Friday, December 19, 2008

"With or Without?"

I had no idea this existed until the main Marmot himself posted about his brother's screenplay ending up on the list.

Congratulations Kevin!

I have to say that the summary of Kevin's screenplay, "The Phantom Limb," sounds rather interesting:
A troubled private detective uncovers a blackmail scam involving a gangster who
runs a brothel that caters to amputee fetishes (and other taboo sexual
interests) and the doctor who performs the body modifications.
Sounds like my favorite bit from "Romeo is Bleeding" taken to the extreme. And when I said interesting I mean truly messed up in ways that only the best 1970's neo-noir stories can be. I really hope this ends up making it to the screen.

In addition to "The Phantom Limb" there are a shit-ton of other movies on this list. Here are some of the titles that jumped out at me as being either worthy project or in need of a little mocking:

"Inglorious Bastards" - Quentin Tarantino + World War 2? YES PLEASE!

"Galahad" - I am a sucker for anything having to do with Arthurian Legend.

"Fierce Invalids Home From Hot Climates" - Apparently this is based on a book which could not possibly be as good as the movie I am seeing in my head right
now. A possible sequel title? "Fierce With Pigs" in which the main characters
set out to violate their strict Hebrew upbrining by eating bacon.

"Roundtable" - Comicdom's Brian K. Vaughn + Arthurian legend? Mmm, mmm good.
"The Amazing Adventures of the Monogamous Duck" - Who gives a flying rat's ass what this is about, the title alone is worth the price of admission.
"The Gary Coleman - Emmanuel Lewis Project" - I know this is supposed to be a place-holder title however I REALLY think they need to leave this as the title
for the film. I like to think of it as the Alan Parson's Project for the new
Willenium.
"Your Dreams Suck" - Nothing to say here except ain't that the truth?
"47 Ronin" - I am happy that this particular story is getting remade for a more
mainstream audience although I suspect this will have trouble living up to the
example set by "Chushingura" however I have heard that this is being
envisioned as a Keanu Reeves vehicle. Really? Please don't. Seriously.
"Samurai" - Sticking with the whole Japanese theme this sounds like it could be
fun. Hope it is done as well as this year's "The Forbidden Kingdom."
"Untitled Channing Tatum Project" - Okay from time to time these untitled
projects have unintentionally funny names, for example see the Gary
Coleman-Emmanuel Lewis entry above, however most of the time JUST ASSIGN A DAMN TITLE TO THE PROJECT.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

You know, it was because of that scene that I ever even heard of Romeo is Bleeding.
My mom had been taking a pretty solid regiment of steroids in between batches of chemo and it had trashed her sleep schedule. Which meant that she often stayed up late at night watching movies on cable and then falling asleep part way through. This lead to some confusion as she'd stitch together new movies from the pieces she'd seen and from the dreams in between, the results often not recognizing the original movies in the slightest.
The steroids also lead to her calling me at odd hours of the morning and discussing crazed business plans and the like. On one of these calls she described this scene, "With or without?" to a T. I told her she was crazy and that she'd dreamed it, but nonetheless, i wandered off to Cactus music to see if I could find it (this being before the days of imdb.com and their ilk).
And sure enough the guys behind the movie counter knew exactly what I was talking about and had it in stock.
Odd fact about the movie: The title comes from a Tom Waits song on his Blue Valentine album.
I have a copy of Fierce Invalids if you want to borrow it. Its a Tom Robbins book, though not nearly as a good as Jitterbug Perfume or Skinny Legs and All.