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Re: Journey and Journey 2

From: Craig Weatherhill <craig~at~agantavas.org>
Date: Tue, 21 Feb 2012 09:34:33 +0000
To: Jules Verne Forum <jvf~at~gilead.org.il>

To be fair, C.S. Lewis has been treated with respect by the makers of
the Narnia films so far. The Jeremy Brett Sherlock Holmes series,
and the David Suchet Poirot series also treated Conan Doyle and
Christie well. The same can't be said for recent Sherlock Holmes
movies or the appalling "modern" Benedict Cumberbatch Holmes.

But yes, Verne, Wells, Rice Burroughs and many others - Cussler is a
current example - have been treated appallingly. I've always said
that, if a book is considered good enough to film, then film it. Not
create another story out of it.

Craig



On 21 Whe 2012, at 02:05, Raymond Macon wrote:

> Hello Art et al,
>
> Hollywood knows that more than one hundred years after his death the
> name Jules Verne still strikes a chord with contemporary
> moviegoers. That is why they shamelessly produce inferior drivel
> and ripoff films that only have their titles in common with Verne’s
> original works. This latest incarnation of The Mysterious Island is
> a case in point. The movie has done moderately well in American
> theaters and as long as this is the case we will continue to see
> Verne’s name shamelessly exploited.
>
> But Jules Verne isn’t the only classical writer to be so abused.
> H.G. Wells has suffered the same mistreatment as has Edgar Rice
> Burroughs. Lately, only J.R.R. Tolkien has fared well at the hands
> of his movie interpreters. Tolkien had the advantage of a
> readership that could still remember his life and times and had
> actually read his work. So the filmmakers knew they would be held
> to a high standard and if they tampered too much with the original
> books the wrath of Tolkien fandom would be too much to bear. So
> they stayed fairly close to the Tolkien text and made a fortune to
> boot.
>
> Verne, Wells and Burroughs do not have that kind of a following.
> Their readers are people like us who, while no less devoted than
> Tolkien’s readers, are somewhat fewer in number. Furthermore, these
> authors have faded from living memory, Burroughs’ death being the
> latest and that was in 1950. So moviemakers have taken considerable
> liberties with their novels and characters feeling—rightly—that most
> of the people who have heard their names have not bothered to read
> the books. So they will cite Verne or Wells in the movies’ titles
> or promotions knowing that the viewers only want to see some kind of
> fantastic adventure that these names will invoke and not a visual re-
> telling of the original story.
>
> Every great writer’s work has undergone this. If the filmmaker is
> truly concerned with creating great art, then he or she will pay due
> respect to the original vision. If, on the other hand, the goal is
> simply to make money, then vision will be damned. A counterfeit is
> produced with the expectation that the movie-going public is as
> unconcerned with verisimilitude and integrity as the filmmaker.
> Time and experience have shown that cynicism to be realistic, more’s
> the pity.
>
> I understand that a Journey 3 is being contemplated “based” on
> Verne’s From the Earth to the Moon. Seeing how well the first film
> did and the second is doing at the box office, this should come as
> no real surprise. Since Verne’s works are now in the public domain,
> nobody can stand in the way of such productions. But just because
> there are those in the entertainment industry who have no respect
> for Verne’s canon, that does not mean all is lost. This Forum is
> but one of many organs in existence to keep the flame of Verne
> scholarship and readership alive and which have worked tirelessly to
> acquaint a new generation with the rewarding experience of reading
> him. We should take great comfort and pride in that. For it seems
> to me that long after the memory of some of these ripoff movies has
> faded from the public consciousness, the books of Jules Verne will
> live on, and for that we can take pride in the part we have played
> to make it so.
>
> Raymond
>
> From: owner-jvf~at~Gilead.org.il [mailto:owner-jvf~at~Gilead.org.il] On
> Behalf Of wbutcher
> Sent: Monday, 20 February, 2012 17:55
> To: 'Jules Verne Forum'
> Subject: Re: Journey and Journey 2
>
> Dear Art,
>
> Yet another Hollywood film, then, where the book is travestied. Is
> it just me, or are they getting worse? Can’t the descendants sue
> given that their moral rights have been trampled on?
>
> The idea that the Voyages are real was first introduced in Hatteras
> and Journey, via the citing of the title of the book within the
> novel. In both cases the idea is absent from the original
> manuscript; for Journey, it appears in the margin, and so may have
> been influenced, if not more, by Hetzel’s reading of the manuscript.
> As you say so pertinently, yet another irony...
>
> Best wishes
>
> Bill
>
> From: owner-jvf~at~Gilead.org.il [mailto:owner-jvf~at~Gilead.org.il] On
> Behalf Of aevans2 tds.net
> Sent: 20 February 2012 23:11
> To: Jules Verne Forum
> Subject: Journey and Journey 2
>
> Dear Vernian friends,
>
> This weekend I went to see the film Journey 2: The Mysterious Island
> with Dwayne "the Rock" Johnson and the young actor named Josh
> Hutcherson who appeared in Journey to the Center of the Earth in 3D
> with Brendan Fraser. It was mildly entertaining but, of course, has
> nothing to do with Verne (although the volcano spitting out gold
> reminded me of The Golden Volcano).
>
> One important feature shared by both films, however, is the notion
> that the events in Verne's novels *really happened* and were not
> just fiction. This is the supposed secret shared by most "Vernians"
> around the world. So the films' protagonists (ironically) follow in
> the footsteps of Lidenbrock, Axel, Cyrus Smith, Nemo et al. and,
> during the course of their many adventures, confirm the real
> existence of these original Vernian characters.
>
> In one way, this notion is a useful gimmick to avoid direct
> comparisons between the films and Verne's novels (which would be
> very unflattering to the films). But I also found it fascinating as
> a verisimilitude-building device. And I remember Verne doing
> exactly the same thing in _Le Sphinx des glaces_ (The Ice Sphinx).
> In this novel Edgar Allan Poe's Arthur Gordon Pym is treated as a
> *real* person whose adventures at the South Pole *really happened*
> according to Captain Len Guy. Yet another irony.
>
> Best,
> Art
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
Received on Tue 21 Feb 2012 - 11:34:41 IST

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