Two new upcoming fantasy movies

[Banshee16]

I saw last night on the special features of the Kingdom of Heaven DVD that there's a movie coming out about the old Arthurian story, "Tristan & Isolde". Hadn't heard anything about it before. I don't know if it's ever been filmed before.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0375154/

Also, just read an announcement that Susan Cooper's book "The Dark is Rising" is being prepared for a movie...

http://www.cinescape.com/0/editoria...tion=page&type_id=&cat_id=270338&obj_id=49825

That could be very cool....I liked those books..

Banshee

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

Holy crap. Those are some decent folks working on The Dark is Rising - assuming I'm putting hte names together correctly. John Hodge wrote "Trainspotting", and Marc Platt produced Legally Blonde and Empire Falls (which got great reviews, IIRC). So it seems like a pretty major undertaking, with some backing. Awesome news.

 

[Banshee16]

Holy crap. Those are some decent folks working on The Dark is Rising - assuming I'm putting hte names together correctly. John Hodge wrote "Trainspotting", and Marc Platt produced Legally Blonde and Empire Falls (which got great reviews, IIRC). So it seems like a pretty major undertaking, with some backing. Awesome news.

What's funny is that I remember thinking a few weeks ago, when there was a thread here talking about fantasy movies that are upcoming, that I was surprised we'd heard nothing about this series, given that C.S. Lewis, Tolkien, and others are all being done now.

IIRC, the Dark is Rising didn't have lots of monsters and such.....it was mainly humans and these immortals, who basically looked like humans, wasn't it?

This also reminded me of something......I realized recently that the "Forget" spell didn't make it into 3E from 2nd Ed., and it was very much present in the Dark is Rising series.

Banshee

 

[Wombat]

The Dark is Rising sequence of books is for me what Narnia is to many others -- a deeply cherished memory from my childhood. I shall anxiously hope that they get the tone right. Colour me "Guardedly hopeful".

As for Tristram & Isolde, I shall wait and see. I have read many different versions of this tale, a couple of which I loved, many of which did nothing for me. Mostly I read the tales due to my Arthurian obsession; T&I were not originally part of those tales, but they certainly become grafted on in fairly short order.

 

[Banshee16]

The Dark is Rising sequence of books is for me what Narnia is to many others -- a deeply cherished memory from my childhood. I shall anxiously hope that they get the tone right. Colour me "Guardedly hopeful".

As for Tristram & Isolde, I shall wait and see. I have read many different versions of this tale, a couple of which I loved, many of which did nothing for me. Mostly I read the tales due to my Arthurian obsession; T&I were not originally part of those tales, but they certainly become grafted on in fairly short order.

What I find interesting is that they're really not a well-known tale. Most everyone's heard of King Arthur, but how many have heard of Tristan & Isolde?

Banshee

 

[Wayside]

What I find interesting is that they're really not a well-known tale. Most everyone's heard of King Arthur, but how many have heard of Tristan & Isolde?

Banshee

Everyone who's ever listened to Wagner, at least. Still not many these days, I suppose, but not too long ago everybody would've known them.

 

[Dioltach]

What I find interesting is that they're really not a well-known tale. Most everyone's heard of King Arthur, but how many have heard of Tristan & Isolde?

Banshee

As part of my Master's degree (Middle English literature), I took a 13-week multi-disciplinary course covering the Tristan legend in all its forms, from Beroult and Marie de France to Wagner. Very interesting.

What I remember best of the whole course, though, was the French professor talking about the 'love potion' that Tristan and Isolde drink. "A dashing young knight, a beautiful princess, sitting on deck of a boat crossing the Irish Sea and gazing at the moon -- who needs a magic potion? Any drink would have had the same effect!"

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

The Dark is Rising sequence of books is for me what Narnia is to many others -- a deeply cherished memory from my childhood. I shall anxiously hope that they get the tone right. Colour me "Guardedly hopeful".

Same here - I found the Chronicles of Narnia first, The Dark is Rising second, and then Lord of the Rings. They constitute the foundation of my interest in fantasy.

 

[SteelDraco]

Oooh, great news. The Dark is Rising series is one of my favorite childhoold memories - I'm in the same boat as Kid Charlemagne, with Susan Cooper, CS Lewis, and Tolkien forming the basis for my reading of fantasy. (And a book called David and the Phoenix, but I don't remember who wrote that.) Here's to hoping they do a good job with it. I wonder which plot thread they'll go with, the three kids, or the youngest immortal?

IIRC, the Dark is Rising didn't have lots of monsters and such.....it was mainly humans and these immortals, who basically looked like humans, wasn't it?

(Note - spoileriness below. If you haven't read the series, you should.)

Yeah, primarily humans and people who looked like humans. The six main characters are the three kids (two boys and a girl, IIRC) who are the main characters in Over Sea, Under Stone and Greenwitch. They have a great-uncle, Merriman, who is one of the Old Ones, who shows up in all of them. Will is another Old One, though he's only about the same age as the kids. He's the main character in The Dark is Rising and The Grey King. There's also an albino Welsh kid named Bran, who is important for the last two books, Grey King and Silver on the Tree.

Trying to think back on what supernatural special effects they'd need. The first two books don't have much, as I recall. Over Sea, Under Stone doesn't have much, just some creepy humans. Lots of snow, floods, and some time travel in The Dark is Rising. Greenwitch gets a bit crazy - a whole town gets attacked by ghosts (and ghost pirates!), there's a crazy plant elemental, and some other evil-ness. The Grey King has a few midieval-type scenes, and a sea serpent. Silver on the Tree has quite a bit - there's a large, idyllic land (think Atlantis in England), which has a few monsters, and a pretty dramatic finale.

Hopefully they'll have a good script and good people playing the main characters. Casting Will is going to be the hardest, since he's a young kid with the bearing and attitude of an old man. Can't think of anybody who could pull that off - they'll probably have to increase his age a bit to make it work. I'd love to see Ian McKellan or Sean Connery as Merriman, but I doubt that'll happen.