Boycotting has never been easier!

[cleolinda]

Okay, as I mentioned to someone else I was talking to, this may just be the week that I get unnecessarily worked up about things, but: I feel like this is something that has to be done, and that y'all are probably going to be with me on this.

I mentioned a detailed list of changes to The Dark Is Rising The Seeker in the linkspam Monday evening. To recap my experience with the books, I read The Grey King in grade school not knowing that it was part of a series, liked it but was very confused, and never got around to reading the other books even after I knew. So I'm not a pissed-off fan talking here, although I do know what the books are actually like, in part. I know enough to know what a travesty this movie is, basically. Let's also recap some of the major points from kiandra_fire's list:

1) Arthurian legend does not play a part.

2) Will is a thirteen-year-old American with neglectful parents and bullying brothers.

3) "Will goes to the mall and is accused of shoplifting by security guards, who take him to their office, demand the signs, then turn into rooks and chase him around the mall."

4) The Walker is young and the Rider has a white horse.

5) "Merriman relies on a mace... Miss Greythorne is rocking her swordcane on two fully-functional legs."

6) Will has a crush on Maggie Barnes and Max is working for the Dark.

7) "Will is Superman, Jr., with super strength and a bunch of other powers. He just can't fly. Alexander Ludwig says in his interview that he regrets he doesn't have this power as well, but — what was it? Ah, yes — 'It would totally change the whole story though.' " OH, WELL THEN.

8) Ian McShane: " 'I think the one thing I wanted to bring to this was reality,' he says. 'It was written in Old English.' "

9) Will has a twin.

10) OLD ENGLISH? ARE YOU SHITTING ME?

I just realized that this is coming out this Friday, so I'm going to say something, I have to say it now. Let me explain why I care about this, and why you should, even beyond the obvious suggestion that I'm a writer and I feel horrified for Susan Cooper. No, first and foremost--nothing has made me happier than the fantasy movie renaissance of the last seven years, and given y'all's responses to things I've posted, I'm pretty sure most of y'all are fantasy fans as well. And so far, miraculously, we've gotten by with extremely respectful adaptations. In the beginning, LOTR and HP (both in 2001) set excellent precedents for faithful book adaptations making shitloads of money, and most subsequent productions have followed in their footsteps. (And yes, the Harry Potter movies have made tons of changes and omissions over the years, but--go back up and read that Dark Is Rising list and see if you don't look at the Harry Potter changes in a totally different light now.) The Lemony Snicket movie changed a few things, including more of a wrap-up at the end, but they all worked, and the rest of the movie was so obviously trying to capture the books. The Narnia movie was fantastic, the Dark Materials people are obviously trying to be as faithful as possible despite the religion issue, Stardust made some majorish changes but was still a lovely adaptation--the only other really, really horrible travesty I can think of off the top of my head was the Earthsea miniseries, and it bombed, so, you know, faithful = money was still being upheld.

What if The Dark Is Rising adaptation ("adaptation") is a hit?

Oh, the studios will say, you can still make a ton of money, but you can do whatever you want? You can change the story and put in pointless but trendy family conflicts, love interests, younger characters? You can squeeze action into bizarre places and completely miss the point of the story? You can whittle it down until it hardly resembles the original at all? Wow, this is really convenient! All this time, we were busting our collective ass for nothing! Why bother actually trying to do the work of translating a beloved property to a different medium? We can just use a known title to sell people a completely different story, and it doesn't even have to be any good!

You see why I'm getting concerned here.

Think of any book series they haven't put on screen yet--because they will, particularly now that Harry Potter has run its course and there's only two movies left. Think of any series you love. The Seeker: The Dark Is Rising is what could happen to those books. In fact, I've heard that they're just calling it The Seeker now, which, as people have pointed out, is a term also used in... Harry Potter.

