Hacker Chronicles 2/HACKER2.BIN/469.SF018105.TXT

Text File | 1993-02-23 | 19KB | 438 lines

SF-LOVERS Digest            Monday, 15 Feb 1993       Volume 18 : Issue 105

Today's Topics:

      Films - Christopher Lambert Interview & Jurasic Park (5 msgs) &
              Superman II (6 msgs) & Solar Crisis (2 msgs) &
              Groundhog Day

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Date: 20 Jan 93 03:00:05 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Craig Welsh  )
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Christopher Lambert Interview

Flipping around on the TV just then and what should I find, but an
interview with Chris Lambert on CBC Newsworld (Canadian version of CNN).
He was on there promoting his latest movie _Night Moves_ which is due to
come out in the next week or so. I missed the first part of the interview,
so I don't know what the movie is about. Anyway, the majority of what I saw
was people phoning up and asking questions to him. Guess what most of them
were about? If you said _Greystoke_ you're wrong.  Instead it was an almost
embarassing selection of detailed questions about Highlander. Some
highlights and things I noticed.

 - His English still isn't all that great. It's passable, but I never
realized he only learned how to speak about 10 years ago. You could
understand him, but it was like listening to Arnold a couple of years ago.

 - Highlander III has NOT started production yet. They are still looking
for a good script to shoot. the good news is that it will be based on the
first Highlander and will completely ignore the second.

 -Lambert himself didn't seem to enjoy the second movie all that much. "I
thought that it was a good movie in terms of special effects and set
design, but that it was flawed in terms of story. There were a lot of
mistakes made." That is pretty much what he said, though I made have
slightly misquoted him.

 - The reason that he even bothered with Highlander II was due to the
contract that he signed when he did the 1st movie. He had no script
approval. SO it sounds like he didn't like the idea, but had very little
say in the story material.

 - No word on who is starring in the sequel, who is directing (it won't be
Lambert, though), or when it will be released. They are hoping to start
shooting the summer in New York and England, but will wait if necessary for
a better plot.

 - On shooting the video of "Masters of the Universe" with Freddy Mercury,
he seemed reluctant to talk about it. Considering he spent about 14 hours,
overnight to get 5 seconds worth of footage, I guess he doesn't consider it
a pleasant memory.

 - He presently has his hair cut very, very short. Someone commented that
he looked like Corey Hart. It is a good thing he didn't know who it was or
he may have been very insulted.

That's all I caught or can remember. I think he and the guy conducting the
interview were both taken aback by the large cult following that Highlander
has. The CBC guy made the obvious comparison to Star Trek at one point.
Anyway, I consider much of what was said to be accurate and straight from
the horse's mouth, so maybe this will clear up some of the rumours about
the Highlander III movie.

Craig

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Date: 25 Jan 93 19:30:58 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Neal and Mara Priestly)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Jurasic Park casting

Does anyone know who is cast for what parts in this film?

I keep getting questions about it, but have no answers at hand.

Neal

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Date: 26 Jan 93 02:31:00 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Dave Martin)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Jurasic Park casting

[e-mail] (Neal and Mara Priestly) writes:
>Does anyone know who is cast for what parts in this film?
>
>I keep getting questions about it, but have no answers at hand.

Gee, I was going to ask that! :)

Actually, I am going under the presumption that there will be no big names
in this movie, only big animatrons. People who have read the book (I just
finished it myself) will go see the movie regardless - about the only big
name that really matters anyway is Spielberg - and those who have not will
go because of the dinos. I would actually prefer that there not be any
major actors involved, since there seems to be little need for it (besides,
there are a lot of great "little" names out there that we may miss out on
because a famous name was *given* a part, rather than earning it.

On the subject of JP, I found it interesting to rebrowse this month's
National Geographic article on Dinosaurs *after* having read JP - the first
time I kind of skimmed past the picture of the paleontologist in the field
(who is credited with discovering many hadrosaur nests in Montana, as well
as with *naming* the maiasaur). The second time I was amazed at seeing the
tipis in the picture - kind of made the book stand out as even more
well-researched than it had before. I would presume that Jack Horner is the
basis for the Alan Grant character, at least somewhat. Maybe Horner will be
playing Grant in the movie...

Dave Martin
Geochemical & Environmental Research Group
Texas A&M
[e-mail]
[e-mail]

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Date: 26 Jan 93 16:49:49 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Greg Bole)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Jurasic Park casting

[e-mail] (Dave Martin) writes:
> Actually, I am going under the presumption that there will be no big
> names in this movie, only big animatrons.

Well, no "big" names as in Nicholson, Cruise, Roberts, or Streep.

> I would actually prefer that there not be any major actors involved,
> since there seems to be little need for it.

But I'd call Attenburough, Goldbloom, Neill, and Dern fairly major actors.

> I would presume that Jack Horner is the basis for the Alan Grant
> character, at least somewhat. Maybe Horner will be playing Grant in the
> movie...

