John Carter (2012)

[EricJ]

Originally Posted by scweb13

You guys do realize that this story is nearly 100 years old right?
Not too much was know about Mars at the time and Edgar Rice Burroughs based Barsoom (Mars) on the idea that it was a dying world that was at one time similar to Earth. ERB thought up some fantastic ideas for Martian technology including an early form of GPS, flying ships, brain transplants and terra-forming factories.
The reason that most people aren't impressed seems to be that a lot of other movies have already borrowed from these Mars stories.

IOW, it was Flash Gordon pulp, with Edwardian Mars "science" (eg., what "civilization" built the canals?), and a hero slightly less bulletproof than Doc Savage, but not by much.

Don't expect anything TOO reflective of the NASA Mars rover, and to those saying "I remember Disney and Mars, didn't they have that movie with Gary Sinise?", boy, have you got the wrong story.

[scweb13]

Originally Posted by EricJ

IOW, it was Flash Gordon pulp, with Edwardian Mars "science" (eg., what "civilization" built the canals?), and a hero slightly less bulletproof than Doc Savage, but not by much.

Sorry, but both of those came way after A Princess of Mars.

[EricJ]

Originally Posted by scweb13

Sorry, but both of those came way after A Princess of Mars.

Well, lessjustsay Burroughs gave them the idea...

There's a funny Roger Ebert review that always sticks in my mind about JCM's, um, pulpish style:

TNT Jackson
You remember the story about John Carter of Mars. He was Edgar Rice Burroughs' hero, and he galloped all over Mars on whatever passed for a horse up there. One day he was attacked and chased by a band of villains who started hacking at him with their swords.

Carter of Mars drew his own trusty blade and started hacking back at them, while trying to make it up the castle stairs. But they were too much for him. First he lost a leg. Then an arm. They were gaining on him. "The hell with this," said John Carter, throwing away his sword, drawing his atomic ray gun and zapping the bad guys into a radioactive ash heap.

I think about that story every time I see a kung fu movie, because kung fu movies depend upon the same unwritten rules as John Carter novels: Nobody can have a gun. If they had a gun, they'd just shoot you, and you wouldn't get to go through the whole "aaaaaiiiiieeeee" number and leap about with your fists flashing, your foot cocked and your elbow of death savagely bent. It's great to have a black belt, but it's better if the bad guys know the rules.

[scweb13]

Originally Posted by EricJ

Well, lessjustsay Burroughs gave them the idea...

There's a funny Roger Ebert review that always sticks in my mind about JCM's, um, pulpish style:

There is no doubt that ERB had a particular style that he wrote in. His Tarzan novels were the same way.

[Monkey]

Originally Posted by WyldeMan45

Actually I'm not impressed by the fact that it just doesn't look good.

Exactly. I want another world to look like another world, not just a desert on Earth.

[Mandalorian]

Originally Posted by Monkey

Exactly. I want another world to look like another world, not just a desert on Earth.

Hopefully this is just because they're hiding the "Mars" aspect.

[Resettito]

Well, this was discussed by Slashfilm in a video, they had the same complaint about the setting, with one guy saying basically the same as you "it looks like a desert", but they did say that they weren't shown much and there is probably more to it (since it was unfinished) All of this comes from Stanton's desire as he put it in the interview to make it feel grounded, he wanted this "uber realism".

So they shot this in Utah, as Slashfilm said, lots of huge practical sets, and CGI extensions. They do say that they saw concept art that looked really sci-fi, like the floating city, spaceships, etc.

http://www.slashfilm.com/film-visits...m-john-carter/

[P@t_Mtl]

So it look like a desert, so what have you seen Mars and what it look's like?

Beside if they had done this in front of green screen a la 300 everyone would complaint it look's fake. No one is happy these days.

[dr. wai]

This movie looks ALOT like Prince of Persia. Until I see more I think I will have to pass.

[Cook]

Originally Posted by dr. wai

This movie looks ALOT like Prince of Persia. Until I see more I think I will have to pass.

I hope you mean in look only as the books this is based on is nothing like Prince of Persia at all. Though, I really don't see how it looks like POP beyond the outfit of the lead being similar to the Prince's. It is set on Mars, has aliens, no time travel, and has spaceships. Yep, just like prince of persia. Do a little research. Being narrow minded doesn't help anyone.

