From the Archives: My immediate reaction on viewing John Carter for the first time

Other Stuff

As I keep trying to get John Carter and the Gods of Hollywood to the finish line (126,000 words and counting), I use the John Carter Files archives as part of the process for monitoring the day by day progression leading up to the release.  I’m finding out “John Carter News” roundup each day to be particularly helpful.

Meanwhile I just came across a post I’d written immediately after seeing John Carter for the first time — a post I had forgotten about.  I thought I would share it again, because it reads differently, and interestingly it seems, given all the debate that has ensued about the adaptation.

I Have Been to Barsoom (but this is not a review, not yet)

February 29, 2012, by Dotar Sojat

I attended the Hero Complex John Carter Screening in Burbank tonight and I will write a proper and complete John Carter review after I’ve had a chance to digest what I saw.   For now, I want to limit my notes to the question: “How did it differ from what you war expecting?”  Isn’t that the question that’s always in our mind when we see a movie we’ve been tracking closely?

Taylor Kitsch surprised me …. he was MUCH better than I expected

If you’ve been watching the trailers you’ve got to be wondering — can this guy do it?  The answer is a surprising and resounding yes.  Some of it is because of the writing — his character is written well.  But you have to give him a lot of credit. It’s like they took his worst moments in the film and used them in the trailer  Also, they id weird things like, when he says: “Get on!” very sharply in the trailer he seems to be saying it to Dejah Thoris and it bumps. But in the movie, he’s saying it to someone else and it’s completely appropriate.

Lynn Collins astonished me – she was so much better than I expected

Again, it’s like they have showcased her worst moments.  She was beautiful and engaging and strong and charismatic —  she was the “incomparable Dejah Thoris” after all….She rocked in unexpected ways.

The score by Michael Giachhinno was MUCH better than I thought it would be.

I had not been blown away listening to the cues without visuals — but they were so perfectly suited to the visuals that I became a complete convert.  The audience felt the same way — he got the biggest applause during the credits.  It’s a wonderful score.

Now for the big one (for ERB fans anyway)

The changes were much more significant than I expected and they have a profound effect on the experience.

If you are a hardcore Burroughs fan who doesn’t want to see changes, you may be in for a rough ride.  You will feel like you went to Barsoom for sure — but you did so in the company of a different storyteller, not “good ol’ ERB”.  This is the part that I have to still process.  Barsoom was there — John was John, Dejah was Dejah, Sola, Tars, Woola — all character were good, and Helium was Helium, the airships were awesome, and Zodanga was a little steampunk funky but …it was there.  But the flow and structure of the story was more nuanced and complex than I expected – but then I should have expected this so the “surprise” may be more on me than on Andrew Stanton.   To tell the truth, Avatar in some ways felt more like ERB than John Carter did and I think it was precisely that similarity to ERB’s dear sweet pulp genius self  in terms of character and story structure that caused a certain critical disdain for Cameron to emerge — whereas this, while not feeling precisely like ERB, will–I predict–be regarded as a far more serious accomplishment in terms of story and character. Andrew Stanton did himself proud and put his own mark on the material while staying true (enough) to the original.  It’s a fine line to walk.   I have to process it some more…..but my main point here is to just register “what was different than you expected” and …it was different.  But it was Barsoom.

I would describe it sort of like this. Imagine there was this amazing Italian Restaurant in your home town that you grew up with , that you loved, that you have only the best and sweetest memories for — but it closed down. Now it’s open again, same name, same decor, and a promise to bring you the best in Italian cuisine. You go there thinking “best in Italian cuisine” means the same stuff you loved as a kid, maybe with some embellishments, but the same –then when you get there,  the cuisine is great, but it’s innovative and fresh and new and that’s a great thing but where’s my lasagna?   The pasta is the great pasta; the bread is the great bread, and the environment is the same environment — but they’ve got a crazy good chef who isn’t happy with just repeating the old favorites.  He’s putting his own imprint on them and that imprint is good, amazingly so.  But on some level you were craving that lasagna from 35 years ago so you have to regroup and rethink.  And you know, your first thought is — I think I’ll go back on Sunday and try this again. It’s different, but it’s good.

I’ve said more than I meant to.  I will be giving this high marks but do I have issues?  Well, maybe not issues, but quibbles, certainly. Remember I’m a film-maker and an ERB fan and I have made this movie in my head so there’s no way I’m going to just rave without reservation.  But I do think Andrew did a better job than I could have, and that’s about the highest praise I can give, given my insufferable ego and love for this material.  Good on ya, Andrew.

More to come … but that’s the preliminary report.

