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Warner Bros and Paramount are getting closer on a co-production of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, the Eric Roth-scripted adaptation of the Jonathan Safran Foer novel that director Stephen Daldry and producer Scott Rudin have been working on for the last half decade. Sandra Bullock and Tom Hanks have been circling the project, a lot of journalists knew it but agreed to wait, and then somebody ran it. Oh, well. The film is not just Paramount, as was reported. Warner Bros has been the lead studio on the project, and now they and Paramount are figuring it out together. I’m told and they are in the process of making offers to talent. The book is about a bright 9-year old whose father is killed on 9/11. He finds a key left behind by his father and goes on a mission to figure out what it unlocks. The novel was a literary sensation when it was published and not the easiest film adaptation, which is why it has taken so long. But it is superb subject matter for Bullock to potentially make her first project since winning the Oscar for The Blind Side.
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Would someone please do an analysis on exactly how successful book adaptations are at the box office? This sounds a boring as the rest. It’s not fair, we either suffer through comic book after comic book or we get adaptations. Can we please have some original material??? Please?????
The Godfather.
Yeah, cuz THE GODFATHER, THE MALTESE FALCON, BLADE RUNNER AND FIGHT CLUB are REAAAAAAAAAAAALLLLY sucked. Oh, wait, they were all adaptations. By the by, I’m all for 100% original content, but there’s nothing wrong with a great book adaptation.
For pure box office, GONE WITH THE WIND.
Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, The Silence of the Lambs
I started going through the Oscar list but realized I just don’t have time to list all the great movies based on books. The only reason you’re seeing so many book adaptations is because the connection is being well-publicized. If you were honest with yourself, you would look at your favorite movies and realize that quite a few are based on books. But, just to give more titles in my favorites: Shawshank Redemption and Shutter Island (ok I’ve only read the book, but I really liked it!
It’s an awful novel – gimmicky, exploitative, cynical, hollow. What this article doesn’t say is that Rudin bought Foer’s first novel, Everything is Illuminated, which Liev Schrieber directed. That one didn’t exactly set the box office on fire. And Roth needs the money, post-Madoff. Could be an interesting movie – as was Rudin/Daldry’s artful if overpolished adaptation of The Hours – but won’t be a hit.
caca poopoo
Sandra’s a delight, but…Blind Side was the single most undeserved acting Oscar of all time. Contained within a cretinous film, I might add.
I’m going to have to go with Julia Roberts in “Erin Brockovich”for the undeserved acting Oscar.
Julia Roberts’ performance in Erin Brockovich was better than Bullock’s and I don’t even like Roberts, but she is a better actress than Bullock.
Cher, Helen Hunt, Halle Berry. In the distant past, Grace Kelly and Elizabeth Taylor (Butterfield Eight).
Would you please give it up with the Bullock bashing. It was totally deserved for an actress who has deserved an oscar for a long time. As far as the other poster complaining about original material — have you seen Scott Pilgrim? As original as you can get these days.
Uhhh, Scott Pilgrim is based on a comic book.
Amen.
I hope Eric Roth sticks to the novel’s remarkable character development.
It’s superb subject matter? Obviously this person hasn’t read the source material, all Bullock’s character does is make phone calls. Both she and the main male lead have some pretty sucktastic parts that don’t amount to much at all.
Maybe they can set it to music and cut up the screen and move the parts around. It worked for CSI, right?
This sounds dull as dirt and Daldry really? After the crapfest that was The Reader I’d rather not see another one of his films. Maybe SaBu will slap on a bad old lady wig and some grandma makeup like Winslet.
Her winning the Oscar was worse than Reese and Gwyneth’s Oscar wins combined.
No Oscar win in the history of the Academy was worst than Gwyneth winning for “Shakespeare In Love.” Ugh!
Like goo from an over greased box of popcorn, “Extreme Incredibleness”, will just gush snide sentiment worthy of Drew Barries,Katie Hawn, or S. LaBuff.
You can’t have original material when the studios have stopped buying ideas and now only want to buy finished scripts. With directors. And stars. Attached.
So, write great specs. And hand them to your agent. You’ll survive it. The world will keep spinning. All will be okay.
Eric Roth? Isn’t he the guy who wrote Forrest Gump twice, and tried to pass it off as two movies?
I guess the 200 + million dollars that the blind side made — making it the most successful female led movie and most successful sports movie EVER — puts your opinion in the minority.
@Original Joe-
“Would someone please do an analysis on exactly how successful book adaptations are at the box office?”
Well, if you look at the All Time Box Office List, 35 of the Top 200 are adaptations (I may have missed a few – I’m procrastinating here, not working!).
