I wonder how the world would have been like if we got an epic like this back then. No many films could overshadow it.
The 80s film landscape would be totally different. Perhaps less glossy films, not such classics as BTTF or Ghostbusters. No Karate Kid either.
Also, goodbye to the muscle action of that decade. No Rambo or Arnold.
I think we would have got more violent noir/crime flics, and dito dramas, with small budgets. It would be a reaction to the grandeour of the 70s.
You pointed out directors in your reply.
How do you pick them for your various projects? Is it because they are known for working in a similar style/genre as the hero(-es)?
I mean, Coppola is an archetypical Batman director. isn't he?
And the same for other directors and DC characters, in films we created from the 1940s up until today.
And since this is a Marvel board, I have to mention Oliver Stone and Captain America again.
Isn't the director a little more important than the cast? He sets the tone for the whole thing, and may have a finger in the writing too. The actors just act out their classic on-screen personas that made us them cast in the first place, in all these alternate films
Picking directors is tougher for me than picking actors for the projects.
I can go with fit , i.e. similar styles in genres , but other times ,it's tougher for me since I only know the name of a handful of directors from each decade of the 40s-70s.
Coppola and Batman seemed to fit like a glove for a dark, noir, 70s Batman film. Hitchcock also seemed like a natural for a noir, thriller, mystery- like Batman film in the 50s.
I did a Mike Nichols Spiderman based film , based off of his handling of
The Graduate . Since the Spiderman film was more of a dramedy with some action elements in it, I felt Nichols at that time(1966), could deal really well with Peter's bad luck with women, his struggle with balancing school, work, and being a superhero, etc.
I could see Nichols handling that type of film better than an action director from around that same time period.
Hammer productions also seemed like natural fit for a 70s era Blade film with Richard Roundtree , given their classic horror catalog and reputation.
In
Secret Wars's case, I wanted to use some of the top talent who could handle sci-fi, drama, with humorous and human emotions, in addition to delving into the psyche of these larger than life characters.
So I went with Kurshner as the director, Nicholas Meyer who wrote and directed The Seven Percent Solution as one of the writers, and I went with Puzo who wrote the Godfather films and Superman films, to be the co writer. I imagine that the studio would have gone with the top hot talent of the late 70s.
I agree , the director is important. Unfortunately, my knowledge of directors, writers, and producers is shallow at best during the post war through late 70s era. I'm much better from the 80s to today.
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, And with the director of The Empire Strikes Back and the writer/director of The Wraith of Khan, and The writer of The Godfather and Godfather 2, it would certainly be epic.
