Avatar returns...is Braveheart next?
If you were a Hollywood fat cat, concerned at the global financial crisis but determined to keep yourself in cigars, how would you go about trying to beat the $1 billion success of the CGI-heavy, but plot-light, blockbuster Avatar at the box office?
How about re-releasing it all over again and bunging in eight extra minutes?
According to Avatar director James Cameron, “Audiences repeatedly told me they wanted more of Pandora and wished they could have stayed there longer.” Thanks to the kindly Cameron, those audiences will be able to set aside their DVDs and head back to watch the Na'avi protect Pandora from those pesky humans from August 27 at UK cinemas.
Personally, I'd rather watch 24 hours of Big Brother on a portable black and white telly in a cramped caravan than have to sit through almost three hours of Avatar again in “glorious” 3D, with eight more minutes hardly tempting. However, I wonder if this sort of re-release, with new, previously unseen footage, could catch on?
Could Jaws, the first real summer blockbuster, be given a new pre-title sequence in which we see the film's star as a pup, bullied by his peers for not having a large enough fin and committing himself to a life of crime as twisted revenge?
Perhaps there could be a scene at the close of Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith where we discover that the first three movies were all a dream, or at the end of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (spoiler warning!) the film doesn't freeze frame and the pair shoot their way to freedom, only to suffer from fatal alcohol poisoning after a celebratory evening in the local hostelry?
I'm surprised nobody has altered the end of Braveheart, where we find that (spoiler warning again!) Wallace wasn't really disembowelled but that it was a case of mistaken identity, the warrior subsequently overthrowing the monarchy and becoming King of England and Scotland and living happily ever after. That would be about as faithful to the history books as the original...
A quick note that tomorrow in Festival Square sees a Family Fun Day take place, with outdoor screenings from 11am of The Red Balloon, The Jungle Book and Buster Keaton's The General (with live musical accompaniment) on the BBC Big Screen.
How about re-releasing it all over again and bunging in eight extra minutes?
According to Avatar director James Cameron, “Audiences repeatedly told me they wanted more of Pandora and wished they could have stayed there longer.” Thanks to the kindly Cameron, those audiences will be able to set aside their DVDs and head back to watch the Na'avi protect Pandora from those pesky humans from August 27 at UK cinemas.
Personally, I'd rather watch 24 hours of Big Brother on a portable black and white telly in a cramped caravan than have to sit through almost three hours of Avatar again in “glorious” 3D, with eight more minutes hardly tempting. However, I wonder if this sort of re-release, with new, previously unseen footage, could catch on?
Could Jaws, the first real summer blockbuster, be given a new pre-title sequence in which we see the film's star as a pup, bullied by his peers for not having a large enough fin and committing himself to a life of crime as twisted revenge?
Perhaps there could be a scene at the close of Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith where we discover that the first three movies were all a dream, or at the end of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (spoiler warning!) the film doesn't freeze frame and the pair shoot their way to freedom, only to suffer from fatal alcohol poisoning after a celebratory evening in the local hostelry?
I'm surprised nobody has altered the end of Braveheart, where we find that (spoiler warning again!) Wallace wasn't really disembowelled but that it was a case of mistaken identity, the warrior subsequently overthrowing the monarchy and becoming King of England and Scotland and living happily ever after. That would be about as faithful to the history books as the original...
A quick note that tomorrow in Festival Square sees a Family Fun Day take place, with outdoor screenings from 11am of The Red Balloon, The Jungle Book and Buster Keaton's The General (with live musical accompaniment) on the BBC Big Screen.
posted by Administrator at
14:38
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1 Comments:
Alternatively, there's the Ridley Scott 'anniversary edition' approach, where you actually skim off a few seconds here, a few there, chuck back in a few scenes that were probably best left out, and yet still end up with a re-released film that's shorter than the original.
Mind you... people wanted to stay longer on Pandora? Don't they realise what a motherf*cker of a planetary entity 'she' is, quite happy to let the humanoids almost get wiped out before sending in the big bastards.... but then, I probably have a rather cynical view of that film's 'back story'
Liked the idea of the Jaws pre-title sequence; could we fit in his mother being killed by a big boat? Just for added impact, you know...
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