Greatest Sci-Fi Movies Never Made - Softcover

David Hughes

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1556524498 ISBN 13: 9781556524493

Publisher: Chicago Review Press, 2002

Synopsis

Steven Spielberg's sci-fi horror movie Night Skies. David Lynch's Ronnie Rocket. Terry Gilliam's Watchmen. Philip Kaufman's Star Trek: Planet of the Titans. Ridley Scott's I Am Legend. Tim Burton's Superman Lives. These are just some of the legendary unmade films covered by this groundbreaking book. Drawing on dozens of exclusive new interviews with the writers, designers, and directors involved, David Hughes charts the tortuous stories of these films and reveals the fascinating details of what might have been.

About this title

Review:

David Hughes' wonderfully readable The Greatest Sci-fi Movies Never Made is not only a fascinating insight into the machinations of the Hollywood production factory, but a true testament to Sci-fi's enduring popularity as a film genre among mainstream audiences. It's amazing how long many of these movies languished in "development hell" and even more amazing how long the people involved hung on, despite the fact that quite often it was perfectly obvious that the project was on its last legs. Movie buffs and Internet users will be familiar with a lot of the tales here which have now practically passed into Hollywood folklore. Using combinations of new interviews and press clippings, quotes and statements Hughes pieces together the development behind some truly major motion pictures which all fell foul of budget constraints, studio nerves or extensive rewrites. And he unearths some real gems about movies that came tantalisingly close to the big screen, only to fail at the last hurdle. There's James Cameron's take on Spider Man (now being filmed by Sam Raimi) that was caught up in years of wrangling over who owned the rights; the live action version of Thunderbirds which would have seen Lady Penelope taking on the villainous Hood in a fist fight and Steven Spielberg's SF horror Night Skies which eventually transformed into ET with a slightly more cuddly alien as its star. Superhero fans will delight in reading about the cheapo version of the Fantastic Four, shot in just under a month, as well as Batman director Tim Burton' s attempts to get Superman to fly again in the ill-fated Superman Lives. There's also contributions from Alien designer HR Giger and Harry Knowles, who runs the Aint-It-Cool movie news Web site, and several pages of rare illustrations from aborted SF movies. This is by far the most well-written and absorbing account of Hollywood's broken dreams and it's truly heartbreaking to read about some of the fantastic films that were so close to becoming reality. Hughes writes with energy and enthusiasm, resulting in a book that movie buffs and Sci-fi fans cannot afford to miss. --Jonathan Weir

Review:

"Wonderful Saturday afternoon reading when you can’t make it to a matinee." -- Ohioana Quarterly

About this edition

• Publisher: Chicago Review Press
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 1556524498
• ISBN 13: 9781556524493
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 256