What went wrong?

[Mugwomp]

I think this guy is very right about why the first book at least would never be filmed literally:


You can see Hollywood executives coming to the part in Tull and going: 'Wait, the hero kills EVERYONE in town? The HERO...?'
I doubt even in a tv-series they would do that.

Depends on whether they're trying to make a series for adults or not. Game of Thrones and many other shows have shown people not only tolerate but enjoy shocking and violent storytelling. One of the heroes in the movie Kingsman is involved in a church massacre where everybody dies a VERY violent death (AMAZINGLY edited/shot scene). But there's a reason why, just like there's a reason why the townspeople of Tull turn on Roland.

Roland is sort of an "anti-hero", I'm sure these are the same sort of producers that would say "Roland lets Jake die? We can't let THAT happen!" The Tull scene would have been one of the most memorable parts of the movie if they did the first book as a fairly direct adaptation. The final shot at the end of the scene when the smoke clears and Tull is nothing but Roland and a bunch of corpses would have been unforgettable. The people in Tull were possessed by the MiB. THAT would have been a heck of a lot creepier than him simply saying "stop breathing." They could have had the last living Tull person speak in the MiB's voice, letting viewers know who is behind the madness, right before Roland puts a bullet in him.

Heck, don't the Breaker kids die at the end of the new Dark Tower movie, without so much as a mention?

If a producer is working on The Dark Tower with the intent of sugarcoating the story for young teens, they shouldn't be adapting the material in the first place.

 

[Portefoi]

I'd like to see reviews by people who have NOT read the books and aren't stephen king fans. Of course purists are going to gnash their teeth and clutch their pearls. So they will trash the movie just so they can say, "I told you so" and feel all superior. And who are the people flooding the review market right now. Dark Tower fans.

I totally understand the disappoint some feel that the book wasn't followed word for word. This is a beloved series of books. But this wailing and lamenting doesn't change the fact that the world just got turned on to the Dark Tower and we will have a whole new group of people taking the journey by picking up the source material. That's a great thing!

I'm pretty sure no one in their right mind would just go see a movie without doing a lick of research on what it's supposed to be about...

 

[not_nadine]

I would. Don't think I need research to see a movie. Just a general idea.

 

[Portefoi]

Watching a trailer is doing research.

 

[not_nadine]

DFTT, DFTT. Taking fingers away from keyboard.

 

[Dana Jean]

DFTT, DFTT. Taking fingers away from keyboard.

I encourage you to report the post.

 

[Dana Jean]

 

[Gerald]

For those who have seen it: would you compare it to films like, say, End of Days (1999) or The Last Witch Hunter (2015)? Or is it really something quite different?

I do quite like those films (the first probably more than the second). They're basically an action/(urban) fantasy/horror mix. Even if I don't like what they have done to the books, I still might like it on those grounds.

It's coming to dvd here just before Christmas, so fairly soon. I hope there's at least some extras to make the experience a little longer. What I fear most what I won't like about it is the short length, and that's what most reviews hold against it - that it doesn't take the time to provide more background.
I suppose a longer cut is out of the question, since Arcel wanted it to be this length.

 

[Robert Gray]

For those who have seen it: would you compare it to films like, say, End of Days (1999) or The Last Witch Hunter (2015)? Or is it really something quite different?

Well.... all three films are bad... so they got that in common.

I do quite like those films (the first probably more than the second). They're basically an action/(urban) fantasy/horror mix. Even if I don't like what they have done to the books, I still might like it on those grounds.

Oddly enough, while I don't like any of the three films, End of Days and The Last Witch Hunter are actually more internally consistent and do bring more to the table, albeit not a lot more. All three would be considered the genre magical realism.

It's coming to dvd here just before Christmas, so fairly soon. I hope there's at least some extras to make the experience a little longer. What I fear most what I won't like about it is the short length, and that's what most reviews hold against it - that it doesn't take the time to provide more background.
I suppose a longer cut is out of the question, since Arcel wanted it to be this length.

Give yourself an early Xmas gift and don't buy it.

 

[Gerald]

Well.... all three films are bad... so they got that in common.