So what I'm asking is this: please, please do not go see this movie. Wait all of three months for it to come out on DVD, if you just need to see Christopher Eccleston the carnage. If you're talking to people about what movies you're all thinking of seeing, but they're not familiar with the books, "Oh, I've heard it's terrible. Basically, a really lame Harry Potter rip-off" ought to suffice. If you're actually talking to Susan Cooper fans, make sure they know that The Seeker is, in fact, a Dark Is Rising adaptation, despite all indications to the contrary. Make sure that people know how flippantly they've massacred the whole thing, and talk as many people out of seeing it as you can. Meanwhile, I'm going to go get the actual books--probably for Christmas--and try to support Susan Cooper that way. If you love the books already, now would be an excellent time to get a set for a young relative, for example, and try to pull in new readers. What I'm basically asking you to do is vote with your wallet--even if you don't want to spread the word, not seeing a movie is a pretty easy thing to do. This shit cannot be allowed to stand, y'all.

Comments

[foresworn.livejournal.com]

First I was excited for this movie, cause the book had some good stuff. Now they've changed all the good stuff. Now it's a crappy kids movie.

10) OLD ENGLISH? ARE YOU SHITTING ME?

WURD.

[lotusbiosm.livejournal.com]

What I think would be awesome is if the sales of the book go up in a noticable way but the movie tanks. That will really show that people are interested in the story, they just don't like unfaithful adaptations.

[amberdulen.livejournal.com]

I'm afraid that someone will think that the book sales are going up because people liked the movie, not the other way around.

[zikade.livejournal.com]

you realize that with a boycott, you are making ppl curious about this movie, right?

I never heard of the books before, and only thanks to Chris Eccleston and the boycott I am interested to see the movie and read the books later.

Are you such a good girl, that you recommend to buy DVDs instead of torrenting it down, cough cough.

[cleolinda.livejournal.com]

I personally recommend Netflix, since you're already paying for the service and not any DVD in particular, or cable (same theory).

As for making you interested, that's the risk you run when you tell people to avoid something. I'm hoping to offset that by making Susan Cooper fans (and casual fantasy fans) aware of what this movie actually is, so they don't go, "Oh, hey, random movie, looks interesting, let's see it." They've done such a good job of butchering the movie and then disguising it with a different title that several people have mentioned they didn't even realize what it was an adaptation of.

here via marginaliana

[julian-black.livejournal.com]

They've done such a good job of butchering the movie and then disguising it with a different title that several people have mentioned they didn't even realize what it was an adaptation of.

I'm one of those people. I've seen the ads for it on TV, and just thought, "Oh, yeah, another kids' fantasy adventure flick, lalalalala..."

Granted, I haven't read The Dark is Rising in years (and wasn't a big fan of it), but when I found out that The Seeker was an adaptation of it...All I could do was say, "WHAT!? No friggin' way!" I honestly didn't recognize the original source from what I saw in the ads.

"Old English" just slays me. SLAYS ME DED FROM HORRIFIED LULZ.

[dietcokebreak.livejournal.com]

All Things Considered on NPR did a story on this situation on Monday. (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=14783609)

1. Susan Cooper knows they butchered her book and she isn't really sure what to say about it. I feel bad for her, but at the same time, don't know why she sold the film rights. She KNOWS her story isn't easily translatable to the screen.

2. John Hodge flat out says that they changed stuff so it wouldn't be Harry Potter, but it sounds like that isn't what happened.

3. NOTHING is mentioned in the story about the internet backlash going on with this film. Now I never read the books, never even heard of them (despite my usual fantasy/sci awareness) until the backlash for the films started flooding the web. I think it will be interesting to see how this film does at the box office, especially when places like IMDB and your journal, Cleo, among others, are talking up the boycott.

[cleolinda.livejournal.com]

Well, she sold the rights years ago to the Henson company, so I'm sure she thought it would be vastly different; they probably expressed a great deal of enthusiasm for her actual writing. The problem is that that deal expired and another studio scooped them up.

I saw what Hodge said about it not being HP, and--you know what, I get the feeling that Hodge adapting fantasy is like someone who hates romance novels trying to write one. Because you don't respect or even know the genre very well at all, you have no idea what you're doing or what the actual tropes are.