Excluding the successful adaptations of The Lord of the Rings (#13, #17, #28), Harry Potter (#26, #35, #40, #43, #49, #61) and the Twilight series (#36, #37)- these are the most successful adaptations:
Jurassic Park (#16)
Forrest Gump (#21)
The Chronicles of Narnia (#41)
How The Grinch Stole Christmas (#53)
Jaws (#54)
I Am Legend (#55)
The Blind Side (#56)
The Lost World (#75)
The Bourne Ultimatum (#78
The Da Vinci Code (#86)
300 (#96)
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (99)
The Exorcist (#104)
Gone With The Win d(#108)
Twilight (#117)
Dances With Wolves (#123)
The Perfect Storm (#129)
The Planet of the Apes (#134
The POlar Express (#143)
The Bourne Supremacy (#146)
Hannibal (#167)
The Pursuit of Happyness (#175)
The Firm (#180)
Horton Hears A Who (#191)
“300″ was a comic book, but otherwise, great list.
How can Eric Roth add anything to this?
Regardless of his talent and Oscar to back it up.
He’s not the director…or the box office star, or even Rudin.
In this day and age…which has go on in a bad way for almost 20 years now;
IRREGARDLESS of the box office numbers…which are juggled as much as the
studio books — stars and producers and directors are going to have the last word.
Right off to the side of the studio uppers.
If any of us had any idea of much Roth himself and his writing have been screwed with over the years — and many other good to great writers like him — we’d know
why so many movies with great potential just bomb.
Because everyone in Hollywood knows how to write and knows more than the writers.
BLIND SIDE made a lot of money because powers that be created a specific cookie
for a growing, specific audience.
The same that idolizes the shit that washes up on the JERSEY SHORE.
And a few years from now…hopefully the smarted audiences will look back at BLINDSIDE
and this upcoming crap…and once again wonder, WHAT THE HELL WERE THEY THINKING ABOUT?
There’s room for really good popcorn entertainment called a movie.
This just isn’t going to be it.
Ask Scott R. how many great ideas he’ll shove in Eric’s script.
Write on, right on.
MARK11
There is no such word as “irregardless.” Look it up.
I see resentful Jen Aniston fans are out in force after her 347th bomb. lmao This sounds like an incredible story – and I can’t wait to see Sandra bring it to the big screen.
“Can we please have some original material??? Please?????”
Inception, The Expendables and The Other Guys aren’t adaptations.
By the way, almost all of the top films of 1939 were adaptations:
http://www.imdb.com/year/1939/
Adaptations in and of themselves aren’t bad things. It’s all in how well they’re done.
“Half-decade” sounds so heavy, Mike. Is 5 years really that long, given the Writer’s Strike, etc.? The Corrections and Kavalier & Clay won’t see the light of day for many more years to come.
“The novel was a literary sensation when it was published”
No it wasn’t. It was heavily hyped and received extremely mixed reviews.
Correct. It was Everything is Illuminated that was the sensation. It was made into a feature by Liev Schreiber, and was seen by exactly 12 people.
That’s right. As an example, the NY Times called it “cloying” and described the main character as “an entirely synthetic creation, assembled out of bits and pieces of famous literary heroes past.” Doesn’t sound like it would make for a movie I’d like to see
Let’s slam the ham Sandy! Blindside was ridiculous. Hard to believe people got behind this flick. Her performance was borderline unwatchable as was the know-it-all kid who “coaches” the family’s newest charge. It wasn’t a football movie, a comedy, or anything approaching feelgood. I’m moving to Canada!
Sandra underserving of an Oscar? Well the competition was slim that year so it’s not her fault she was the best in a weaker field. Past history is filled with people who did not deserve their Oscar wins, so to say Sandra was “the single most undeserved acting Oscar of all time.” is a little extreme. Burstyn deserved it over Julia. Crowe deserved it over Washington (since Washington was a supporting role). Blanchett and Streep were both more deserving than Paltrow.
So let’s not beat up on Sandra because she is finally getting some recognition to match how gracious she has been in all her years in Hollywood.
Stop referring to celebrities by their first names. Very tacky, and very E! “Sandra” isn’t your pal. Industry and proper media standards are “Bullock”……or “Sandra Bullock.”
Roberts and Washington’s performances were both better than Bullock’s. The Blind Side was a piece of crap film and everyone knows it, the only reason she won anything for it is because it made money. Whether you like Roberts or Washington or not they gave good performances in their movies, even if it wasn’t the best that year, they were great performances. Bullock gave an average performance in a below-average crap movie that America ate up because everyone loves a story of rich white people saving poor black people, rme.
