Buffista Movies 5: Development Hell
A place to talk about movies--old and new, good and bad, high art and high cheese. It's the place to place your kittens on the award winners, gossip about upcoming fims and discuss DVD releases and extras. Spoiler policy: White font all plot-related discussion until a movie's been in wide release two weeks, and keep the major HSQ in white font until two weeks after the video/DVD release.
SA,
no, the film only deals with the present generation. Basically, Angier sets Borden up to be arrested for his murder, and then arranges for Borden to be given a copy of his diary, which at the end has a "Ha ha I only wrote this for you to find so fuck you!" note. And in the middle of this, we're also flashing back to the events of the diary, in which Angier is reading a stolen copy of Borden's diary, which also contains a "Ha ha, sucker, you totally fell for my Stolen Diary trick!" note at the end. And it spirals around a few times until gradually we end up in the present day with more or less the whole story.
It sounds like a LOT was changed.
SA,
no. Nothing about a seance, a miscarriage, or any descendants. In the movie, Angier has no children.
oh EW.
Now I don't know that I want to see it at all. That is so not the story. And the book's story was really, really good.
Sigh. Hollywood.
Well, I wouldn't call that the story, just the structure.
Sigh. Hollywood.
I'd say it's more a case of necessary compression and reimagining. A classic example for me is LA CONFIDENTIAL which is wildly different from the book in terms of plot, and even in terms of some of the who-did-what-to-whom, but retains the core characters and themes, and substitutes a pretty good plot of it's own.
SA, in the book did
Angier blame Borden for his wife's death in a tank trick gone wrong
?
In the book,
Angier's wife didn't die, until she was quite old. Angier retired from the magic world after the prestige accident, using one of his previous prestiges as a way to fake his own death. Then he became the rightful Earl of Whatever, and he and his wife lived there pleasantly until he developed a cancer; the prestige-copy came back upon his death and resided with his wife for some time, until she died, and then he never actually died. He ended it because of Borden and the prestige accident, but even then he didn't really blame Borden for that. Since he had the Earlship (or whatever) waiting for him, and his attentions had actually begun to turn towards the running of the estate (it was his wife, on condition of their reunion--as they separated for about four or five years, during which time Angier researched the tesla machine--who encouraged him to continue as a magician; she had no knowledge of his aristocratic status until he final broke it to her) he was more inclined to give it up once the opportunity presented itself, though it was sooner than he had intended. He'd always intended to fake his death with a prestige and retire to the country estate.
SA, that almost sounds like
a happy ending for Angier, which the movie definitely doesn't have. One of the Bordens sort of has one by being reuinited with his daughter. However, even there, it's tinged by the dual tragedies of this Alfred being the one who loved the wife, and having lost an essential part of is being. Borden, while having moments of utter bastardom (bastardity?), comes off as much less monstrous than Angier. Among other things, there are several times when Angier attempts to end Borden's life, wheras Borden only went so far as to injure Angier (albeit, giving him a permanent limp), at least in terms of them being professionally competitive.
Rachel MacAdams has been cast in the movie adaptation of The Time-Traveller's Wife.
I watched Beowulf and Grendel last night. I'd been looking forward to it, 'cause...Gerard. Butler. 'nuf said. It was odd, and one of those films where you want to like it because you know the cast and crew really suffered to bring it to you. A venture down wikipedia lane just now, however, made me not like it much at all. Very broad interpretation and a serious redux of the poem. Somehow adding Sarah Polley as a character not even mentioned in the poem..so that she can be the greek chorus of explainy things just didn't make it any better.
Rachel MacAdams has been cast in the movie adaptation of The Time-Traveller's Wife.
Interesting.
Niffenegger's novel is about a Chicago librarian who involuntarily travels through time and falls in love with a young heiress along the way.
That's...the first time I've ever heard it described that way. The fact that it's adapted by the same person who did
The Notebook
worries me because, like, I know the core of the book is this romance between Henry and Clare, but to me, it was about so much more than that.