Oddly enough, while I don't like any of the three films, End of Days and The Last Witch Hunter are actually more internally consistent and do bring more to the table, albeit not a lot more. All three would be considered the genre magical realism.



Give yourself an early Xmas gift and don't buy it.

All three get more or less the same rating, around 6 on IMDb. End of Days is not really a great film, but it's one that I've still always enjoyed, and ended up watching over again when it appears on tv even though I never found it good enough to buy. I think it has to do with the director Peter Hyams who mostly made fun films. None of his films are rated particular highly, but he manages to inject his films with a kind of fun I react to - most obvious example 'Running Scared' (still LOVE that theme tune by Michael McDonald!).

Last Witch Hunter I've only seen one time, but I do like Vin Diesel a lot. And it has Rose Leslie, who I haven't seen in a lot outside Game of Thrones.

What I like about these films (and hopefully Dark Tower too) is that they don't fit in a particular mold. They're a bit of a mix of things, and you can't really predict so much where they will go. So many Hollywood films fit in a rather strict mold, I'm always looking for things that are a bit outside the mainstream genres - or mix different genres into something new.

Don't know if I'll buy The Dark Tower - will depend on the extras and price also. No doubt I'll see it at SOME time, just wonder if it's worth the visit to the cinema - even longer, over two hour films like Star Wars feel short to me.

 

[Robert Gray]

Between End of Days and The Last Witchhunter, I prefer End of Days. Both are empty calorie films.. but End of Days has some really strong ensemble performances. It is one of those films that has Arnold in it but doesn't exist merely to be further the cult of Arnold. Does that make sense? There is a difference between an Actor and a Movie Star. There is a simple test which reveals it. If you think of a movie that you saw and an remember the actor's name rather than the character's name first, you are talking about a Movie Star. If you think of the character's name first, then you are talking about an Actor.

For example, if you had to name the character's Arnold plays in most of his movies (even his good ones) it would take most people effort. Their names in the film are really moot. They are Arnold. Case in point, what is Arnold's character's name in film: Predator? By contrast, in the film: Silence of the Lambs, no one has any trouble remembering the names Hannibal Lector or Clarice Starling. Tom Cruise is another good example. His best films generally are those that he has no leverage or pull whatsoever in how they are made. They aren't a shrine to himself, like that horrible Mummy remake.

This brings us all the way back to the DT film. I think Idris is a great actor. But if you talk to people who saw the film (but haven't read the books) it is the actor's name that they tend to remember, not Roland of Gilead. The character simply didn't make an impression, and like it or not that is a failure of the film and all involved. If an actor or a film sells the story, it has invested us in the characters. We know their names. Do I know the names of those actors involved in the television series Breaking Bad? Sure. But it is Heisenberg we think of first. It is burned into our collective consciousness.

 

[danie]

https://www.google.com/amp/ew.com/movies/2017/09/26/dark-tower-movie-stephen-king-reaction/amp/

 

[Robert Gray]

I hope they don't double down on what went wrong when they do the television series. We don't want a reboot. We don't want a new mythology. We want as faithful adaptation of the original work as possible. It needs the same kind of treatment Gaiman's American Gods got on Starz. That means they need tabula rasa, i.e. totally expunging the film, all actors in it, all implications of it, and go back to the books. There is a reason they are great and have kept people coming back to read them all the way to the end. It was foolish to ignore the source material. It needs:

1. A talented cast of largely unknown actors, no pretensions of Star power.
2. It needs to be R-Rated so that the material can be honestly portrayed.
3. It needs to be faithful to the books, i.e. no candy coating of any scene or character. (Roland is an anti-hero in the first book for example)
4. It needs to go back to the book order, not some arrogant notions a better order as envisioned by the film makers.
5. Like the show Breaking Bad, it needs a beginning, middle, and an end rather than being written on the fly.

I could go to a full list of ten, but these are the most important. Everything else is icing. There are all sorts of conventions (most of them tired) for films right now, i.e. how quickly an action sequence must happen, artificial costume silliness, and so on. All of that needs to be tossed.

 

[lovely1]

Saw this movie in the cinema. It was nothing like the books and they made the story go in another direction. It was mildly entertaining with a few cool gunslinger special effects thrown in.