11 comments

  • I didn’t mean to slight Indiana Jones or imply that it is “just” pulp. I was only thinking of it as on a gradient, closer to the pulpy end of the spectrum when contrasted with Last of the Mohicans, which is closer to the epic drama end of the spectrum. Both films have elements of humor and drama, but in different degrees. I have complete respect for both types of movies, and recognize that an APOM film could be made at virtually any point on that spectrum and still be considered close to the source material. But the epic drama qualities of the novel don’t get nearly as much airtime as the pulp adventure qualities, which raises interesting questions about what direction a future film version might go.

  • MCR wrote

    And what’s with the bias against Carson of Venus?

    Noooooo!
    Not bashing it at all. Just talking about how it’s more Indiana Jones-ish because Wrongway Carson has humor throughout. I think Venus movies would in some ways work better than JC for modern moviegoers precisely because of the humor that would be laced throughout………I can’t imagine people coming out of a Venus movie and saying the leading man was flat and uncharismatic………

    I do personally like the Barsoom series better just because the world of Barsoom is more interesting and developed. But having said that ….. Venus was a close second….

    By the way I’m working (as a writer/producer) on a very cool animated Venus mini-project with ERB Inc…..can only tease about it now but we’ll be announcing something soon. It will showcase Venus in a cool way……

  • Dotar Sojat wrote:
    “But you also seem to be saying the only way to do the adaptation would be to have it be as much of a romp as Raiders of the Lost Ark and I disagree with that. Carson of Venus — yes. APOM, not so much.”

    I’m not saying John Carter-or a film adaptation-needs to be a romp. When I responded, I was responding to what I felt was Abe slighting the Indiana Jones films as “pulp,” the same way Burroughs was dismissed. Now I’m not saying their deep films-and you can pretty much say there is nothing underneath Temple of Doom or the last one-but Last Crusade has a good father/son story to back up the adventure and Raiders is a great movie that it seems some do want to dismiss-even you if your comment about it being nothing more than a simple “romp” are an indication. There is more there than you or Abe seem to be giving it credit for, just as there is more there to ERB’s work. Plus I said “Now I’m all for taking the story seriously as with Lord of the Rings” and LOTR is not just empty pulp either. I just felt that with this movie that Stanton was too busy trying to make it epic-and not hitting it-and lost the fun aspects of A Princess of Mars. The fun of discovering Barsoom through John Carter’s eyes, the excitement and the enchantment of it wasn’t there.

    And what’s with the bias against Carson of Venus? If you really want me to go full on bash mode don’t knock Wrongway Carson. That man has enough problems!

    Finally “Now MCR, when you write back, you can bash me all you want but don’t bash the guy who wrote that. ”

    I’m not going to bash him. It’s his opinion, he’s entitled to it. I’ll bash you if you don’t stop trying to convince me that scene is some how a classic scene. 😉

  • MCR wrote:

    @ Abraham wrote: “The oft-repeated narrative that John Carter is the quintessential pulp adventure story definitely contributes to expectations that a film adaptation of it would be more “Indiana Jones” than “Last of the Mohicans”. But does the “pulp adventure” label adequately account for everything in the books?”

    Well see you’re missing the point. Raiders does take itself seriously. The characters take the story as serious as does the characters in Last of the Mohicans but at the same time there is a level of fun to Raiders. It’s not Schindler’s List or Sophie’s Choice. Now I’m all for taking the story seriously as with Lord of the Rings but there does need to be something there, a hook, usually provided by becoming invested with the lead character. In the cases of Indiana Jones, Hawkeye and Frodo Baggins-even with all of their foibles-you do as a viewer and a reader. And you do with Edgar Rice Burroughs’ John Carter but I couldn’t with Stanton’s. Probably due to his constant “It’s not my problem, I want my cave of gold” attitude. It’s hard to become invested in a hero when he’s reluctant to become involved with the story.

    I think in a way you’re missing the point in that it is the existence of those levels in Burroughs’ books that those expecting “straight pulp” in the adaptation are missing. In other words they’ve read the mantra “pulp adventure writer Edgar Rice Burroughs” so much that they have it pegged as having to be exactly the stereotype of pulp adventure when it’s a little (a lot) more unique and specific than that. I think we’re all in agreement that those levels exist in Burroughs work. But you also seem to be saying the only way to do the adaptation would be to have it be as much of a romp as Raiders of the Lost Ark and I disagree with that. Carson of Venus — yes. APOM, not so much.

