The greatest films never made

Eddie Constantine in Jean-Luc Godard's Alphaville

I learn from Richard Brody's new book Everything is Cinema: The Working Life of Jean-Luc Godard, that prior to settling on Alphaville with him, Godard wanted American expat tough-guy portrayer Eddie Constantine to play the lead role in an adaptation of Richard Matheson's I Am Legend.

The mind fairly boggles at the notion: Jean-Luc Godard's I Am Legend, starring Eddie Constantine.

What are your favorite unrealized movies, in the mode of this, or, say, David Lean's Nostromo? There are hundreds out there, for sure...

On a side note, it's pretty droll how Lou Reed has turned into such an Eddie Constantine lookalike in recent years, no?

Comments

[Bill C]

I'm fairly certain that Tim Lucas' face just melted at the prospect of a Constantine/Godard I AM LEGEND. Myself, I really don't see how it couldn't be more interesting than either of the book's three adaptations.

I tend to think of unrealized projects as be-careful-what-you-wish-fors in the wake of GANGS OF NEW YORK, but I'll chime in with Altman's BREAKFAST OF CHAMPIONS (with Sterling Hayden as Kilgore Trout) and Cronenberg's BASIC INSTINCT 2.

[bill]

I really like "Gangs of New York", so most of these are painful to think about.

[Matt]

Now and then I wonder if David Lynch would've done a better job with Return of the Jedi than he did with Dune. I know Lucas would've kept him on a pretty short leash (which I believe is why he opted not to do it), but I think he would've brought out some interesting and different qualities in the actors, if nothing else. And maybe he could've shoehorned Dean Stockwell in there somewhere, as the Emperor or something.

(Yes, I know he didn't work with Stockwell before Dune, so that idea doesn't really make sense. Let a man dream...)

[D Cairns]

Richard Lester's Flashman (Britain's most-decorated coward in Alfghanistan), Send Him Victorious (near-future right-wing take-over of Britain), Victory (Conrad adaptation scripted by Pinter.
More Pinter: Joseph Losey's Proust film.
Sam Fuller's The Lusty Days (Civil war epic).
Alexander Mackendrick's Mary Queen of Scots (the storyboards exist), Rhinoceros (with Peter Sellers and Peter Ustinov).
Robert Hamer's A Pin To See the Peepshow.
Ken Russell's Beethoven, Clockwork Orange, The Angels, Moll Flanders (apparently back on).
Hitchcock's Mary Rose, Kaleidoscope-Frenzy.
Clouzot's L'Enfer (about an hour of cut footage exists).
Ophuls' Modigliani.
Leone's Seige of Stalingrad.
Gilliam's The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, The Defective Detective, etc

[Griff]

Altman's production of RAGTIME.

[Tim Lucas]

I would have loved to see an Eddie Constantine I AM LEGEND. The thought of him driving around an empty Paris, swigging scotch off the shelves of abandoned bars, and socking it out with rubber-fanged vampires is enough to make me suffer an exquisite sense of loss. Just knowing that this one project never happened is enough to confirm what I have always said: that the power of cinema is in the wrong hands.

There was also talk in the early 1980s of Amos Poe directing a remake of ALPHAVILLE, with King Crimson's Robert Fripp and Deborah Harry in the Eddie Constantine and Anna Karina roles.

Another great unmade movie: TERMITE TERRACE, Charlie Haas' script about the behind-the-scenes realities behind the invention of the great Warner Bros. cartoon characters, which Joe Dante tried to get financed for years.

My Mario Bava book describes a wonderful unmade project of his called ANOMALY. A spaceship encounters a vast mural in space adorned with the likenesses of terrible creatures. The ship ventures through an opening in the mural, disturbs a powerful force within and makes its getaway... but the figures on the mural come to life and pursue the ship as it journeys earthward. I can't imagine the third act of such a piece, but the first two acts sound more compelling than the storylines of most of the films Bava actually made.

[bill]

You know, with some of these, I ALMOST half-wish that some other filmmaker would pick up the gauntlet. I know somebody did that with Welles's "The Big Brass Ring". I haven't seen it, and I don't have much doubt that I'm not missing anything, and I realize that these dead projects are best left alone (if the filmmaker is no longer around, anyway), but a very small part of me wants to see these movies made anyhow. Like "Anomaly". I mean, what the Christ? I want to know what the hell happens now!

[Bill C]

I like GANGS OF NEW YORK, too, lower-case Bill, I just think, after 25 years of Scorsese talking it up, its mystique preceded it. I guess I should've saved myself some trouble and said TOYS, though.

[bill]

Well, that's true. "Gangs of New York" does get better on multiple viewings, after you're able to shake off your expectations.

But, yeah, "Toys" is a better example. Much better...

