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The wankest film idea ever conceived? Danny Boyle's Ed Sheeran Beatles thing

Started by Thomas, August 31, 2018, 05:27:45 PM

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St_Eddie

I'm with popcorn on this.  There's nothing inherently wrong with the premise of this film or The Invention of Lying.  The failure of both films is purely down to the execution (and the failure to actually even follow the basic logic of the premise, as is the case with The Invention of Lying).

SteveDave

From wikipedia

QuoteJack realises he is the only person who remembers 9/11

Someone has blundered.

Replies From View

I just think "waking up to discover you are in a mildly alternate dimension so you exploit it" lacks ingenuity however you cut it.

Groundhog Day is much more than that, as is Back to the Future (if we're including everything Gervais arrogantly compared The Invention of Lying to).

popcorn

Quote from: Replies From View on July 01, 2019, 12:56:48 PM
I just think "waking up to discover you are in a mildly alternate dimension so you exploit it" lacks ingenuity however you cut it.

Groundhog Day is much more than that, as is Back to the Future (if we're including everything Gervais arrogantly compared The Invention of Lying to).

But Groundhog Day and BttF are both basically "you are in a mildly alternate dimension" premises. The difference is they are really good stories and use the what-if premises really well.

Ferris

Quote from: popcorn on July 01, 2019, 01:16:24 PM
But Groundhog Day and BttF are both basically "you are in a mildly alternate dimension" premises. The difference is they are really good stories and use the what-if premises really well.

Yeah I'm with popcorn in this.

There's nothing inherently wrong with a "what if" premise, but an irredeemably shit story would ruin even the most innocuous of ideas.

St_Eddie

Quote from: Replies From View on July 01, 2019, 12:56:48 PM
I just think "waking up to discover you are in a mildly alternate dimension so you exploit it" lacks ingenuity however you cut it.

Not every premise needs to be ingenious though.  Again, it all comes down to the execution.  A simple and well trodden premise can still be exceptionally executed.

BlodwynPig



BlodwynPig

Quote from: popcorn on July 01, 2019, 01:45:41 PM
This has been a PR masterstroke.

Shame it was only the jellyfish of the forum that came out in support of your LUDICROUS statement

mothman

Quote from: St_Eddie on July 01, 2019, 11:44:21 AM
I'm with popcorn on this.  There's nothing inherently wrong with the premise of this film or The Invention of Lying.  The failure of both films is purely down to the execution (and the failure to actually even follow the basic logic of the premise, as is the case with The Invention of Lying).

This is how I feel about something like Bright where they basically take the modern world we understand and change one thing - in that case that there are now Elves, Orcs etc. But such a fundamental change would have vastly affected the way the modern world would have developed; instead it's like the whole world suddenly changed and nobody realised (which to be fair has been done - see ST:TNG "Conundrum," Dawn - and also Jonathan! - in Buffy, etc.). Yesterday is like Bright but if one person remembered when there weren't elves, orcs etc. and wrote a book about it. It's The Man In The High Castle but done as a rom-com...

popcorn

Yes, it is one of those "think about it for half a second and it falls apart" things. If the Beatles never existed and this means, for example, that Oasis also never exist, this presumably would have had drastic knock-on effects in an infinity of other ways. Don't forget that he's also in a universe where smoking has never been invented, which probably would have created a stranger universe still. But to be honest I'm all right with shrugging and going "well whatever" for all that sort of thing.

The romcom thing is bollocks because among other reasons it has absolutely nothing to do with the premise of the film, which is the only interesting bit. It's not even thematically connected, there's no effort to make plagiarism some sort of metaphor for being honest in love or something, it's godawful.

Just to stress this again it is a very poor film.