    As usual (but nicely this time) you get back to your beef about what he did with the character of John Carter and while I, like you, had the problem you refer to, at least on a first viewing, there are plenty who didn’t have that problem at all. One of those types just popped up here today and made his first comment (on the Foreword to JCGoH) and I’m going to repeat it here just to make the point that just as much as you don’t like what he did, there are people out there who really responded to it.

    I’ ve seen John Carter 3 times. Each time it made me weep. Im not even sure why ( I mean, I know, why. The scene with Carter & Woola vs. the Thark horde. but I’m delightfully surprised that a 100 year-old story can bring out such emotions when put in the right hands)…..This film is a piece of American art that must be protected and fought for. Im a comic book artist/geek who loves the Avengers. But John Carter made me weep. Any motion picture that make a ( mostly) grown man weep honest tears is something worth cherishing.What can I do to help?

    Now MCR, when you write back, you can bash me all you want but don’t bash the guy who wrote that. Leave him in peace. He’s sincere, and new, and I don’t want him to get beat up on day one just because I shared his comment. I’m not asking you to argue with him …. just making the point that your point of view is not a Universal Truth….. it’s just a point of view, and other people have other points of view.

  • Abraham Sherman wrote:
    “The oft-repeated narrative that John Carter is the quintessential pulp adventure story definitely contributes to expectations that a film adaptation of it would be more “Indiana Jones” than “Last of the Mohicans”. But does the “pulp adventure” label adequately account for everything in the books?”

    Well see you’re missing the point. Raiders does take itself seriously. The characters take the story as serious as does the characters in Last of the Mohicans but at the same time there is a level of fun to Raiders. It’s not Schindler’s List or Sophie’s Choice. Now I’m all for taking the story seriously as with Lord of the Rings but there does need to be something there, a hook, usually provided by becoming invested with the lead character. In the cases of Indiana Jones, Hawkeye and Frodo Baggins-even with all of their foibles-you do as a viewer and a reader. And you do with Edgar Rice Burroughs’ John Carter but I couldn’t with Stanton’s. Probably due to his constant “It’s not my problem, I want my cave of gold” attitude. It’s hard to become invested in a hero when he’s reluctant to become involved with the story.

    Also your comment : “Does it account for the chivalrous, Arthurian/Bushido aspects of John Carter’s personal code and Barsoomian warrior culture in general? Does it account for the Iliad and Odyssey-type mythic qualities of the ancient history and battles and journeys and encounters with creatures? Does it account for the Shakespearean family history of Tars Tarkas, Gozava and Sola?”

    All of that is present in the books. It’s also present in Star Wars and at least in the original trilogy there was a balance to it. We had the “chivalrous” hero in Luke Skywalker. We had the Bushido aspects with the Jedi Knights, we had the Ilian and the Odyessey of battles and encounters. We even had Shakespearen tragedy in the form of Darth Vader. Yet the movies were also fun and achieved a balance. No one was winking at the audience or acting like “this is silly and we know it” but there was all of the fun and epic qualities there. I felt Stanton missed that. He missed the fun of Burroughs’ work while his attemps at the epic qualties was drowned out by his cliched changes and by making Carter the way he did.

  • Abraham wrote:

    The oft-repeated narrative that John Carter is the quintessential pulp adventure story definitely contributes to expectations that a film adaptation of it would be more “Indiana Jones” than “Last of the Mohicans”. But does the “pulp adventure” label adequately account for everything in the books? Does it account for the chivalrous, Arthurian/Bushido aspects of John Carter’s personal code and Barsoomian warrior culture in general? Does it account for the Iliad and Odyssey-type mythic qualities of the ancient history and battles and journeys and encounters with creatures? Does it account for the Shakespearean family history of Tars Tarkas, Gozava and Sola?

    BINGO
    You’ve hit on something that I’ve been groping for.
    This constant dismissing of Burroughs as a “pulp” novelist is missing out on some of the elements that elevated his writing. There is a grandness to the scope and vision, and there are subtleties in the characters and cultures that he depicts, that invite a more serious treatment and maybe Stanton sensed that — the mythic elements. It’s almost like a 100 year old echo of the same thing Burroughs faced when he couldn’t get a publisher to publish Tarzan as a novel even though it had been a runaway success in the pulps…

  • MCR wrote:
    “It’s also funny considering most of the criticism from the critics was that Stanton possibly took it too seriously. I don’t think he should have camped it up but making the hero Mopey Carter with his dead-family-by-way of The Outlawy Josey Wales possibly wasn’t what audiences were looking for.”

    Some folks are saying it was too serious, while others are saying they had hoped it would be MORE serious and dramatic. It seems that people have a variety of different John Carter films running through their imaginations.

