John Carter of Mars

[Dan]

Production on Disney live-action adaptation of the famed Edgar Rice Burroughs novel "John Carter of Mars" has begun with a 2012 release year set. The film will be directed by Pixar's Andrew Stanton, who also co-writes with acclaimed author Michael Chabon (Wonder Boys, Spider-Man 2).

It stars Taylor Kitsch (Friday Night Lights, X-Men Origins: Wolverine) as the title character of John Carter, Lynn Collins (True Blood, X-Men Origins: Wolverine) as Dejah Thoris, Willem Dafoe (Spider-Man, Finding Nemo) as Tars Tarkas, Thomas Haden Church (Sideways, Spider-Man 3) as Tal Hajus, Mark Strong (Sherlock Holmes, RocknRolla) as Matai Shang, Dominic West (The Wire, 300) as Sab Than, James Purefoy (Rome, Resident Evil) as Kantos Kan, Samantha Morton (Minority Report, In America) as Sola, and Daryl Sabara (A Christmas Carol, Father of the Pride) as Edgar Rice Burroughs.

The production crew Stanton has assembled includes cinematographer Daniel Mindel (Star Trek, Mission: Impossible III), production designer Nathan Crowley (Batman Begins, The Dark Knight), costume designer Mayes Rubeo (Avatar, Apocalypto), and video effects supervisor Peter Chiang (The Bourne Ultimatum, Stardust).

[Locall]

Can't wait to see some footage of this, looks like they got a great production team together!

[Ben]

Didn't we already have a thread for this? There's been quite a bit of discussion already I thought.

[Dan]

Mark Strong, who plays Matai Shang, recently conducted an interview with the web site Cinematical in which he talks a bit about John Carter of Mars as well as Green Lantern, in which he will play Sinestro. Here are the bits regarding John Carter of Mars:

Cinematical: How soon are you starting to shoot [Green Lantern]?

Strong: It started today [March 16]. I mean, I'm in London, but they started today. I'm still working on John Carter of Mars, which I finish off in May, and then I go out to New Orleans in June

Cinematical: How has your experience been on John Carter of Mars?

Strong: It's an amazing experience. It's proving to be a fascinating jigsaw, and each moment, each line almost, fits into this vast plan that Andrew has, and he's been working on it for years. You have to have faith; you have to go in and do your stuff, because your piece of the jigsaw allows him to complete the puzzle, so I'm really enjoying it. It's a fascinating process, and I've still got quite a lot to go I'm filming for three months, the whole of March and then I've got a week or two in April, and then I'm out to Utah for a few days. So there's still plenty to go. We're right in the middle of it, but I find it fascinating. Last week I was performing in a massive warehouse with 400 extras on this floating platform in the middle of a battle between two opposing tribes, and the sequence took two or three weeks for an incredible four-and-a-half-minute sequence. It's amazing.

You can read the rest of the interview here:
http://www.cinematical.com/2010/04/07/e ... carter-of/

[Dan]

First trailer:

[Ben]

I'm kind of as much blown away as I am...kind of not.

Production looks great, but I'm not really "feeling it" the way I thought I would. And I think Disney are missing a big trick in not promoting this from "the Academy Award-winning director of Finding Nemo and WALL-E".

Okay, JCM isn't exactly a Disney/Pixar film anymore, but there's no stopping them using that pedigree to appeal to audiences, especially Stanton's fans that still don't know that he's behind this.

[Randall]

I'm still disappointed that there's no "Mars" anywhere in the title--- even though the abbreviation at the end of the trailer looks to be "JCM". So dopey. (Of course, it should be "APoM" anyhow. )

I didn't really "feel it" either. Looks pretty generic, rather than amazing, though I have no doubt the final film will be wonderful. I guess one problem with Carter is that so much else has been based on his stories in the past century, that to modern audiences this film will ironically seem derivative of stuff like Superman, Buck Rogers, Farscape, and the like.

[ShyViolet]

New images:

http://www.aintitcool.com/node/52084

[Ben]

Still not feeling terribly blown away yet. Hoping the full trailer gives this the boost that it needs.

[Bill1978]

As someone totally clueless about the story, the stills don't grab and me and say 'Come and watch me'. I'll reserve further judgement until I've seen the stills move.

[LotsoA113]

New trailer. Just in case you haven't been to the Youtube homepage all day



I'm STILL not feeling the vibe of greatness that both the andrew Stanton name and the literary source would bring. It seems to have too many elements cribbed from Star Wars: AOTC and Avatar. And yes, I know the novel came out nearly 100 years ago, but cinematically and visually it looks like a copycat. Also, am I the only one who chuckled at the "Your ugly, but beautiful" line? Maybe it's from the novel (haven't gotten around to reading APOM, but I will before I see the movie) but the line remains hokey nonetheless. Like the trailer itself, it feels very trite, been-there-doen-that, though with undeniable moemnts of greatness that Ihope are indictave of so much more

With a $325 million budget looming, to quote Obi-Wan Kenobi, I have a bad feeling about this

[Vernadyn]

I just read the first three books of the Barsoom series, and enjoyed them. Now, I'm not saying that they are the best pieces of literature ever written. But given that they were written as "pulp," it's impressive how varied Burrough's vocabulary is, especially compared to the popular fiction of today. (Though I haven't read much from the "pulp" genre of that period--maybe they're all like that). Looking forward to the film, though the massive budget does make me worry about its financial success. It was nice to see a glimpse of Woola (the bulldog-like creature). I do wonder what role Matai Shang (Mark Strong) will have, since he's only mentioned in the second book (where his race of people, the therns, first appears) and doesn't actually appear himself until the third book.

And I don't recall the "You're ugly, but beautiful" line appearing in the novel. But there are plenty of hokey moments in the books, especially given that they're narrated by John Carter himself in a sometimes vainglorious manner.

[LotsoA113]

Not gonna lie. The fact that that line isn't from the book makes me worried about the quality of the dialogue. Ah well. I'm starting nitpick what will probably be a very enjoyable flick. After all, the trailers for Scott Pilgrim and Arthur Chrishmas weren't the best either and look how those turned out!

[ShyViolet]

International trailer:


http://www.shockya.com/news/2011/12/04/ ... l-trailer/

EDIT: Same as above

[droosan]

I'd already seen the new trailer once, when it hit a couple of weeks ago .. but I've only just noticed that Disney has set the release date for John Carter at March 9, 2012.

March 9th.

A ~300-million-dollar 'tentpole' movie, released on March 9th.






As an aside, I've been reading the new Dynamite Comics adaptations of Burroughs' Mars books (warning: accurate portrayals of Dejah Thoris ) .. and they're pretty darned awesome..!