Water Flow On The Valley Floor! Options

[SigurRosFan]

Original link: http://www.msss.com/mars_images/moc/2005/09/15/

Okay, okay. It's only a FLOW of a SEA oF DUNES.

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

Keep in mind that -- while Hollywood claims to regard Dick as a hot property -- they have, every single time they've used him, stripped all the core ideas out of his work, from "Blade Runner" on. The reason, I think, is that his core ideas are too SCARY for Hollywood to use. (The final insult is the fact that his name was misspelled in the credits for "Total Recall"!)

As for Anderson supposedly being too conservative for Hollywood to use: that hasn't stopped 'em from using Tom Clancy -- who is both distinctly more right-wing than Anderson and infinitely stupider. And do I really need to bring up the Rambo movies, or John Milius? The real reason they haven't used Anderson is simply that his stories are too INTELLIGENT for Hollywood to use in an SF movie, since readers of SF with any brains whatsoever both have some background in science to begin with and are willing to put up with a hell of a lot of expository background material that moviegoers won't tolerate. (It's the triumph of the McLuhanite self-lobotomization of mass society in a nutshell.)

[dvandorn]

As for Anderson supposedly being too conservative for Hollywood to use: that hasn't stopped 'em from using Tom Clancy -- who is both distinctly more right-wing than Anderson and infinitely stupider.

Very true -- but then again, against all odds, Clancy is a very entertaining and compelling storyteller. You all have been able to tell, I'm sure, that I'm not exactly a political conservative. But I've read, and highly enjoyed, every book Clancy has written. And anyone who can present such conservative views in such a way as to keep me from tossing the book against the nearest wall must have some really good storytelling techniques going for him...

Besides, the film versions of Clancy's stories (with the possible exception of "Hunt for Red October") have gutted his core statements, just as Hollywood has carefully avoided Dick's core statements. This isn't a matter of Hollywood preferring liberal or conservative authors -- it's a matter of the Hollywood blender removing controversy from most of its products in order to maximize blandness -- er, non-offensiveness.

-the other Doug