Magician The Movie?

[Fake Vencar]

Aye but Jackson is doing The Hobbit until its current release date in 2011. What we don't want to have is some second-rate director doing a poor job and then causing thousands of would-be fans to not read the books at all. Better not to have a film at all

[Cayal]

Well Magician hasn't been announced so it would be past 2011 anyway.

[Ivexus]

yeah, look what happenned to Paolini's Eragon, it was rushed and ultimately ruined as a film

[Overread]

I think the key problem with book to film productions is that film producers see one book as being one film, where in truth a single book often holds enough for two or more films. Magician I see as being one of these types; if done as a single film then chances are it will be a flop for fans and either a good or high rated epic action film for the masses; and seeing as the masses are the ones that bring in the ever sought after box office records, that is who the film will be made for.
It is a shame because Magician is a very strong and well written book and it would be wonderful to see it on the big screen.

Another idea - to throw into the pot - if they ever made a Magician film, it would be one of the best fantasy worlds to produce a mini-series off. There are something like 25 books on the world and enough depth to allow a writer to open up the world to new ideas --- however I don't know if I would want that to ever happen; some things need to be left alone to preserve their quality and identity

[Kulgan]

Overreach, you're reading my mind on this one. I was thinking myself - and about to post - that Magician would make a much better miniseries than just one movie. I don't think you could do justice to it in less than 6 hrs, and like LOTR and Dune it would be better developed that way and run on the small screen rather than in the theatre.

[Overread]

The only problem with a mini-series would be getting the people together for the larger battles which dominate a good portion of the book - it could be done, but would require the budget of a film for the mini-series-- but it would have a much greater change of being faithful to the source material.

[Kulgan]

Well, I've always preferred reality to comp. generated, but as U remember, most of the participants in the battles in LOTR were comp generated. They used perhaps a hundred or so real actors and generated thousands of trolls, orcs, etc, to fill in the action. It worked better than I had anticipated and could also be done for Magician - or any other REF they wanted to make.

[Overread]

true it did work well - but remember they also made the CGI in LOTR blend well with the real shots they made - which requires a high investment. Many mini-series skip on expense with the CGI (everything look new and clean and flat) which detracts from the quality. thus either way a large investment is needed - I wonder if there are more fans for Magician than there are for Fire Fly?

[Fake Vencar]

I'm against a mini-series myself. It would be the death of Midkemia

[Woodfoot]

Depends how much money is thrown at it to whether it will be a great film.
Some books are just too Fantastical to make the move to the Silverscreen and others ....well just look at Beastmaster

I would love to see magician as a film as i would some of Eddings work but i feel it will not do justice.

[Woodfoot]

Has anyone read the Chronicles of Prydain by Lloyd Alexander then watched the film The Black Cauldron (Disney cartoon)?

I enjoyed it more than i would have a "real" film, do you think sometimes that with the right type of animator it might be better in animation?
Would you like to see Magician made that way? and i don't mean in a cute way

[Overread]

ahhh animation!
something like an epic full animation would be wonderful - totaly wonderful! (I likes animation too much). I think the anime groups would be the best to animate this - they tend to blend animation and CGI better than the western producers - mostly - and I can see the use of CGI for the battle scenes. Though a full animated epic - as a series and not a film - now there would be something.
Personally I cannot see why the west has moved away from animation - aside from the cost its just as good a meduim as any other - and does not lack when it comes to adding the unreal, like dragons and magic, which are often poorly done with cheap CGI


and now I have to find that book as well!

[Cayal]

Originally Posted by Kulgan

Overreach, you're reading my mind on this one. I was thinking myself - and about to post - that Magician would make a much better miniseries than just one movie. I don't think you could do justice to it in less than 6 hrs, and like LOTR and Dune it would be better developed that way and run on the small screen rather than in the theatre.

Magician is two books anyway.

[Overread]

it is - in the UK its only one single book - but even at two, its a lot to fit in to two films

[GOLLUM]

It's only ever been 1 book from when I bought it and the 25th anniversary edition was also a single volume. It may be that it was printed at some stage in 2 volumes but I think you'll find in most cases it was published as a single volume.

I met Feist in Melbourne and got the 3 krondor books I think it was ? signed in Hardback by him. Quite cool actually.