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Message: <blockquote data-quote="replicant2" data-source="post: 2790699" data-attributes="member: 16498">It's a tragedy for those of us who like sword and sorcery yarns, but to defend the film making industry I think the problem is a lot of S&S material doesn't translate well into the kind of films audiences like/are used to seeing.It's easy to empathize with the characters of Narnia, Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter. Oftentimes they're flawed. Many of them represent the everyman, like Frodo. They have to overcome not only impossible odds but their own mortality and frailty. It's easy for audiences to identify with these types of characters. They also feature groups of characters working together, allowing for more on-screen interaction and external character development.Conversely, S&S often features a single, larger-than-life protagonist who overomes all odds through brute force, or ingenuity. S&S is, in its purest form, all plot -- pure story -- with cool worlds to explore, monsters to fight and riches to win, but frankly, without a lot of depth, The characters are quite often static and change little, if at all. I love these kinds of stories, but thematically many of them are rather shallow. They'd make for great spectacle, sure, but I think they'd be panned by the critics and their turnout would suffer. It's too great a risk for a multi-million dollar movie production.Before I get the Howardites jumping down my throat, let me state that I understand there is a lot more going on in the Conan stories than just a brute hacking away with a sword. I think the whole civilization vs. barbarism angle could make for a compelling hook to a film, I'm just not sure of its appeal to a large audience -- or, just as important, a Hollywood exec who has to finance a grim, dark film like "Beyond the Black River," for instance. And I'm not even going to get into Elric.I also think a secondary factor is that a lot of the S&S films of the 80's were just plain bad, and who wants to take a risk on another Hawk the Slayer or Beastmaster? Again, films you and I and probably a lot of folks on these boards enjoy, but do they truly have a broad appeal?</blockquote>

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