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This Is The Really Real World, There Ain't No Comin' Back

By TK | Posted Under Trade News | Comments (28)



The-Crow-symbol.jpg

Who’s psyched for a reboot of The Crow? Huh?! Who’s FUCKING FIRED UP ABOUT IT?! Show of hands, people, raise ‘em high and wave ‘em wild.

Kill yourselves.

As you can perhaps surmise, I’m not excited. I firmly believe that 1994’s The Crow, as directed by Alex Proyas, was cinematic lightning in a bottle. It remains one of my favorite all-time comic book movies, one of the few successfully executed dark, grim and intense R-rated ones. It’s bloody, funny, and generally great. I’ve written about it in detail before, so I won’t get too deeply into it.

After spawning three progressively hideous sequels and one borderline offensive failed television series, I’d sort of hoped we were done. There was simply no one who was capable of adapting James O’Barr’s character more successfully than Proyas had, and every effort was a miserable disaster. The character was turned into some sort of shitty goth icon, and it… wasn’t good.

But no. It’s being remade… not another sequel, but a remake. Even though that makes no sense, because the plot doesn’t seem to resemble the original at all. But whatever. Trying to make sense of Hollywood is like trying to make sense of the drunken lunatic who lived in my college town who used to call me Moonlight and vowed that he knew what I’d done. As if he’d seen it. You know what? Bad analogy. Never mind.

ANYWAY. Producer Edward R. Pressman talked to MTV recently, and gave a bit of info on the project. The script, written by director Stephen Norrington (Blade, The League of Extraord… oh, fuck me) is apparently complete, and he says that casting announcements should be coming soon, He also had this to say about it:

“The setting is the southwest — the Mexico/Arizona area — and an urban [setting], Detroit or Pittsburgh or something like that,” he described. “There are two locations that the film is set. Its initial platform is in the southwest and then it moves to the big city in the north, middle or eastern America, and then back.”

Um, OK. That’s not particularly useful, other that to tell us that for some reason the character will be removed from the urban settings that it so famously inhabits.

“The Crow itself is a creature in this movie — it’s not just a bird,” said the producer. “It’s got a personality and a character. Not like Godzilla exactly, but it’s very different [and has] a more active role in the story.”

I’m sorry, what was that? Did you just say Godzilla? What in the monkeyshitting fuck are you talking about? Why would that comparison even come to mind? What the hell… why are we comparing a dark spirit of vengeance that revives the wrongfully killed and grants them superpowers to a giant Japanese lizard that stomps on cities? You cannot be serious. YOU CANNOT FUCKING BE SERIOUS.

“Obviously it’s a different time and a different idea, but I think Stephen is a very talented fellow and I’m very excited to work with him,… I think it’s a very different conception [than the original film]. After the first ‘Crow,’ there were so many other films that were inspired by it, by its look. Steve is an artist himself, and he’s created a very different visual idea.”

Yes. A different, and fucking retarded idea. Norrington, I’ve always kind of defended you because I have a soft spot for Blade. Despite the fact that you’re responsible for what is arguably the worst comic book movie in the history of everything. But I am filled with nothing but dread for this project.

(Source: Slashfilm)









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Comments

Oh, gag me with a fucking spoon, yo. This is going to suck so bad, it'll make the sequel seem epic by comparison.

Posted by: Stella at June 3, 2010 9:05 AM

I saw this yesterday and the wife and I retched together. It sounds awful but I do have a solution. My idea is simple; re-name the character. Retire the name "Eric Draven" from the series forever. Re-boot, remake, whatever you want to call it, but leave Eric out of it. Then I don't care what else they do. There was one Crow movie, I don't give a shit what the studio says. Eric Draven = Brandon Lee, Brandon Lee = Eric Draven. It's simple math. Leave the character the fuck alone and make your dipshit movie with a new character. Do the right thing and honor Brandon's memory with this simple change.

After that I don't care. Set it on the moon and turn the Crow into an alien. Makes no nevermind to me.

Posted by: TylerDFC at June 3, 2010 9:17 AM

With Norrington's track record and Pressman's description, it's pretty safe to say that it will end up as the same type of epic clusterfuck League of Extraordinary Gentlemen - one resembles the original only in the title and the character names. So, TylerDFC I'm going to place my money that the character of Eric Draven will be kept, but will be turned into a ridiculous parody like Mina Murray in LOEG.