Bullock is the most undeserving Oscar winner of all time, even worse than Reese Witherspoon who did not do a thing to win hers either. There was not one moment in the Blind Side that was Oscar worthy, at least in Brockovich, Roberts had at least two moments (the speech about being Miss Witchita and the moment where she cried in the car after finding out her daughter said her first words) that were worthy of award recognition.
Sandra seems nice, and that is great, but she’s a below average actress and always has been.
Most undeserving Oscar winners- all time:
Women: Grace Kelly, Elizabeth Taylor, Cher, Helen Hunt, Halle Berry, Katherine Hepburn (Guess Who’s…), Sally Field, Marlee Matlin, Jody Foster (The Accused), Jessica Lang, Charlize Theron, Nicole Kidman.
Men: Humphrey Bogart, William Holden, Burt Lancaster, Maxmillain Schell, Sidney Poitier, Lee Marvin, Rod Steiger, John Wayne, Jack Lemmon (over Marlo Brando), Al Pacino (for the wrong film), Art Carney, Peter Finch (over Robert De NIro), Richard Dreyfuss (over John Travolta), F. Murray Abraham, Paul Newman (after being ignored for a fabulous body of work). It’s not that these actors didn’t deserve it but they got it for the wrong reasons and at the wrong time when other actors clearly deserved it more.
The Academy Award has always been as much as a reward for popularity than an award for good acting. Sandra Bullock is as worthy as anyone under these circumstances. Her film was enormously popular and she was the sole reason.
I inadvertently left out, Al Pacino (Scent of a Woman), Robert Begnini, Adrian Brody, and Philip Seymour Hoffman. Remember The criticism, “the award is for best acting, not MOST acting.’
I’m gonna throw this one out there…Russell Crowe for ‘Gladiator’, was good but Tom Hanks should’ve won that year for single-handedly carrying ‘Cast Away’, and Crowe should’ve won the following year for ‘A Beautiful Mind’. Then again, that’s just me…
Good point. That’s the trouble with giving awards, you have to pick one out of the many performances that are deserving winners. Maybe we need a new Oscar category,- honorable mention performances of the year, in addition to the Oscar for best performance. I’d still pick Russell Crowe for “Gladiator”, NOT because Tom Hanks didn’t do well in “Castaway”, just because of the way Russell Crowe interacted with the other characters in “Gladiator”.
I never said that Denzel Washington’s performance was weak. It was strong. BUT it was undeserving of Best Actor. “Training Day” was a film where Ethan Hawke’s character is the main character. The movie begins and ends with his character. Denzel Washington was just a strong scene stealer, but his performance would not have worked if you didn’t care about the outcome of Ethan Hawke’s character. The Lead.
And up against Russel Crowe in a “Beautiful Mind”, Denzel Washington was undeserving.
Who was Bullock up against again? Exactly… If you are going to deem her performance overrated, the same could be said about her fellow nominees in the category.
Wasn’t Washington’s Oscar win for Training Day the Academy’s way of acknowledging that he’d been shafted from best actor wins for both Malcolm X and The Hurricane?
“Stop referring to celebrities by their first names. Very tacky, and very E! “Sandra” isn’t your pal. Industry and proper media standards are ‘Bullock’……or ‘Sandra Bullock.’”
I couldn’t agree with this more.
“Because everyone in Hollywood knows how to write and knows more than the writers.”
Explain.
I beg to differ.
“Because everyone in Hollywood knows how to write and knows more than the writers.”
It was said in jest.
Writers are eternally underrated. If a suit had to write a screenplay, the movies would suck even more!
For the book adapter query, even THE GRADUATE was a book adaptation. Or how about DRACULA, FRANKENSTEIN, or any of the classic horror films?
I’d rather see an interesting novel made into a film than some of the original crap that comes out these days.
To Original Joe: You are an idiot. Have you read the script? Do you have any idea what you are talking about? THIS IS ORIGINAL MATERIAL. Try and educate yourself before making stupid remarks. This is one of the best scripts I have read all year. Read the material, then come back to us with your stupid, multiple question marks.
Love Bullock and her movies (ironically, except for that heinous Blindside movie.) She did not deserve that Oscar. When she got the Oscar instead of Streep (who DID deserve that Oscar,) the Oscars lost any residual credibility or interest.
Ah, the desperate, miserable, bitter people who can’t sell a script are in good form today. I LOVE the argument that book adaptations don’t work as movies! Though my favourites are those who confidently predict the failure of projects that haven’t even finished scripting. Idiots. Have fun bitching with your ‘colleagues’ in the coffee shop where you sit ‘writing’ the great movie that you’re already defensively telling yourself ‘They just didn’t get it.’.
Max Records for the kid!