits. Certainly the special effects technology is up to showing them... but *you can't see the actor's face* in a battlesuit. My bet is they'll throw away any part the book which doesn't relate to combat action, and botch that by throwing away the suits. Result: a 'Starship Troopers' clone. Enough Said.
WHY can't the movie industry *build* on the great SF out there? Imagine "Snow Crash" done with the technology used for "Final Fantasy". Imagine Lord of the Rings as a *series* - say, 5 hours for each book. Imagine a production of "Bridge of Birds" on the same lines as "Princes Bride". I could go on for *hours*.
Maybe "we" ("the guild of paying movie-goers and ad-watchers") don't deserve any better. Even when a good production gets made (by accident or thanks to the courage of some producer), it tends to be a commercial flop.
Take for example the animation move done based on "The Last Unicorn" by Peter S. Beagle. Can you believe it? serious fantasy, in animation, not targeted at kids! In a word: a flop. You probably never even heard of it, but trust me, you won't regret seeing it, even if you've read the book.
BOOK. That's the answer, *read a good book*. Come to think of it... it doesn't have ads, it costs very favorably compared to a movie ticket, and you don't need Tivo to time-shift it!
Just been bought FW for by birthday. Not bad, some interesting stuff, but it didn't seem like great or anything. Just another Vietnam-era "fighting-a-pointless-war" thing, plus teenage male fantasy stuff with compulsory promiscuity. Interesting ideas in changing society over time, but nothing outstanding ("Brave New World" but gay).
Trouble is, most SF authors are good at coming up with ideas but crap at writing. Witness Clarke, Asimov, Bova, Bear (and Crichton just about makes SF too) - all got great ideas and concepts, but lousy execution.
Off the topic, anyone know anything about Laurence M Janifer? I've got his book "Survivor", and that seems pretty good - pretty well-written, decent characterisation, basically an intelligent SF action book. Anyone know what his other stuff is like? I reckon that kind of thing would translate pretty well to screen.
Grab.
Star Ship Troopers was a decent book, but the movie just skipped all that "stuff" that didn't make a flashy movie.
As was said at the time: "Starship troopers: Based on the back of a book by Robert A Heinlein"
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I, too, was a bit disappointed by the second Amber series, but let's cut Roger a little slack. If I recall correctly, it was supposed to be only three books. I think he ran against two problems that caused the work to suffer: 1) it was obvious that Merlin's story wasn't going to fit into three books, and 2) Zelazny knew he was dying and hadn't a lot of time to finish.
Yeah, not as good as the first series, but not a bad read overall. (Of course, he's in my Top Three Authors of the 20th Century, so I'm biased.)
Tripping the Rift...hooo, boy, that's going to be interesting.
gm
Ad luna, Alicia! Ad luna!
>Just been bought FW for by birthday. Not bad, some interesting stuff, but it didn't seem like great or anything. Just another Vietnam-era "fighting-a-pointless-war" thing, plus >teenage male fantasy stuff with compulsory promiscuity. Interesting ideas in changing society over time, but nothing outstanding ("Brave New World" but gay).
The book is really about how the experience of war seperates the poor bastards made to fight in it from the rest of society. The time-dilation plot device (tours of duty last a few month subjectively, but hundreds of years pass back on earth) is just an exaggerated metaphor for what the author felt like after returning from his own stint in Vietnam.
I found it to be a really moving, an rather well written book. Definitelyone of the best anti-war novels I have ever read and a good contender for a place in the top ten SF novels.