And see, exactly about the boycott--the "astroturfing" phenomenon (where they pretend like people are actually excited about the movie) is fascinating to me. And I want people to know that, you know, folks are actually pissed about this. Me saying something isn't going to do much in and of itself, but people reading this and posting something themselves could snowball until it shows up on the mainstream media's radar. I mean, if that crazy Britney fan on YouTube can get national attention, surely "Internet fan outrage causes movie to tank" is worth a few seconds.

[mandie-rw.livejournal.com]

Wow. American (because an American audience just COULDN'T connect with the character if he were ENGLISH), malls, a twin, and...Old English.
I'm linking to your page and am DEFINITELY not going to see the movie.

[lylassandra.livejournal.com]

No, we Americans just hate them British characters. Like that Harry Potter bastard. And James Bond. And Obi-Wan Kenobi. And Elizabeth Bennett. Oh, and Jack Sparrow and company? Are right out.

[floatingpencil.livejournal.com]

You couldn't pay me to see this travesty.

After waiting for a film from this series for twenty years, I am so disgusted and frankly furious with the pile of utter trash they are turning out that I just want to find and burn every last copy of this pathetic excuse for an adaptation.

God, I hope it bombs. I mean, never-work-in-this-town-again, loses-millions style.

[maetang.livejournal.com]

The more I hear about the movie "adapation", the more I just want to weep.

The Dark is Rising cycle made me want to learn Welsh when I was growing up! In Singapore! That's how much I loved it.

It deserves a lot better than this treatment.

I wish there were some kind of campaign, where readers and fans could buy a copy of the books, and send them to the filmmaker, or the studio, or someone who might pay attention to the possibility of sequels, and say something like: "Here are the books which we know and love. For God's sake, READ THEM! Then READ THEM again! Repeat until you understand just what a travesty your film version will be, and then don't. Just don't. PS: I will be boycotting your movie, and telling all my friends and family to do the same." Or something along those lines.

[newsong.livejournal.com]

I am posting about this. Against this, in some sense.

I have never understood why people think the movies and books should be connected or evaluated in contrast.

If anyone cares about my opinions, which I know you most of you won't, come look: http://newsong.livejournal.com/435581.html

[cleolinda.livejournal.com]

Well, my problem is that the movie bears so little resemblance to the book that they might as well have just made it completely unrelated anyway. Usually I'm very forgiving of changes--but only if they work, and the review we've seen of the movie so far said this one was atrocious, all changes aside.

[citrinitas.livejournal.com]

I've...got mixed feelings. I somewhat agree with you, yet disagree as well.

You're right, excessive fidelity to the source material isn't required for a well done adaptation. Sometimes the movie adaptation requires changes to make it good: cutting one character, adding a scene, or tweaking plot to make it flow better in a different medium. (One of my friends, after seeing A Series of Unfortunate Events, went to grab the books...was surprised, and ultimately deemed the movie the superior of the two.)

They're different experiences. A book isn't the same thing as a movie, and I personally get different things out of the two of them. However...

However, adaptations are..adaptations. They aren't original stories (or 'original' depending on your view of plots) but instead are taking someone else's story and changing it to a different medium. As such, the original and the movie are (for better or for worse) tied together...more so if the original happens to be something of significance. (Some book no one's heard about versus a movie adaptation of the Bible or the Iliad or a book series with fans, like the Dark is Rising.) And as such, I feel that the fans who walk into the movie are entitled to a certain amount of...how shall I put it? Respectfulness.

Respectfulness to the source medium in regards to how it's changed to the movie. Because there's changes which make the movie run better, and there's...changes. It's the difference between cutting the Tom Bolbaldi song-and-dance interlude in the first movie, and adding Eowyn to the roster of the Fellowship of the Ring (as in, she's walking with them) so that there's female representation. Or the difference between making the natives of Peter Pan's Neverland a bit more Native American in bent, versus giving Captain Hook a sinister pedophiliac fetish as a social commentary on the greater society. Or, in this case, several fans of the Dark is Rising books not being able to recognize the movie's origin from the trailers. And I feel that people who liked the books being unable to recognize the movie...that's not a sign of a good adaptation.