    The oft-repeated narrative that John Carter is the quintessential pulp adventure story definitely contributes to expectations that a film adaptation of it would be more “Indiana Jones” than “Last of the Mohicans”. But does the “pulp adventure” label adequately account for everything in the books? Does it account for the chivalrous, Arthurian/Bushido aspects of John Carter’s personal code and Barsoomian warrior culture in general? Does it account for the Iliad and Odyssey-type mythic qualities of the ancient history and battles and journeys and encounters with creatures? Does it account for the Shakespearean family history of Tars Tarkas, Gozava and Sola?

    In light of such elements, a more serious Barsoom film would be at least as much in order as one that played up the pulpier, faster-paced adventure aspects of the books. So the question isn’t “can a Barsoom film be serious?” but rather “how serious will it be?” and “how to do it?”

    It seems to me that Stanton’s film is caught somewhere between unabashed pulp adventure and epic drama. It feels like it’s touching both worlds, and perhaps in doing so, it doesn’t quite realize the potential of either. It is a wonderful, enjoyable experience for what it is, but it is not the last word on what a Barsoom film should be. (Nor do I think that Andrew Stanton would ever claim that it’s supposed to be.) I hope we get to see Stanton’s sequels, but whether or not we do, chances are a reboot sometime in the future will take Barsoom in a different direction. And then we’ll all have the fun and games of going through a totally different type of therapy to come to peace with that! 😉

  • If there is another go at Barsoom, either a sequel or a reboot, the filmmakers will have no excuse for eliciting responses any less enthusiastic than this one (except for the responses of those critics who are just plain grumpy and can’t be pleased by any adaptation). Hopefully the next film will be done in such a way that the caveats will be unnecessary, or at least minimal, and the only remaining criticism will come from the types of purists who rant about the injustices that Lord of the Rings did to Tolkien, despite the fact that the LOTR films are the best work in their genre to date.

  • “To tell the truth, Avatar in some ways felt more like ERB than John Carter did and I think it was precisely that similarity to ERB’s dear sweet pulp genius self in terms of character and story structure that caused a certain critical disdain for Cameron to emerge — whereas this, while not feeling precisely like ERB, will–I predict–be regarded as a far more serious accomplishment in terms of story and character.”

    HAAAAAA HAAAAA.

    Sorry but I think Cameron got the last laugh there. If anything can be learned from that is that audiences may want that “pulp” feel to a movie. If not then Star Wars and Raiders of the Lost Ark would not have succeeded. It’s also funny considering most of the criticism from the critics was that Stanton possibly took it too seriously. I don’t think he should have camped it up but making the hero Mopey Carter with his dead-family-by-way of The Outlawy Josey Wales possibly wasn’t what audiences were looking for.

    “Was I too charitable to Stanton?”

    You really want an answer to that? True you did flag that we should have been aware of Stanton’s butchering of the material (even though I knew that when Mark Strong said he was going to “shift his shape” back in 2009 that a faithful film was pretty much shot) but still…at this point you were honest about how you felt about it the first time, and usually the first time is the impression that sticks with you. If you were being too charitable it was probably because you had waited so long for a John Carter movie and was willing to forgive anything Stanton did. So to answer it yeah you were too charitable but I can understand it. You didn’t want it to be a disappointment and you allowed it to slide.

    OK now I bashed you. Don’t take it personal. 🙂

  • Funny, my initial impression while leaving the theater was precisely: “that was not Barsoom”, that and “the pace of the movie was so wrong”. My intial thought was summed up as “what was ERB’s was good, what was Stanton’s was crap”.

    I had time to digest the whole experience thereafter, and I saw what Stanton did right, and that’s quite a lot frankly to me now. But I had a very, very hard time getting there. Now I can say I love the heart displayed in this movie.

    I can in all honesty say that’s the first time a movie grows on me that way. In most other instances my first impressions of a movie stay the same thereafter. Not in this case, and I don’t really know why. But it feels good. 🙂 I’ll be first in line to buy the most expensive John Carter dvd-blu ray package when it will be released in France next wednesday.

  • Can’t wait to get bashed on this one, given all that has ensued after I wrote it. Was I too charitable to Stanton? Too unsure of my own reaction? Hoping too much for the film to succeed?

    There is some of that in there. I guess I was a lot more willing to give Stanton the benefit of the doubt than a lot of people are….and more willing to try at least to “suspend my inner ERB fanboy” and give Stanton a chance to do his own thing…………

    But I did clearly flag the fact that ERB purists are likely in for a “rough ride”. At least I get credit for that.

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