I found something interesting. Its the 1985 cover of the book. And John Carter is wearing something on his chest very similar to what he is in the movie. And I have seen other drawings of him wearing similar attire. What does he wear in the book?

[scweb13]

Originally Posted by Cook

I found something interesting. Its the 1985 cover of the book. And John Carter is wearing something on his chest very similar to what he is in the movie. And I have seen other drawings of him wearing similar attire. What does he wear in the book?

It is called a harness in the book. It is used to carry items and attach weapons to, since they generally don't wear any other clothing on Mars.

I get the feeling from reading this thread that not a lot of people have read any of the books.

[Blu Titan]

'John Carter of Mars' Preview at Disney's D23 Expo

Walt Disney Pictures is kicking off a busy year of blockbusters with the March 9th release of John Carter, previewed this morning at Anaheim's D23 Expo.

"I assumed that live-action would move faster than animation," joked director Andrew Stanton backstage to ComingSoon.net, "and was used to being on films that could last up to four years. This is just a few months shy of that by the end of my time with it. It's actually way more familiar than I thought it would be."

The first scene showcased had John Carter (Taylor Kitsch) waking up on Mars and wandering, bewildered, up a hill. He finds a large rock that looks like it has a symbol on it. He clears off some of the dust and finds it filled with eggs, which start to hatch. Out pop what seem like hundreds of baby Thark aliens. In the distance, Carter sees Thark riders coming out to meet him, and doesn't notice Willem Dafoe's character (Tars Tarkas) coming up alongside him. Not sharing a common language, Carter instinctively jumps away, not realizing that Mars' lesser gravity gives him seemingly super-powered abilities.

The riders arrive, shooting at where Carter hid. Tars manages to talk them down, and he says he will deal with the strange being. He puts down all his weapons and puts up all four of his hands to approach Carter. Carter sees that the weapons are gone, and slowly comes out. Carter and the Tharks bumble their way through first contact, with Jeddak successfully introducing himself and Tars thinking that Carter's name is Virginia.

Tars asks if Carter could jump for him again. Carter sees this as an opportunity and leaps over Tars to his pile of weapons. Tars is horrified as his comrades-at-arms pull out their guns and runs to try to stop the violence. Despite Carter holding his own gun at him, Tars throws himself around him. The screen cuts to black, there are gunshots, and Tars screams.

Dafoe, Kitsch and Collins were then brought out to talk about their characters. Dafoe had to wear three foot tall stilts every single day of shooting to help create the realism of the nine-foot tall Tharks.

"You just gotta deal with being nine feet tall," Dafoe grinned, "That's where you start and that's an important place to start. You have to feel comfortable on stilts and basically perform a movie on stilts. I've also got four arms, so there are certain times when I'm doing things with my real arms and I have to be assisted with some puppetry to animate the other ones."

The second clip had Carter held captive in a Thark nursery. Realizing he has immense strength on Mars, he tries to pull his rusty chains loose as a bizarre dog/lizard with ten legs approaches sleepily. When it seems to conk out, Carter rips his chains off the wall and leaps to another landing, only to find the creature waiting for him. He leaps again, and the creature again is waiting for him. The creature can run as fast as Carter can jump, it seems, and Carter just can't shake him.

The third clip was between John Carter and Dejah Thoris. Dejah is betrothed to marry a man she despises for the peace of her people, but Carter appears in her bed chambers. When Carter tells her not to marry the man, she demands that he give her a reason. Carter hesitates, looking at what looks to be a wedding band on his hand. Sensing this, Dejah pulls out a pendant Carter had on him when he (presumably) first appeared on Mars. She explains she has deciphered how to send him back, if that's what he chooses. All he needs to do is hold it and say a series of sounds. Guards start pounding at the door as Carter repeats the syllables and the pendant glows. As Dejah speaks the last sound, the door bursts open and the guards ask Dejah if she is alone. She looks for Carter, but he is nowhere to be seen.



Read more: D23 Expo: The John Carter Presentation - ComingSoon.net http://www.comingsoon.net/news/d23ex...#ixzz1VhEGGodW

[pikeman1]

sounds fun, can't wait to see a new trailer!!!!

[Duffy12]

.

From Marketsaw-



MUST SEE: New Image From Disney's JOHN CARTER! PLUS Cool Spoilerish Info...








Check out this cool photo from Disney's JOHN CARTER! There's some interesting information below - some spoilers too; be careful!