Yep, it was pretty interesting to see the scientists that Crichton based
his characters on.  Horner must have been a major influence for Grant, but
I doubt he was the only one.  As stated earlier Sam Neill (Dead Calm, The
Hunt for Red October, Reily Ace of Spies) will be playing Alan Grant.  (And
I think he's perfect for the part)

Could someone please post the names of all the other major characters?  I'd
like to match them up with the actors who will play them and include them
in a mini-FAQ for Jurassic Park.  (I *know* this question will come up time
and time again before June)

Greg Bole
[e-mail]

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Date: 28 Jan 93 06:15:41 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Roger Noe)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Jurassic Park casting

Here's what I have, all based on what I've seen on the net:

Sam Neill               Alan Grant (paleontologist)
Laura Dern              Ellie Sattler (paleobotanist)
Richard Attenborough    John Hammond (wealthy old dinosaur nut)
Jeff Goldblum           Ian Malcolm (chaos mathematician)

Roger Noe
Department of Computer Science
University of Illinois
Urbana, IL  61801  USA
[e-mail]

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Date: 10 Feb 93 15:26:44 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Jeffrey Waltersdorf)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Jurassic Park

I believe the release date for Jurassic Park is June 25.

Jeff

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Date: 31 Jan 93 23:18:23 GMT
From: [e-mail]
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Superman II - Missing Brando?

I recently read in the Superman: Making of the Movie book that a scene of
Jor-el (Marlon Brando) was filmed that would have been placed right after
the powerless Clark Kent finds the green crystal in the fortress of
solitude in Superman II.  This scene consisted of Clark Kent making a plea
to his father to regain his powers or something of that nature.  In the
actual movie, it is ambiguous as to how he actually got his powers back.
All we see is him looking at the green crystal and next thing we know he
has all the capabilities of Superman again.  Does anyone know why this
integral scene was cut from the finished film?  My only guess is some legal
dispute that Brando may have initiated to remove his face and name from the
film.  Also, does anyone know the exact content of this scene?  Is there a
novelization of the film which perhaps includes it?  Thanks for any help!

Eric

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Date: 1 Feb 93 13:23:06 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Tom Kuchar)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Superman II - Missing Brando?

[e-mail] writes:
>Does anyone know why this integral scene was cut from the finished film?
>My only guess is some legal dispute that Brando may have initiated to
>remove his face and name from the film.

You would guess correctly. Superman I & II were filmed almost
simultaneously (actually SII was finished after SI premiered).  Scenes with
Brando for both movies were filmed. He was paid his salary (something like
$50,000 for each second he appeared on film, or some such figure) and went
his way.  He later decided that since he was going to be used in two films,
not one (there's some confusion about this, perhaps part of SII's plot was
to be in SI) that he wanted to be paid double.  The compromise was to drop
Brando from the second film and substitute some of those scenes with
Superman's mother.

Tom Kuchar
[e-mail]
Department of Astronomy
Boston Univerity

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Date: 2 Feb 93 04:56:23 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Richard A. Schumacher)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Superman II - Missing Brando?

A much bigger crime is how those goofballs, the Salkind brothers, dorked it
up by firing Richard Donner and substituting Richard Lester as director. We
still brood about that one.

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Date: 1 Feb 93 21:42:59 GMT
From: [e-mail]
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Superman II - Missing Brando?

Okay, thanks for the info!  Actually, I think the confusion can be cleared
up.  Brando knew he was filming scenes for the second film and didn't think
they would be used in the first film.  But he was paid his full salary for
all the scenes before Superman II was even completed.  So by the time it
was finished, he figured since he had nothing to lose he might as well go
for more money and who cares if the scenes that he was already paid for
made it to the screen or not.  I think the scenes should have been included
anyway without Brando being paid extra, personally.  His contract for the
original did mention that his footage would be used in two films.  But when
Brando has that kind of money the lawyers he could get could accomplish
anything I guess, whether fair or unfair.

Eric

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Date: 2 Feb 93 23:50:31 GMT
From: [e-mail]
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Superman II - Missing Donner?

Are you kidding?  I thought Lester did a superb job.  However, Donner was
great too.  My main criticism of Donner, though, is that some scenes felt
like they were coming out of a 'screamer' movie.  I mean, there was just
too much screaming!  This really didn't bother me on the first viewing or
early viewings.  It becomes noticeable once you've seen the movie enough
times, though.  Still, I love both Superman I and II extremely.  Lester was
great at packing all kinds of throwaway jokes and touches into nearly every
scene.  Just watch the first hotel scene, for example.  Marvelously done.
These types of details are great to notice for the first time even after
you've seen the movie plenty of times.  Superman II is also a more tightly
paced film.  Mainly because of all the exposition necessary for the first
one to work.  Donner plodded through some of this; the looong camera hold
on Clark and Martha Kent comes to mind.

However, I don't know what the hell happened to Lester on Superman III.  I
guess 'abysmal script' sums it up pretty well.  Some of the powers got a
little funky in part II as well.  Since when can Superman turn his chest
symbol into a giant net, I ask you?  But, again, that's a script problem
and merely a minor blemish.  Also, too bad they couldn't get John Williams
back for part II's music instead of having Ken Thorne's rehash.  A good
rehash, but still just a rehash.  Anyway, if you want bad directing as well
as bad script writing, refer to Superman IV.  Or better yet, don't!

