American McGee To Adapt Oz As Movie

Ant writes "According to ShackNews and Hollywood Reporter, American McGee's "Oz" is back on track in several ways. Infogrames dropped the Wizard of Oz based videogame a while ago, but it's being revived now that McGee will be writing an Oz movie script for producer Jerry Bruckheimer. McGee said: "The hero of the story, a teenage boy named Arthur, is whisked away from Earth to an Oz in turmoil. Like Neo in 'The Matrix' films, the boy makes a hero's journey and comes to grips with his powers," he said. "What Jerry Bruckheimer was able to do with 'Pirates of the Caribbean' was simply brilliant, and since 'Oz' is similar in tone to that film franchise, I'd like to follow that model.""

Comments

Translation

[MyLongNickName]

"What Jerry Bruckheimer was able to do with 'Pirates of the Caribbean' was simply brilliant, and since 'Oz' is similar in tone to that film franchise, I'd like to follow that model."

Babel Fish translation: "It made a crapload of money. Rather than go a different direction, which requires creativity, I'd like to copy it and make my own crapload of money."

That Babelfish gets better and better with each passing year!

Re:Translation

[bluephone]

He could at least have kept Dorthy a girl, rather than changing it to a boy. After all, isn't the core of the film "A young girl awakens in an alien landscape to discover she has accidentally killed a woman. She later conspires with three strangers to kill again."? :)

I still want to see his take on "Strawberry Shortcake". ;)

Not True To The Original

[TheWanderingHermit]

I've never heard of American McGee, but I used to read the Oz books to my students when I taught elementary school. After looking over the American McGee site, I can't see that it has any real, significant connection to the originals. For one thing, there's a reference to "the darker side of Oz" and Frank Baum made it clear there was no darker side. His intent was to create a land of wonder and amazement without the creatures that caused kids nightmares.

I've never been able to stand it when movies or updates sanitized stories for mass consumption, and I find I'm feeling the same way about taknig something that was created with specific intent and twisting that intent into something opposite of it.

So, after checking out the site, it looks to me like American McGee took someone else's creation and re-did it without a lot of what made the original special. It'd be kind of like taking the Terminator series and remaking it without evil robots. So am I missing something about American McGee, or is it the same kind of "ignore the original and remake in our way" stuff as what I just described?

Disney

[Ian_Bailey]

Disney has followed a simmilar pattern for its entire history.

Either it was neutering the most frigtening parts of the stories (Snow White, Litte Mermaid, etc.), or just re-inventing a new story (Treasure Planet).

I don't see anything wrong with it, as this is really the purpose of copyright expiration. New storytellers can re-imagine elements of old stories and mix them into something entirely new.

This is different than taking something that's currently has copyright protection (see Lion King vs Kimba the White Lion), making money for a big idea-starved company that the original creative artist should be earning. Determining what the limit for copyright expiration is a tricky issue, but it should eventually expire for precisely this reason.

Re:Disney

[TheWanderingHermit]

I agree with the point about copyright expiration. I like seeing new works that can include old works (for example, "Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid"), but I think there's a limit. I guess I should point out that I'm a writer (I started my current business to finance a digital film production company so I could shoot my own scripts MY way instead of selling them and seeing them re-written 20 times). Maybe that's why I feel the original creation should be treated with respect. It's also why I don't like remakes. For example, "Casablanca" was a great film, and there's no need to remake it. The remake of "Psycho" a few years ago seemed totally pointless to me -- especially since it was a "shot for shot" remake.

If a writer/artist can't come up with something original, I'd rather not see them do anything with it at all. I don't like ripping off another person's work, signing your name, and passing it off as new (which is one reason I never bothered to see "Treasure Planet" -- the book is great and if it were done RIGHT on film, there's no need to do it with spaceships instead).

I don't like Disney neutering, as you say (good term) work. I think it's wrong, and I think it's just as wrong to take something tame (like Oz) and darken it. I'd rather see the people involved showing enough creativity and imagination to come up with something on their own.

On the other hand, I do have to add that "Forbidden Planet" (a re-write of "The Tempest") is one of my favorite SF films.