Here's the storyline:
From Academy Award(R)-winning filmmaker Andrew Stanton comes “John Carter”–a sweeping action-adventure set on the mysterious and exotic planet of Barsoom (Mars). “John Carter” is based on a classic novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs, whose highly imaginative adventures served as inspiration for many filmmakers, both past and present. The film tells the story of war-weary, former military captain John Carter (Taylor Kitsch), who is inexplicably transported to Mars where he becomes reluctantly embroiled in a conflict of epic proportions amongst the inhabitants of the planet, including Tars Tarkas (Willem Dafoe) and the captivating Princess Dejah Thoris (Lynn Collins). In a world on the brink of collapse, Carter rediscovers his humanity when he realizes that the survival of Barsoom and its people rests in his hands.

From Entertainment Weekly (yeah they sure do get studio exclusives lately!): There’s the many-legged amphibi-dog named Woola that becomes Carter’s loyal companion. And then there are one of the most intriguing and fearsome creatures in the series: the great White Apes.



Slight Spoiler below this line!!

[Show spoiler]
...(John Carter) needs an army to solve his big problem in the third act, and the only army he knows was his previous captors. When he goes back, the game has changed, and he gets incarcerated. This is what he has to get out of. He has to get out of jail and not get killed by these apes in order to get his bigger problem solved.

Andrew Stanton talks about those White Apes: "No, they’re sort of an oversized gorilla in the books, and they’re kind of ubiquitous. They’re littered everywhere through at least the first several novels. They were always cool, just from a visceral standpoint, [but] they don’t really have a narrative function in the first book. So what we did is we made the White Apes a formidable creature that you kind of hear about throughout the movie, but you never really witness. There’s a subtle sense of anticipation for what these things might be like. Then Michael Kutsche — who did a lot of the designs on [the Johnny Depp movie] Alice in Wonderland – came up with this design on his own, for just their scale. He made them nocturnal, almost like moles — they stopped using their eyes, and just had a heightened sense of smell. We just love that. We needed a scene where Carter was going have to get out of his execution sentence in order to move the story forward, and we thought what better than having to go up against this formidable creature?"

Here's some of cast:
Taylor Kitsch, Willem Dafoe, Lynn Collins, Thomas Hayden Church, Samantha Morton, Mark Strong, James Purefoy, Polly Walker, Bryan Cranston, Ciaran Hinds, Dominic West and Daryl Sabara.




Mild spoiler below this line!

[Show spoiler]It is a pretty cool premise - John Carter is a human on Mars so the gravity is less than Earth's. The Tharks know about his ability to leap great distances (his sole 'super power') and thus chain him to a rock (pictured).

Watch for JOHN CARTER in theaters March 9.





_____________________




And a much much bigger picture of that damned dirty ape below-

[Show spoiler]

http://marketsaw.blogspot.com/2011/1...neys-john.html




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[pikeman1]

White Ape seems to big, huh?
anyway, pretty cool

[Foggy]

Mars has less gravity than Earth? Did these guys go to the Science School of George Lucas

[MyBlu-rayBrotherEd]

Originally Posted by Foggy

Mars has less gravity than Earth? Did these guys go to the Science School of George Lucas

The diameter of Mars is 6,800 km across. This is 53% the diameter of Earth. And then consider the mass of Mars. It has only 10% the mass of Earth. Because of the small diameter and low mass, the surface gravity on Mars is only 38% the gravity on Earth. If you weighed 100 kg on Earth, you would weigh 38 kg on Mars.

http://www.universetoday.com/22603/m...ared-to-earth/

Just sayin'.

[Foggy]

Originally Posted by MyBlu-rayBrotherEd

http://www.universetoday.com/22603/m...ared-to-earth/

Just sayin'.

Must be getting my planets mixed up

[nefilim]

dont remember if i said this before, but : read all the books as a kid and absolutely loved them. would buy them now, but they are out of print and very, i mean VERY expensive here in Finland, if you can find em...

have zero expectations of this movie. they ruined it, im sure...surprise me - pleaaaase !

[Walts Ghost]

I was at D23, and the footage we saw was spectacular. Stanton really loves this series and he's worked so hard to give John Carter fans the movie they've been looking forward to. I have high hopes for it, but the teaser trailer isn't doing the movie any justice, and I'm afraid audiences don't want to see it. I'd really love for this to become a series, but there's no promise it will because the general public doesn't always know quality and may ignore the movie.