Ferris

Quote from: BlodwynPig on July 01, 2019, 01:46:43 PM
Shame it was only the jellyfish of the forum that came out in support of your LUDICROUS statement

#ImWithBlodwyn


marquis_de_sad

The premise is fine, it's just the unbearable naff equation of The Beatles + Richard Curtis. If Boris Johnson goes on Desert Island Discs again, he would vigorously pretend to like this film.

mothman

One of the Right Sort watching such vulgar popular entertainment? I should think not!




greenman

Quote from: FerriswheelBueller on July 01, 2019, 01:24:39 PM
Yeah I'm with popcorn in this.

There's nothing inherently wrong with a "what if" premise, but an irredeemably shit story would ruin even the most innocuous of ideas.

As you can see with several attempts to recycle the groundhog day idea since, I spose that Cruise action him was decent enough.

Ferris

Quote from: greenman on July 01, 2019, 04:01:36 PM
As you can see with several attempts to recycle the groundhog day idea since, I spose that Cruise action him was decent enough.

That Cruise film (Edge of Tomorrow) was unexpectedly good even if the title is complete dog dirt - I thought it was well done and I enjoyed the bleakness of it all.

mothman

Yeah, opinions may vary whether Live Die Repeat is a good title or not, but either way changing it to Edge Of Tomorrow wasn't an improvement. It was always going to end up being remembered as "Groundhog Day with aliens," but depsite that it's not a complete disaster and is quite watchable.

The explanation for the time travel was shonky and just by having to have an explanation at all makes it instantly lesser than GD, which didn't need one to work.


Replies From View



Sebastian Cobb

Quote from: SteveDave on July 01, 2019, 12:56:09 PM
From wikipedia

Someone has blundered.

Just going through the edit history, this had also been changed to Yesterday itself, Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball, Neon Genesis Evangelion, Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure and Plan 9 from Outer Space.

Zetetic

Quote from: mothman on July 01, 2019, 02:03:58 PM
This is how I feel about something like Bright where they basically take the modern world we understand and change one thing - in that case that there are now Elves, Orcs etc. But such a fundamental change would have vastly affected the way the modern world would have developed
I note the Shadowrun approach of having elves, orcs, etc. suddenly start existing in 2012. (As in - people turn into them or are as born as them. Works better being extremely pulpy.)

(Which both avoids having to work out elves, orcs, etc. prior to 2012, and gives you some more grist from the period of transition.)

DukeDeMondo

Quote from: mothman on July 01, 2019, 04:59:52 PM
Yeah, opinions may vary whether Live Die Repeat is a good title or not, but either way changing it to Edge Of Tomorrow wasn't an improvement. It was always going to end up being remembered as "Groundhog Day with aliens," but depsite that it's not a complete disaster and is quite watchable.

It was the other way round, "Live. Die. Repeat." was the tagline initially. I think it's fantastic - the film, not the title(s) - and probably prefer it to Source Code, far as that sort of thing goes.

Zetetic

Vaguely connected - it looks like we might be getting a few time-loop-immersive-exploration-detective-sim computer games soon. Outer Wilds is lovely. The Forgotten City being remade as a full game. Feels like the sort of mechanic that will be fashionable for a while.

(Edit: Majora's Mask (2000) deserves a mention of course.)

mothman

Quote from: DukeDeMondo on July 01, 2019, 06:26:45 PM
It was the other way round, "Live. Die. Repeat." was the tagline initially.

I stand corrected. I forgot that the original title was All You Need Is Kill.

notjosh

Quote from: popcorn on July 01, 2019, 02:09:05 PM
Yes, it is one of those "think about it for half a second and it falls apart" things. If the Beatles never existed and this means, for example, that Oasis also never exist, this presumably would have had drastic knock-on effects in an infinity of other ways.

Boyle actually mentioned this in a Guardian interview:

Quote from: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2019/jun/21/danny-boyle-they-should-get-robert-pattinson-to-be-the-next-james-bondthe Beatles influenced pretty much everything. Yesterday concentrates solely on the music, but their social and political impact extended well beyond that. "If you took them out of the equation, the ripple effect would be enormous. We'd probably be living in this massive dystopian universe. It would take a novel to track just how much everything changed."

