In what might be the worst ever match of director to material it has just been announced that Roland Emmerich will be directing a big screen adaptation of Isaac Asimov's Foundation. Sigh. Poor Isaac ... I, Robot already got beaten up and dumbed down (through no fault of the director in that case) and now his undisputed masterpiece is about to be treated to more of the same. Don't get me wrong, I've actually enjoyed a good number of Emmerich films for exactly what they are: great big piece of stupid entertainment in which things go boom. But big as Foundation is it sure aint stupid and Emmerich has never shown ANY talent whatsoever for little things like subtext, subtlety, character development, integration of themes, intelligent social commentary, etc etc etc - all things essential if Foundation is to be done right. Frankly I'd rather see a Farrelly Brothers version of Foundation than an Emmerich one. That would at least be funny. This will just be painful ...
I remember reading about another Asimov project in the works. Hold on i'll remember it. The End of Eternity is the book.
No fault of the director--on iRobot?!?!
Please.
Proyas could have quit.
No fault of the director....
It's not like he's turned that crap's box office success into high profile projects for himself. I think iRobot's got to be the worst case of fine, late-1990s directors selling out.
DRAMATIC SLOW MOTION NOOOOOOOOES!
Andrew: if Alex were selling out he WOULD have capitalized on the financial success of I Robot and cranked out whatever crap Hollywood wanted to. Instead, what he did was go on record saying that he would never work with Fox again and then backed that up by going home to Australia and developing his own projects for a good long while before coming back to make Knowing. And, honestly, given the way contracts are written it's VERY rare that a director can quit, except under very specific circumstances, without getting sued for breach. Otherwise you'd see it happening all the time and I honestly can't remember a director that has quit an in-production film in the last five - ten years. Not a single one. It happens occassionally in pre-production but that's it.
Proyas' issues on set of I, Robot have been VERY well documented. Google is your friend.
Oh no, I hear ya Todd. Emmerich certainly has his place in Holywood, I give his films a chance knowing that they'll be rediculous, but as chewing gum for the eyes they can work quite well, at times. I just have to be in passive mode to be able to find them entertaining. I even watched Moon 44 (for the first time) the other day. It had such promise at the beginning, everything looked good, I liked the casting, but the story that unfolded just wasn't anything like what I had imagined might happen in the ensuing 1 & a half hours. Mr. Roland just consistently fails to actually deliver on the promises of the golden shiny trailers.
It just amazes me how so much money can spent on effects/post production for a film when the content just isn't worth it, it hardly makes sense. One prime example of over expenditure vs bad storyline that comes to mind is the Japanese film Gunhed. I thought that film looked amazing, great set pieces etc. but the film just made absolutely no sense!
Ugh. I read these books just a few years ago. I meant to read just one, but got instantly hooked until I read 'em all.
Sad new indeed...
How many novels and films over the years have been inspired by, emulated from, or just plain ripped off of Isaac Asimov's stories? If the goal isn't to produce something of comparable quality to his writing, what is the point? Why use his name in the first place and drag it through the mud? For another cheap cash-in. If that's how it's gonna be, they should create another derivative snore-fest and call it "Robot's Jounrey" or something. Leave the guy out of it.
I haven't heard of Roland Emmerich before now, and from what's been said, I am afraid to take a peek at his imdb profile...
"I haven’t heard of Roland Emmerich before"
He did that american Godzilla flick, and that movie where the USA saves the world from aliens in July 4th, with Will Smith.