So, I agree with you in that fidelity isn't necessarily a good thing, but I disagree at the same time...the Seeker might end up as a mediocre-to-decent movie. However, from what I've seen and what I watched, I think it'll be a piss poor adaptation.

[nicocoer.livejournal.com]

This book was a major part of my childhood- so maybe it is from the POV of an enraged fan that I'm coming from. Even my little sister, who reads rarely, read and loved these books. She remembers them, loves them, and, even though she's now a party hound/typical teen-aged "hot chick", she still has a soft spot for them and can summarize scenes she hasn't read in 10 years. This book connects all three of us siblings (who are all very different and of very different opinions on just about anything) in ways few things can.

I'm making a post of my own. um. Is it okay if I quote you (credited of course) in it? If not, I'll remove the quote.

http://nicocoer.livejournal.com/206976.html

[snapdragon76.livejournal.com]

OK, I've never heard of this series (woe) and even I am upset in regards to the changes that they made. I mean, why even bother adapting a book in the first place? Why not just make an original movie if they don't plan on being even remotely faithful? I mean, I can se minor changes in regards to length or something, but they still kept the basic premise et al.

[roguepuppet.livejournal.com]

OK. I loved this series so much that until I read this post I was willing to brave the changes and go see it anyway...
the "old english" comment killed it for me.
WTF?
If they disrespect the original that much.. no way. I will wit and settle my morbid curiosity via netflix.
thanks for the info.

[elanorkat.livejournal.com]

It burns me to boycott a film that has Ecclecakes in it, but I fear you're right. I only came to these books a few years ago, am re-reading them at the moment for the n-th time, and love them. My partner, on the other hand, read them first when he was 8. They moulded the imagination of his childhood, and I just don't want to see him cry in public. So, a-boycotting we shall go!

Effective dollar usage

[roguepuppet.livejournal.com]

I am going to take the amount of money that would have been spent on movie tickets tomorrow night and use it to buy copies of the books instead. I can always find someone to gift them to..
it is a small dollar amount, but I will vote that way.

[ladracul.livejournal.com]

Okay, I'm going to respectfully say this-

If you want to see a closer adaptation of the books, they should just make it for BBC. And it wouldn't have been good material for a feature film.

But I'm still going to see the film. I'm not boycotting it because it's not like how some executives made dumbass decisions regarding "Eragon" (I'm sorry, but you can't put a 700 page book in under two hours. And the fact the most important scenes were cut out of the final cut got me more annoyed.). And there were some good points in "Eragon"...though I think I have a weakness for long-haired baddies that look like they stepped out of mangas... But anyway, even the movie-tie in cover claims it was 'inspired by', not 'based on' the book.

As for "His Dark Materials", I'm going to wait to see what the Catholic newsletter my mom gets will say. I had tried to read those books, but I got very bored, pissed off and annoyed about the reveal of her parents coming so early in the book. In short, I think I can say, don't put things on pedestals.

[lotuseyes.livejournal.com]

I was gonna see it 'cause of C.E. but I'll just rewatch Doctor Who and Heroes until the movie hits HBO or Showtime or whatever it comes on...

since I have a few fantasy/scifi series I would dearly love to see in theatres it worries me that my treasured Acorna could be screwed up so badly just to make money.

[eruvadhril.livejournal.com]

I saw it yesterday. I paid for a ticket for Hairspray, but accidentally found myself in the Dark is Rising theatre. Whoops. :D

Just so you know: it was way, way worse than we thought. Specifically, there is no Walker, AT ALL. There is no Sign of Fire. And the Sixth Sign? Will's SOUL, of course. He can use the full power of the light now that he's found the other five signs. John Hodge, this is not an episode of Captain Planet.

[cleolinda.livejournal.com]

*facepalm*

[alysscarlet.livejournal.com]

The excellent MaryAnn Johanson over at the Flick Filosopher has reviewed it, and she is of the same opinion as us. And she says Christopher Eccleston looks bored throughout, so not even worth watching it for him:

http://www.flickfilosopher.com/blog/2007/10/the_seeker_the_dark_is_rising.html