<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Avery:
Sweetpea financed Imperium Games with the thought that by developing Traveller as a property and grooming it properly, it would become a movie after they did the D&D movie. The problem was that writing was rushed and incompletely co-ordinated with "me." Then, the economic down-turn in Asia forced the investors behind the project to stop putting money into it. Finally, they pulled the plug, and everything reverted to "me."
Maybe there will be a movie someday.
Marc
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Marc; that's very interesting to hear. But are you sure you want a film based on your work that turns out like that D&D movie? I don't know what your movie experience is, but here are some thoughts based on my personal experience.
Years ago I used to fantasize about producing a Traveller film, but only if I could either find or write a good script that had some integrity behind it. Right now we're riding the peak of a sine wave that oscillates between market driven films and art driven films. One extreme being films like the infamous D&D movie, Will Smith's version of "The Wild Wild West", and more recently "A Knight's Tale," and "Planet of the Apes." The other extreme being any independent film shown in any film art house across the nation. Within the last ten years there've been very few, if any, films that have been produced that encompass portions of both.
These days (actually, ever since Star Wars) Hollywod shoots for the blockbuster, so with something like Traveller they'd pack it with gunplay and outrageous action sequences, witty language, and groin kick jokes, because that's what your average gamer expects, and according to the marketing data the average gamer is some acne potted teenage male who likes "in your face" kind of stuff. And since they're the ones who go out on dates (i.e. movies), they're the ones whose dollars you have to grab.
If you wanted a thoughtful story about, say, a band of adventurers seeking out "The Secrets of the Ancients", you might read the first draft, probably approve of it, only to have the thing reworked during filming, and reworked again in post (post-production; editing, sound, music, and so forth). Heck, they may even shoot a couple more scenes without your consent. But this is their perogative since you did sign away your rights on the Traveller property. Hence they can do anything they like with it.
Exploitation movies have always been made, but now it's all the trend, and is done so unashamably, and probably also out of ignorance by those who are the film industrie's masters. However, there was a time when films, even big action flicks, were created not just with technical craft (lighting, pyrotechnics and what have you) but were also created with a kind of artistic integrity that has not seen the light of day for some time. Just look at any of the classic Westerns, and you'll see rightaway what I'm talking about. That kind of spirit may return at some point, but even so I think today's audience has become so conditioned to bad movies that they wouldn't know what to do when they saw a good film; i.e. a film that didn't have a sexually suggestive joke or gun going off every five minutes, nor had some kind of rythmic pop soundtrack constantly playing in the background. Heck, they'd probably call it a bad movie, and would ask "Where're the sex jokes, pop sound track, and action?"
Myself, I think there's a hidden market that's more than ripe for a good movie, but they're not the ones who go to the movies anymore. They used to, but the movie experience has gotten so bad that you rarely see people casually taking in a movie anymore. Movies are now an event, and to grab the dollar at the event you have to create an event. And so the industry is now caught in this vicious circle in which it needs to spend the big cash on the big blockbusters, or they go belly up. And it doesn't matter if the film is good or not, it just needs to be hyped enough, and crafted enough, such that people will feel compelled to go see it.
Now, do you really want your game's fiction subjected to that venue?
Just some thoughts from someone who worked in the industry for nearly a decade.
[This message has been edited by Blue Ghost (edited 01 August 2001).]
Necromancy;
As my time on the forum draws nigh, I just wanted to add some thoughts here. I fell out of love with movies over the last five years with the realization of how a lot of media properties are formulated, and how their formulation evolves through a process that makes their ultimate presentation different from what was conceived.
There's always been angsty relationship between writers and producers (directors), because you have this "That's now what I wrote" or "That's not what I intended" feeling that surges back and forth. A lot of that is cosmetic hype to make the film seem more interesting than it is.
Films today have specific psychological formulations, and for science fiction there's added psychiatric phenomena tossed in to tantalize the smarter audience that scifi, on average, tends to draw to the theatre. All of it is intentional, and looking at all of the TV and feature films I've consumed over the years, today's media offerings are more about fantasy release or realization. Some years back at Francis Ford Coppola's Virtual Studio website some lady who was reading a screenplay I had written stated "So this is a fantasy realization, SP, right?" "SP" meaning screenplay. I did not know how to answer because I did not know what she was talking about. I truly was just trying to write a good screenplay, but, as it turns out, the successful or "greenlit" screenplays have a self aware psychological component to them.
I shrug my shoulders at it. It's something you probably learn in a masters or doctorate level class, but emotional and psychological manipulation is pretty much the key "ingredient" to all mass media, and specifically feature films.
As per my web log entries, I think that is just way overplayed, and the belief in the "power of film" is close to a religious mantra because of its alleged abuse in war propaganda films. Ergo the industry, at one point, was very closed off due to a fear of the wrong people getting to make films. YouTube has demonstrated otherwise, and upheld my convictions and other people who called themselves independent film makers, that you can make the most socially unacceptable visual piece, and it'll only tantalize or otherwise attract those people with like fantasies or social views; i.e. making a horror or "slasher" flick doesn't turn people into serial killers, but attracts people who like to be scared.
With a Traveller movie, if it were shot in the 80s, then it would be aimed at socially forward thinking and science oriented individuals, and in my opinion, truncated of the violence that makes Traveller attractive to young males as a game. In my opinion, as happened with D&D and its cartoon iteration, Traveller might have become a kind of "The Next Generation" knock off, neutered of things like Fusion Guns, Gauss Guns and whatever else, in favor of showing socially disparate individuals coming together to solve a problem or crime. People of various backgrounds or social identities cooperating to solve a mystery is not a bad message, but that's not really the basis for Traveller--though it can be.
Simply put what was done to Dungeons and Dragons in the early 80s with the D&D cartoon, again had Traveller been shot, probably would have happened to Traveller. And, in my opinion, you would have had a pretty angry player fan base who were wanting to see firefights during boarding actions, or assaults on secret Zhodani bases within the Imperium, only to get stories about a group of Scouts doing something that lacked that violent element that Traveller and D&D are known for.
Way back in 1987, or even before that, when I was scripting out concepts for Car Wars and Traveller, it was my thinking that feature films would be the way to go, because in this way you could keep all of the violence that makes a lot of the classic games what they are, and frame it as a socially positive thing without having to go the TV trope route. Simply put you could have all of the gun battles and other confrontations in a feature film because that's what attracts the male ticket buyer.
Old School Hollywood formula for TV films goes something like this;
Guys go to movies (you males go with other young males, or take a date, or, if more mature, take their spouse or family).
Gals watch TV, largely because they're the ones who buy products for the home, therefore you make shows that women will want to watch with friends and family.
The newer formula is that of market tailoring. You can make a female film strictly for a female audience as long as its compelling and strong enough. Those films typically deal with children in some regard, familial ties, and relationships in general. Male films are pretty one-dimensional, the lone hero going against the odds kind of thing.
Therefore, my thinking is that today is probably the right time to get a crowdfunded small project going, if anyone were so inclined. The old way was to take your idea and bounce around from studio to studio or production company to production company, and essentially beg for money by proving that your project was worthwhile. You don't need to do that anymore, and so the content of whatever is shot holds up the project, or torpedoes it depending on how it's received.