Posted by: stardust at June 3, 2010 9:32 AM

I'm glad we didn't ban Murdertank because we need to roll that shit out, NOW

Posted by: Nadine at June 3, 2010 9:36 AM

Actually I went Googling on news for the remake and it seems they are not using the name Eric Draven. So really, I have no idea what this movie is. Sounds more like Crow: Wicked Prayer and that was bloody awful.

And I really wish someone would remake LXG more like the book and less like an atrocious abomination.

Posted by: TylerDFC at June 3, 2010 9:44 AM

We need to roll the Murdertank in a plane and drop it on the production of this pile of dung and create a splash that would make TankGirl green with envy!

And thats only the start..

Posted by: Magiel at June 3, 2010 9:47 AM

for what is arguably

No, there's no argument. I mean, there's "Batman and Robin" but that's more an unforgivable case of sequelitis than the ungodly abomination that is LXG.

Posted by: twig at June 3, 2010 9:50 AM

Ugh.

The continued remak raping of existing beloved work by these brain-dead fumblebucks, replete with their self-fellatio for being "creative" is getting really, really old.

Fuck you, Hollywood.

Posted by: Rykker at June 3, 2010 9:50 AM

It’s bloody, funny, and generally great.

Plus, Bai Ling! And Ernie Hudson!!

BOOOOO on remaking this movie. BOOOOO, I say.

Oh, wait, and then I read this:
“The Crow itself is a creature in this movie — it’s not just a bird,” said the producer. “It’s got a personality and a character. Not like Godzilla exactly, but it’s very different [and has] a more active role in the story.”

WHAT. WHAT IN THE WHAT.

That's just plain dumb.

Posted by: Anna von Beaversmack at June 3, 2010 9:53 AM

...and I haven't even read the comic. (Yet.)

Posted by: Anna von Beaversmack at June 3, 2010 9:56 AM

So obviously the producer doesn't know what the FUCK the story's about. Fanfrickintastic. After the high of the Thundercats news, this shite sobered me up damn quick.

What was so wrong with leaving The Crow ALONE! Brilliance should not be tampered with dammit! I think I need my ice cream now. It's rum and raisin - sweet and liquor filled - just what I need right now.

Posted by: Four Eyes at June 3, 2010 10:06 AM

I'll chase em out of Pittsburgh if they think they can come here and ruin my favorite comic book movie of all time.

And since when is Pittsburgh on the same level as Detroit?! Pfffttt

Posted by: Colinn at June 3, 2010 10:08 AM

Anyone seen Stephen Norrington's debut feature as director, Death Machine? Hilariously tongue-in-cheek sci-fi/horror where mad scientist Brad Dourif creates a hulking, robotic... well, death machine. Plenty of cheeky nods to Aliens and Terminator. It's not 'good' by any stretch of the imagination, but it's just balls-out crazy and charming enough to be entertaining.

Posted by: Dill The Devil at June 3, 2010 10:11 AM

"Obviously it’s a different time and a different idea, but I think Stephen is a very talented fellow and I’m very excited to work with him...

To paraphrase: "So it's going to be nothing like the original and frankly the only reason we're using the title, The Crow: Desert Princess at all is because it's a bankable name and we can massage it's tonsils with a spiky phallus due to the fact that the current generation has no idea how good the original was anyway."

Dickety fuckers.

Posted by: admin at June 3, 2010 10:13 AM

Yeah Colinn...and when did we move to the southwest...?

Posted by: Kate at June (formerly Kate) at June 3, 2010 10:20 AM

One of the things that made The Crow's success so impressive was that they lost their lead actor before the shooting was done, but after so much of it was already shot that they couldn't go back and start again. If the movie had been a total failure, they could have fallen back on the tragedy as an excuse. Instead the filmmakers worked with what they had.

Some of the movie's charm came from the creativity that was done after Lee's on-set death. They now couldn't make a bloated overdrawn movie if they wanted to. They had to be dedicated to just getting the main ideas across and little else. The result was an almost minimalist movie, that wasted little little time in the smaller details and just got on with the story. It was a shining example of being able to pull a complete story out of the ultimate movie production roadblock and still come up with a positive result. It still works as if it were always meant to be that way.

Compare that with the nonsensical and near incomprehensible twaddle listed above about this potential remake and I'm already seeing a long and unrecognizable product on the horizon. If ever there was a time a potential investor in a movie project should see a red flag going up- this would probably be it.

Ah well, it can't rain all the time. That sensation you're feeling is Hollywood pissing on your shoes.

Posted by: bleujayone at June 3, 2010 10:21 AM

I mean, really, Godzilla? I feel like someone should have been checking for other symptoms of a stroke.