Eric

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Date: 2 Feb 93 21:24:47 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Greg Bole)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Superman II - Missing Brando?

[e-mail] (Richard A. Schumacher) writes:
> A much bigger crime is how those goofballs, the Salkind brothers, dorked
> it up by firing Richard Donner and substituting Richard Lester as
> director. We still brood about that one.

It probably looked good on paper, Lester is a brilliant director, who had a
pretty damn good track record:

Lester, Richard         Butch and Sundance: The Early Days
                        Four Musketeers, The
                        Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, A
                        Hard Day's Night, A
                        Robin and Marian
                        Royal Flash
                        Three Musketeers, The (1974)

Greg Bole
[e-mail]

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Date: 5 Feb 93 12:51:43 GMT
From: [e-mail]
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Solar Crisis ?!?

A friend recently passed onto me a copy of American Cinematographer from
1990 which discussed a SF film starring Charlton Heston called "Solar
Crisis".  The film was about a mission to the Sun to try and prevent a
predicted solar flare which was expected to destroy the Earth.

Apparently the film and editing was complete, but the film (as far as we
know) has never been released. My friend suggested that it may have been
tied up with Orion Pictures and as such may never see the light of day
(pardon the pun).

Does anyone have any further info on the status of this film?  If it is
tied up with Orion is there hope that we will ever see it?

The stills in the mag and the article outline some very good, and very
expensive special effects. It looks as though a lot of money was spent on
this film and it would be (at least visually) a great movie to see.

Jason Hellwege
La Trobe Uni
Melbourne, Oz.

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Date: 5 Feb 93 20:51:26 GMT
From: [e-mail] (Gerald Edgar)
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Solar Crisis ?!?

Solar Crisis played here in Columbus briefly... I did not see it.  Reports
said it was not worth going to, even if you get in free.  The director is
listed as "Alan Smithee" because the director did not want his real name
associated with this film...

Gerald A. Edgar
Department of Mathematics
The Ohio State University
Columbus, OH 43210
Internet: [e-mail]
Bitnet: EDGAR@OHSTPY

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From: [e-mail]
Date: Mon, 15 Feb 93 09:17 EST
Reply-to: [e-mail]
Subject: REVIEW: GROUNDHOG DAY

                               GROUNDHOG DAY
                      A film review by Mark R. Leeper

          Capsule review:  If you could live one day over and
     over, as if you were replaying a video game, could you ever
     get the day perfect?  What would be your best strategy?  Bill
     Murray plays a weatherman reliving over and over February 2
     in Punxsutawney, PA.  What is the best he can make of the
     day?  The premise is engaging and the execution entertaining.
     Rating: high +1 (-4 to +4).

   On May 5, 1961, TWILIGHT ZONE ran an episode called "Shadow Play,"
written by Charles Beaumont and directed by John Brahm.  Dennis Weaver
played Adam Grant, a man sentenced to death.  It is the day Grant is to be
executed for murder.  He claims to have a sort of deja vu and can even tell
people verifiable facts he seems to have no way of knowing.  He claims that
he is living the same day over and over.  Eventually he is executed only to
wake up in his cell with the same day starting over.  This idea gets
re-used and explored in detail in GROUNDHOG DAY.

   Phil (played by Bill Murray) is a television weatherman with a funny
on-screen persona.  Of the television he is bitter and cynical and does
just about whatever he can to make himself difficult to deal with.
February 2, Groundhog Day, finds Phil in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania,
filming the famous Groundhog Day festivities.  Phil is less than thrilled
and is making life miserable for his producer Rita (played by Andie
McDowell) and cameraman Larry (played by Chris Elliot).  Next morning he
wakes up and it is still Groundhog Day.  Phil is living the same day over
and over and making the same mistakes.  The day becomes like a video game
that he plays over and over, practicing to get past all the hazards of the
day.  He uses one strategy after another trying to find how to get the most
out of the day and how best to benefit from having gone through the day use
his experiences of having already been through the day.

   The script (by Danny Rubin and director Harold Ramis) starts taking on a
higher meaning of just what the purpose of life.  Phil can play his day for
thrills, he can play it to gain self-enrichment, he can play it to get sex,
he can be an altruist, or he can romance Rita.  The latter is questionable
since, first, Rita is a bit sappy herself, but also it is a bit of a
challenge since after Phil has been so nasty way back on February 1, it
seems unlikely that one day would be enough for re-educating Rita.  The
film's conclusion about what the best of all possible Groundhog Days is is
a bit of a cheat, since it depends very heavily on previous knowledge -
life is not really like a video game and it is somewhat reminiscent of IT'S
A WONDERFUL LIFE.

     Ramis has an intriguing premise taken just about as far as it could be
taken.  It is pleasant but not particularly deep.  I rate it a high +1 on
the -4 to +4 scale.

Mark R. Leeper
att!mtgzfs3!leeper
[e-mail]

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End of SF-LOVERS Digest
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