St_Eddie

Quote from: mothman on July 01, 2019, 04:59:52 PM
Yeah, opinions may vary whether Live Die Repeat is a good title or not, but either way changing it to Edge Of Tomorrow wasn't an improvement. It was always going to end up being remembered as "Groundhog Day with aliens," but depsite that it's not a complete disaster and is quite watchable.

The explanation for the time travel was shonky and just by having to have an explanation at all makes it instantly lesser than GD, which didn't need one to work.

FUN FACT: Earlier drafts of the script for Groundhog Day did explain why Phil Connors was stuck repeating the same day over and over again...

Quote from: NeatoramaGroundhog Day makes for great discussions, and numerous theories about the movie and its meaning have been put forth.

Is it karma? What goes around comes around? Is it a commentary on man's true nature? His true goodness -reflected by kindness, understanding, and warmth? Some Buddhists have adopted the film as a modern symbol of their religion. One keeps "coming back" until they finally evolve into a "perfect state," at which time the endless "coming back" ceases. All valid and very metaphysical theories.

But why was poor Phil stuck in the "endless" time loop in the first place? This is one thing that the film leaves nebulous and unclear. In one sense, it is "hell," i.e. a world of endless repetition, with no randomness, no unpredictability. But in another sense, this is the situation we all want and need: endless chances to fix and correct our mistakes, and then to understand why they were wrong. In the film, when Phil finally straightens out what he's done wrong, the "endless" loop stops.

But again, why the punishment? After all, Phil is undeniably a jerk, but hey, he never murdered anyone. He's not a rapist. He didn't torture any small animals. Why Phil? Okay, here's the answer.

The second draft of Groundhog Day says, actually, it was caused by Phil's scorned ex-girlfriend Stephanie. The second draft of Groundhog Day is pretty close to what we all see in the film. There is a bit more of Phil in the studio at the beginning, but nothing major. But also in the second draft, Stephanie, Phil's ex-girlfriend, puts a curse on him. Literally, she opens a book of magic spells and does a little ritual that causes him to get stuck in time.

Near the beginning of this script, we meet Phil's girlfriend, Stephanie, who Phil coldly and unceremoniously dumps. Later, as Phil is going to bed in Punxsutawney, we see Stephanie in her room, using Phil's business cards and broken watch (conveniently set at 5:59) to perform a magic spell from a book titled 101 Curses, Spells, and Enchantments You Can Do At Home. This sets the theme of Groundhog Day in motion. There is no "higher purpose" given, just an angry, embittered ex-girlfriend with a little book.

Excerpt from the second Groundhog Day script: Stephanie: Are you saying that our relationship was a waste of time? Phil: Our relationship? We went out a total of four times, and only once did anything happen. It was fun, but I don't see that as a big commitment. Stephanie (closing in again): I had our charts done. My astrologer says we're extremely compatible. There may even be some past lives involved here.

For whatever reason, the director, the writer, or whoever, made the decision to completely excise any mention of Stephanie and her vindictive curse. I guess they just felt it was unnecessary to the movie or that it "slowed down the action" or that it made Phil too sympathetic, or some such Hollywood reason. Well, maybe they were right.

The screenplay also specifies that Phil will spend the next 10,000 years (Holy cow!) trapped in the time loop. It also has a more definite answer as to why he comes out of it. It was apparently the kiss with Rita at the end of the film that broke the spell, much like a fairy tale. Even in the final filmed version, you can hear a tinkly magic sound as Phil and Rita lock lips.

Thanks goodness they scrapped the explanation from the final draft!

Golden E. Pump

They really missed a trick by not calling this movie Strawberry Fields For NEVER.

mothman

I bet Stephanie would have had red hair. Be played by Glenne Headly or Joan Cusack or one of the other go-to comedy nutjob actresses of the 1990s.