Posted by: twig at June 3, 2010 10:28 AM

Spank my Ass and call me BoBo this is the dumbest effing idea ever! They need to stop this shit now, rev up the murdertank Im takin her out for a spin.

Posted by: Nieve 'The Threadkiller Queen' at June 3, 2010 10:52 AM

GODZILLA?

DID people once believe that sometimes, just sometimes, when someone dies tragically enough, Godzilla brings their spirit back to put the wrong things right?

Because there WERE a lot of drugs done in the godzilla era, so I'm willing to believe it.

Posted by: Nat Kittyface at June 3, 2010 11:09 AM

Ohhhhhhhh, this "In the SW and back." fucknuttery (Can I say that? Who cares, I just did.) does not bode well.

The Crow - the mythic critter - is a big deal in Native American cultures, and particularly in the SW. It's a totem, an avatar and a Demiurge, and it plays a symbolic role in some myths, like the Salmon in old Celtic tales. If we go there and back again, making the crow a character, my spidey sense tells me they're going for some Gichy Manitou mis-appropriation of the mythos.

Which will suck even more.

Look, performances, mood, production design, sound track of the original - win. But there's room for that stuff because The Crow is mostly off stage. Once the omnipotent bestower of super powers is front and center with an agenda, everybody else is just a prop. In the original the bird is a power-pack. A channel. An extension cord, connecting Eric to the big vengeance-grid in the sky. Who / what-ever decided to give him his langniappe ain't the thing with feathers.

If you bring a motivated Deity on stage in the first act, it must go off (Shooting up a couple "enemy wessels") in the third. Haven't these people read Chekov?

And BTW, why (oh why) does every attempt to set creepy super-natural stuff in the American SW suck picturesque vistas of rocks? The atmospherics are there. There's plenty of source material. Yet, it doesn't translate, even when it should. What was the name of "Angel gets P-Oed at Dennis Hopper all over New Mexico" flick? Angel. (OK, Boreanaz, but still.) And creepy blood / midnight / ritual / bad stuff premise. And Dennis Hopper. And it still sucked. Even fucking X-Files lost its mind when Mulder went all vision-quest-y.

They're gonna turn this into Exorcist III with face-paint and a totem pole, I just know it.

Posted by: BierceAmbrose at June 3, 2010 11:11 AM

Have they turned The Crow into a SyFy movie of the week? I hope there's bicycle-kicking involved in the final battle sequence. Bicycle-kicks always make a shit monster movie better.

Posted by: Robert at June 3, 2010 11:39 AM

I'll probably see it at some point because somebody (one of the two for sure) will inevitably bestow a DVD of The Crow remake upon me and think it an ingenious comeback for Van Helsing I gave them last Christmas or Dracula 2000 one of them getting for his birthday in the very near future. Face it, we need these films, otherwise ideas for practical jokes would be hard to come by, or, worse still, we would have to stoop to getting people real presents. Plus, we must think of the goths – they need it too for ... ah, whatever reason.

Posted by: SB at June 3, 2010 11:44 AM

Ohhhhh so many soul-crushing things that people have already pointed out (Godzilla WHAT?), but I just have to reiterate: wasn't a big part of The Crow the Detroit setting, Hell's Night, etc.?

Again, it's one of those cases of "take away all the stuff that made a movie/idea distinctive, but leave the name." Why not just make a different movie with a different name???

MURDERTANK!!

Posted by: MM at June 3, 2010 12:22 PM

The simple fact the producers are speaking to MTV in order to generate some buzz tells you all you need to know about where this movie is going.

Posted by: votre at June 3, 2010 5:11 PM

After reading the descriptions provided by the people behind the remakeshit (and the obvious comparison to Batman and Robin mentioned earlier), the new "direction" (if you can call god-damn awful a direction) sounds more and more like nipples and codpieces on the bat suit.

Posted by: bignick at June 3, 2010 8:17 PM

Wow...and here I was thinking they'd never be able to top the Deviled Egg-eating scene from Wicked Prayer as far as sheer retardedness.

Posted by: Case at June 5, 2010 3:02 PM

I'm going to go punch a basket of kittens.

Posted by: Irmata at June 6, 2010 5:56 PM

I agree totally to reboot the franchise fine but leave Eric Draven out of it Brandon Lee will always be Eric Draven for my shit the guy died as Eric Draven the last thought going through his head before the freak death was him being Eric Draven so if you think about it truly Eric Draven died at last with the soul of Brandon Lee so it should stay and not allowed in the remake

Posted by: Corey James at August 7, 2010 10:54 PM