[Tony Dayoub]

I would have liked to have if seen Tim Burton's Superman starring Nicolas Cage. Didn't sound promising, but an interesting failure to be sure.

Also John Boorman's Lord of the Rings for much of the same reasons.

Godfather IV which I had heard talk of Coppola doing, if III had succeeded, structured as a parallel to part II. It would have contrasted Vincent's consolidation of power, with Michael's "resignation" filling in the gap between II and III with Pacino playing his actual age at the time.

Hey, maybe Coppola (

[bill]

"...and I don't have much doubt that I'm not missing anything..."??

Sigh...

[Tony Dayoub]

Didn't finish that last thought.

Hey, maybe Coppola deliberately sabotaged III by casting his daughter? His disdain for the franchise was well documented.

[Stephen Bowie]

Peckinpah's "Summer Soldiers," written by Robert Culp and S. Lee Pogostin (the writer/director of "Hard Contract").

Just a tip: if you're reading about Jerry Schatzberg's (DP: Vilmos Zigmond) un-released Dandy, The All American Girl, play Can's Bel Air, from Future Days. They go together like peanut butter and chocolate.

[lazarus]

I second the mention of Leone's Stalingrad, and I suppose we'll have to settle for Tornatore's Leningrad, which is supposedly in the works. At least he's using Morricone.

Also, no mention of Welles trying to shoot Heart of Darkness in POV as his first film for RKO?

[Dan]

Matt, I think a lot of people shortchanged the film because it wasn't the exact ending of the book (and we'll be here all day if you get me started on "fans" who shred anything that isn't a word-for-word adaptation)...but when you look at the movie? It's closer than it might seem at first glance.

The "darkstalkers" are NOT animals. What do we see in the film? That they are capable of logical thought (they set a trap and bait it), that they can form a society and emotional attachments, and that they can form a plan and execute it. Are they what we would describe as rational? No, but, then, neither is Neville, and they have excellent reason to view him as a threat: he's been picking them off one by one, and when they find out where he is, they act quickly with a strategy to hit him where he's weakest and overwhelm his defenses. They are, essentially, cavemen; not technologically advanced but dangerous to underestimate.

Of course, then you've got that whole "Where the hell did they find the floor plan of his house and the information about his defenses" problem, but we're not talking about screenplay mechanics right at the moment. :-)

[Griff]

Schatzberg's DANDY, THE ALL-AMERICAN GIRL was shown at Cannes in 1976. A year or so later, MGM very gingerly released it as SWEET REVENGE; it also aired on pay-cable under that title in the late '70s.

[bemo]

Cronenberg's Basic Instinct II, you say? How about Total Recall? If I remember correctly, he went onto Naked Lunch(?), so not much lost, considering that eXistenZ is a much more multi-layered confection if what he worked with was the basic 'is he, or isn't he?'

And Lynch's Monroe biopic.

I have a thing for Davids.

[Evan]

For me, it has to be Scorsese's adaptation of Nick Tosches' Dino. I seem to remember hearing that Tom Hanks might have played Dean Martin. That might have been pretty amazing...

[Jack]

Confederacy of Dunces.

[Kent Jones]

THE CREW (Antonioni - great script), GENESIS (Bresson), THE CRADLE WILL ROCK (Welles - nothing to do with that crummy Tim Robbins movie), BEYOND THE AEGEAN (Kazan), THIEVES LIKE US (Rowland Brown), any one among the many Cassavetes projects that didn't get off the ground, SCHINDLER'S LIST (Billy Wilder).

[Kent Jones]

And let's not forget the collaboration between Renoir and Brecht that almost came to pass.

[Lou Lumenick]

Hitchcock's TITANIC
Capra's THE FORTY DAYS OF MUSA DAGH
ETHAN FROME with Davis and Crawford

[Aaron Aradillas]

Considering what finally got made, I think I would've liked Ratner's Superman over Singer's. Hell, Bay's Superman would've at least MOVED.

Just tryin' to keep it real.

In all seriousness, I would happily donate my life savings towards Scorsese's Dino or Lee's Jackie Robinson Story. Also, I seem to recall Woody Allen wanting to do a jazz biopic of Coleman. I know very little about jazz, but I would love to see Woody Allen do a real biopic.

Finally, Tarantino's Inglorious Bastards would be nice to see one day.

[Jordan]

We've yet to see if Wendell Harris will ever complete a second film, but his idea for Negropolis, an epic satire that would take place in ancient Rome except the ruling elite would be black and the slaves white is the most inspired idea I've ever heard of that never had a chance at seeing the light of day. Harris wanted Howard Stern as a Jewish Alexander the Great and Oprah Winfrey as Cleopatra, while reserving the film's lead role the emperor Canigula, (yes you read that right) for himself. There's no way that would not have been great.