What with the burgeoning LDS film industry and all, I wonder if anyone's approached OSC about the rights to Saints. I suppose the market on Joseph Smith films might be slightly tight right now, particularly with Dutcher's movie finally grinding into production, but I'm reasonably sure that a well done Saints film would be quite capable of holding its own against the Work and the Glory.
Posted by Brian J. Hill (Member # 5346) on :
IMO, Saints is too gritty to be a successful film in present-day Mormon culture. It is a novel full of people struggling to do what is right and making choices based on what they think may be best, but they are often in the gray area of murky and questionable moral choices. Joseph Smith is portrayed as simply a man, one who struggles with the day-to-day meaning of his prophetic mantle, who sometimes comes off as cocky and overly proud and arrogant.
Most Mormons just aren't ready for such an honest portrayal of Church history. They tend to prefer their history cut and dried, full of well-defined good guys and bad guys, and above all Joseph Smith is to be a heroic Great American Prophet, rather than a man. In other words, The Work and the Glory. Posted by MattB (Member # 1116) on :
Well, I guess that depends on what you mean by sucessful. I stick to my statement - it would be quite capable of holding its own against the W&G.
In ways other than - and more important than - financial ones. Which is kind of the point you were making, I think.
I hold out some hope for W&G - I am indirectly acquainted with the new writer/director, and know a couple other moviemakers in his family pretty well. They know story. So, some hope - though keeping in mind the source material, only some - for the next installments.
Posted by alluvion (Member # 7462) on :
Struggles are a pretty universal theme, I would reckon. Call me stupid in the face of obscene obviousness.
The mormon pioneer (as well as the latter-day adaptations to pioneer cultural environs) stories would hold up as well as any other human saga.
I suspect a well-told mormon tale might play-out better among non-mormons than among the saints.
Posted by MattB (Member # 1116) on :
quote:I suspect a well-told mormon tale might play-out better among non-mormons than among the saints.
That's the goal. There's a critic named Lavina Fielding Anderson who calls _Saints_ "inside-outside" literature; intended to appeal to audiences outside Mormon culture while remaining true to inside readers as well. I think it does pretty well. Richard Dutcher, the father of contemporary Mormon movies, is constantly stressing the need for Mormon artists to do just that. Unfortunately, other than his own, most of the recent crop of Mormon movies are self-consciously insider-only works. Hopefully that changes in the future. Dutcher's upcoming Joseph Smith biopic may be the beginning.
Word is, Val Kilmer's shown interest in the title role.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
Most Mormons would think it was an anti-Mormon film and non-Mormons would find it weird at best, proselytizing at worst. I don't think it would fly.
Hobbes Posted by MattB (Member # 1116) on :
quote:Most Mormons would think it was an anti-Mormon film and non-Mormons would find it weird at best, proselytizing at worst.
I dunno. Do you think Fiddler on the Roof is weird propaganda?
Posted by alluvion (Member # 7462) on :
The Fiddler was mormon?! do tell!
Posted by MattB (Member # 1116) on :
quote:The Fiddler was mormon?! do tell!
Well, I wasn't saying that. But it was steeped in a religious culture that was quite distant from that of most average Americans who went to see it. And it crossed over pretty well, it seems.
Posted by Liz B (Member # 8238) on :
From a non-Mormon who loved _Saints_:
I have no idea how it would work as a movie, but as a book it sure made me understand Mormon history better -- and as a result, identify and sympathize with it more. Even if it annoyed the LDS community, could such a result (from a non-Mormon) be bad for the community as a whole?
RE Hobbes's comment about it being "weird at best, proselytizing at worst" -- perhaps so. I found even the book "weird" at moments -- and it was in a medium where I could actually read character's thoughts about, say, plural marriage, rather than having to try to discern them from dialogue and action.
best
lizzieb
Posted by eyetell (Member # 8229) on :
The only thing that i have to add is that anything that is comercized well will be soldin the box office.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
I have no idea what that means.
Posted by eyetell (Member # 8229) on :
i'm sorry
Posted by Miro (Member # 1178) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattB:
quote:Most Mormons would think it was an anti-Mormon film and non-Mormons would find it weird at best, proselytizing at worst.
I dunno. Do you think Fiddler on the Roof is weird propaganda?
Jews don't actively pursue converts. Mormons are famous for it. Also, Fiddler on the Roof is about a Jewish family, not about the founding of the religion.
Those are just two of the differences that would make a movie version of Saints far more controversial. That's not to say it couldn't do well, it would just have to walk a much finer line.
Posted by alluvion (Member # 7462) on :
you know,
I think American pop culture (and its attendant facination with money and celebrity) is often (or always) the conduit for digestion and re-dissemination of viable ideas from the multitude of subcultures that we routinely experience in this great nation.
alluvion
Posted by eyetell (Member # 8229) on :
correct, but not allways routinely, some are eternal, a major routine being the New Age movement that i hope has vanished. An eternall is judaism or chrisiantiy, which will most likely last untill their prophieces come true, or some other ending of the earth.
Posted by MattB (Member # 1116) on :
"Jews don't actively pursue converts. Mormons are famous for it. Also, Fiddler on the Roof is about a Jewish family, not about the founding of the religion."
The first part is certainly true, though Saints is also very much about a family, and not really about the founding of the Church (the Mormons don't enter until ten years after the founding date). But I'm not really sure how many people would take these things into account when they go to the movies. You're right, though - it would be more controversial than Fiddler was. But controversy over movies tends, if nothing else, to blow up the box office receipts.
Posted by MattB (Member # 1116) on :
Since there seem to be a couple of Cards around today, I'm going to bump this.
*hopeful*
Posted by ill malkier (Member # 8244) on :
quote: Word is, Val Kilmer's shown interest in the title role.
Eh? You're not serious... or are you?
Posted by Puppy (Member # 6721) on :
I don't speak for the author, but since you're looking for a Card's opinion ... I don't think it will ever get made into a movie. A book has room to deal with the complex issues surrounding good people doing uncomfortable and sometimes deceptive things, but it would be much harder to pull off the same trick on film. The slightest error in tone or judgment could drive every audience member away for a different reason.
And it would be hard to attract the right audience to begin with. Mormons are very put off by the mention of polygamy, in part because they get so sick of being accused of practicing it today. And some non-Mormons seem to be fascinated by it for all the wrong reasons ... the same reasons that people watch horrible shows like Who Wants to Marry a Millionaire? or Temptation Island. Prurient interest only
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
Which is kind of the point you were making, I think.![[Confused]](confused.gif)
You're not serious... or are you?