I'd like to see him do it ala A twilight zone movie style. Tom Hanks could play the aging astronaut.

A TZ-like rendering of the story would be ideal - they captured the essence of that type of Martian story on several episodes of the Zone.

RB tells me that there are better than fifteen scripts at Universal right now! He didn't say anything about Spielberg, tho.

Speaking of scripts, starting working on the screenplay for Dandelion Wine last night - a real challenge! But I think something beautiful could come out of it.

When done with my sample, I'll show it to RB. I'm trying to get the screenplay-writing job should a studio or producer pick up the option (I can't afford the option).

Perhaps if we all optioned it together! After all, who loves RB better than we?

I think the only way to do the book justice would be on TV as either a four part mini-series or as a single-season series of 20ish one hour episodes.

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quote:

Originally posted by grasstains:
I think the only way to do the book justice would be on TV as either a four part mini-series or as a single-season series of 20ish one hour episodes.

You may be right, although remember the mess they made of the boring 1980 miniseries.

Let's be careful out there.

Yes, of course I remember that. Terrible. Horrible. Embarrassingly bad. They could do a much better job with it nowadays. Like what they did with Stephen King's THE STAND, or McMurtry's LONESOME DOVE.

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quote:

Originally posted by grasstains:
...They could do a much better job with it nowadays...

Thing is, they could have done a much better job of it thenadays if they could have been bothered.

(He said, coining a new word.)
(Thenadays is a good word.)

The problem with a bigscreen adaptation would be in dealing with the passage of time between expiditions. That episodic feel would be difficult to avoid without some kind of a non-canonical gimmick, like a narrarator, an immortal Martian, or a wandering Jew type of character. Perhaps the guy with the robot family could serve that purpose?

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quote:

Originally posted by raycolerick:
Tom Hanks could play the aging astronaut.

No he couldnt.

and shouldnt.

No.

quote:

Originally posted by grasstains:
The problem with a bigscreen adaptation would be ...

Well, that's one problem. Another is that it's too long a book to fit a two-hour movie. What can you do? Compress all the stories, or throw some out? Either way, we'd be upset.

However, Ray has done a play of MC. I've not seen it, but I've read the script. Works fine for me. If any of his screenplays for the film are in the same vein, it could work.

The big HOWEVER is that the book doesn't conform to the Hollywood template. There's no obvious three-act structure, hero or villain, and most of the Campbellian elements that Hollywood script editors look for wil either not be there, or they'll be in the wrong place. This doesn't mean it wouldn't make a good film, it just means it's unlikely to ever get past a script editor.

Yup, that too. They'd also probably combine elements from different stories to where it would be recognizable as THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES but certainly not what we have always known it as. The finished product might look like "The Lost City Of Mars" with archeologists stumbling across ancient relics of the failed expeditions and ancient Martian ruins, each find with an accompanying little story. Those are about the only ways I see it getting done.

And "Usher II" would probably never make it in the film.

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This little video clip may give you a moment of insight concerning the rigors of scripts for Hollywood projects like a remake of "The Martian Chronicles" and "Fahrenheit 451".

I did this video clip last Summer, 2006. I put it on YOUTUBE at this time in order to share it with the Board ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gzplanJ1jxw

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Thanks again, Nard!
Wow. It seems he's having more trouble than even Orson Welles did in getting movies made!

quote:

Originally posted by Braling II:
It seems he's having more trouble than even Orson Welles did in getting movies made!

Or Ed Wood!

I'd say Ray looks all exasperated on the video over the problem of movie scripts. Lot to do with the generational thing as well, likely. The young script writers and script readers are playing on a different ballfield. They would probable throw Citizen Kane and Sunset Boulevard scripts onto the reject pile.

Phil, sad to say, I believe you have it exactly correct.