Ridley Scott Returns to PKD 99
Krau Ming quotes from a report at Sneakpeek.ca "Ridley Scott's Scott Free Productions will produce a 4-hour TV adaptation of author Phlip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle, based on a script by Howard Brenton. The original 1962 novel was a science fiction 'alternate history' that won a sci fi Hugo book award in 1963. Premise of the book, about daily life under totalitarian Fascist imperialism, occurs in 1962, fourteen years after the end of the Second World War in 1948. The victorious Axis Powers, Japan and Germany, conduct intrigues against each other in North America, specifically in the former US, which surrendered to them, after the Axis conquered Eurasia and destroyed the populaces of Africa." Adds Krau Ming: "Hopefully this will fall in the category of well-done PKD adaptations (though I'll leave it up to the slashdotters to determine which of the previous movies should be categorized as such)."
Re:Please correct me if I'm wrong.... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Please correct me if I'm wrong.... (Score:5, Informative)
Not bothering to look this up but I think almost self-evidently the correct answer would be Shakespeare.
Re:Please correct me if I'm wrong.... (Score:3, Informative)
In fact, to reply to my own post... I just found ;-) [wikipedia.org]
Re:Please correct me if I'm wrong.... (Score:3, Informative)
True. According to this article, there are a few more authors [suite101.com] who have beaten our Dick.
The article lists:
0. Bible/Homer/Shakespeare/Dickens
1. Stephen King
2. W. Somerset Maugham
3. Ernest Hemingway
and possibly, depending on the current count
4. John Grisham
Ian Fleming seems to be missing from that list, and I suspect others as well.
Re:Please correct me if I'm wrong.... (Score:3, Informative)
Filmographies (Score:3, Informative)
but isn't PKD the author who has the most works that have been translated to the silver screen?
"The Prince and the Pauper" was filmed by the Edison studios in 1909 - at Mark Twain's home in Conneticut!
There have been at least 120 credited and uncredited adaptations of Twain's stories.
292 tales from Dickens.
232 adaptations of Sherlock Holmes.
223 productions based on the novels and stories of Robert Lewis Stevenson.
201 adaptations from O.Henry, 137 from Jules Verne.
83 from H.G. Wells, 77 from Rudyard Kipling.
As improbable as it sounds, there is new version of The Three Musketeers in production. The first was in 1898.
Re:Please correct me if I'm wrong.... (Score:5, Informative)
For myself, I loved Blade Runner. It was a little ahead of its time and is much more cerebral than a typical "SciFi" movie, but it certainly is at the top of nearly any list of best movies I can cite. The groundbreaking effects and ideas expressed in the movie have been copied by many subsequent films enough that some things look cliche because you've seen those other movies that came after Blade Runner. IMHO it was also one of Harrison Ford's better roles, but I suppose that you can form your own opinion about that actor and his work. Harrison Ford has been one of Hollywood's most "bankable" actors as he is in films that have a combined gross take in the billions of dollars. Perhaps that is why he is hated but the roughly billion or so people who have seen at least one of his movies might beg to differ on that point. This film is certainly more "hard SF" than "SciFi", which perhaps is the problem with the above reviewer.
As for Total Recall, I thought it was a fun diversion, but as for realism I thought it was absolutely stupid and highly inaccurate. "Scientifically accurate depiction of exposure to the Martian atmosphere".... hardly. It looked cool on film I suppose but it really didn't work very well. FYI, you can survive on Mars with mostly a pressure suit and an oxygen mask. Parts of the surface of Mars have the same atmospheric pressure as the top of Everest. Really, it isn't nearly as bad as depicted in the movie. The lead actor is the now governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger. If you know his work, it sums it up pretty well. Perhaps one of the more cerebral roles for the governator, but there is still a pretty high body count by the time the movie is done. He also has more dialog in this movie than Terminator, but almost any movie would qualify in that regard and doesn't say much and is perhaps one of its flaws too. It is a movie to watch with your brain put into neutral merely to enjoy the film as an action thriller, not for any scientific accuracy if you really know anything about this stuff.
Minority Report stars Tom Cruise as the lead. If you've seen "Mission Impossible" (1 or 2, it doesn't matter), it is essentially the same movie in a slightly different setting. Tom Cruise portrays the cocky punk that he has been in most of his movies and this isn't even really his best role either. There is more that is redeeming than just the data search user interface with the computers that he is using (running Hollywood OS, of course). The stuff that Phillip K. Dick wrote in is certainly thought provoking including the whole concept of arresting people who merely show the potential of committing a crime. If the Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] entry is to be believed, it was originally supposed to be a sequel of Total Recall, to be also starring the Governator as the lead actor instead of Tom Cruise. Thank goodness that script was lost and that plan abandoned. While not a horrible film, this film doesn't really inspire me either so I wouldn't say to avoid this film but also don't go out of your way to watch it either. If it comes up as something on TV or you have a friend who has it on DVD and you have a couple hours to kill with nothing better to do, there are worse ways to spend those two hours of your life.
Re:Please correct me if I'm wrong.... (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Fitting... (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Please correct me if I'm wrong.... (Score:3, Informative)
As for Total Recall, I thought it was a fun diversion, but as for realism I thought it was absolutely stupid and highly inaccurate. "Scientifically accurate depiction of exposure to the Martian atmosphere".... hardly. It looked cool on film I suppose but it really didn't work very well. FYI, you can survive on Mars with mostly a pressure suit and an oxygen mask. Parts of the surface of Mars have the same atmospheric pressure as the top of Everest. Really, it isn't nearly as bad as depicted in the movie.
Your complaints about the movie's scientific accuracy would be more compelling if you were more accurate than the movie was. Air pressure on Mars is less than 10 millibars. Air pressure at the top of Mt. Everest is about 300 millibars. Not remotely "the same atmospheric pressure".