000LeaguesUnderTheSea Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Two months after being replaced on the He-Man movie Greyskull, Justin Marks has lost another big screenwriting gig: McG's Captain Nemo: 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. You can speculate and snicker all you like. In the meantime, The Hollywood Reporter says that screenwriter Randall Wallace has been brought aboard to rewrite the script before taking his directing job with Disney's Secretariat. (So handy to have those screenwriter / director guys just hanging around the studio!)

20,000 Leagues is being envisoned by Disney as an origin story for Captain Nemo, and that nifty little colon after his name indicates that they'd like to make him over into a nautical franchise to complement their ongoing Pirates of the Caribbean series. Everyone is kind of hoping they'll draw on Jules Verne, and explore Nemo's background as given in that lesser-known sequel, The Mysterious Island. He was revealed to be the Indian Prince Dakkar, who had lost his wife, children, and kingdom after participating in the rebellion of 1857.

While the film is being labeled as an action-adventure, I think it's extremely likely that Wallace is being brought on board precisely to flesh out that tragic backstory, and up the anti-imperialism. This is the screenwriter of Braveheart, Pearl Harbor, and The Man in the Iron Mask, after all. If he has a specialty, it's perilous wartime romances, especially if they're set against the backdrop of revolution. We're probably in for a very frothy 20,000 Leagues, but at least its steampunk setting allows for that. Now cast Naveen Andrews so it'll be sexy steampunk.

I have to admit it's kind of funny that if you do a quick search for the screenwriter Justin Marks, you will get "the guy they brought in to f*ck up He-Man" in your results (probably not very funny to him, but what can you do?). 'Digital reputations' aside, you have to hand it to the guy: with only a few credits to his name, he's managed to attach himself to some high-profile 'geek' properties in the last year. Marks will be working on McG's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea: Captain Nemo, as well as Green Arrow: Escape From Supermax and Suicide Squad for Warner Brothers. Now, the latest to be added to the pile according to Variety is courtesy of Sony, who has hired Marks to write the screenplay for a feature film version of the PlayStation 2 game, Shadow of the Colossus.

Colossus centers on a young man named Wander who must battle sixteen giant bad-guys -- and I mean giant -- if he wishes to restore the life of a young girl. The game wasn't your usual action adventure fare, and players spent most of their time traveling on horseback in a desolate (but beautiful) landscape. In fact, the only action you see is when you encounter one of the 'Colossi'. Ultimately, the title was less action and adventure, and more of a puzzle game where you had to discern the weakness of each Colossi if you were to have a hope in hell of defeating it.

Since the game itself is pretty sparse on the details, Marks will most likely be tasked with trying to fill in a little more story in between action set-pieces. Of course, the big question still remains: Is Marks your man if you're looking for interesting characters and a solid story?

Last week, the trades announced that McG was going 20,000 leagues under the sea to tell the origin story of Captain Nemo and his incredible submarine. I'm sure we all began making a mental list of who would make a really cool Captain Nemo because that's what film fans do.

Well, McG is doing the same thing, and when Latino Review caught up with him at the Terminator: Salvation roadshow, they asked who his dream captain was. "Man I'm trying to get Will Smith to do it, been trying to get a hold of him. I've been wanting to work with him for a long time already. That guy's great." Oh. While Smith is capable of good work, he isn't the actor that first comes to mind when McG describes this version of Nemo. "The character Nemo in this film is more about obsession, he is obsessed and people tend to forget that when you become so obsessed you end up being the villain."

Add to the fact that Jules Verne's Nemo is actually a tragic Indian prince, whose origin and secret lair are revealed in The Mysterious Island -- it could be a great, star-making part for (and I'm going to steal CHUD's brilliant casting idea) a guy like Naveen Andrews. Andrews would be a perfect Nemo. Let's hope Smith is too busy producing The Karate Kid remake, and being the last pharaoh, and someone else has a chance to step in.