gary goldman Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Get your ass to Mars ... again. According to Moviehole, there's a new Total Recall movie in the works, but it is hard to really tell if it's to be a sequel or a remake. Apparently The Weinsteins have owned the rights to the original TR for years and they had plans to do a follow up. Then Spielberg's Minority Report happened. Huh? Aside from also being adapted from a Philip K. Dick story, MR has nothing to do with TR. Except that it was originally scripted by Ronald Schusett and Gary Goldman as Total Recall 2. Of course, the end result bears no resemblance to that draft, in which Tom Cruise's character was actually Arnold Schwarzenegger's Doug Quaid, the Precogs were mutated humans (from the Martian atmosphere) and all the action took place on Mars. Still, Moviehole claims Minority Report beat The Weinsteins to the punch and so this new Total Recall project will in fact be a remake.

Personally, I don't see how Minority Report keeps The Weinsteins from doing a sequel. Dick's story had no relation to his "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale", which was the inspiration for Total Recall, and really the movie makes no reference. Sure, Schusett and Goldman's idea for a sequel is no longer possible, but there is certainly other ways to do one. However, the fact that Schwarzenegger isn't exactly an actor these days also contributes to the problems with producing a sequel. Doing a follow up without him, though, would not be that surprising. In fact, it is particularly common with Paul Verhoeven movies to do a sequel without the stars of the first film (Hollow Man II; Robocop 3; Starship Troopers 2). At least Sharon Stone is interested in a Total Recall sequel. Certainly it would be more ridiculous to go the remake route, considering how popular Verhoeven's original was -- and still is.

If, like me, you grew up with two distinct obsessions -- movies and video games -- then you're certainly familiar with Don Bluth's classic 1983 arcade game Dragon's Lair. Produced by Bluth and his team after they left Disney to make The Secret of NIMH, but well before they collaborated with Steven Spielberg on stuff like An American Tail and The Land Before Time, Dragon's Lair was a pretty unique type of arcade game -- in that it was a cartoon. Basically you got to control Dirk the Daring as he quested through a very colorful dungeon filled with traps, creatures, spirits and (of course) a really big dragon, all in an effort to rescue the powerfully curvaceous Princess Daphne from a creepy dragon. The game, which demanded 50 cents to most games' 25, was a big hit, spawning a sci-fi "cartoon game" called Space Ace in 1984 and a sequel called Dragon's Lair 2: Timewarp in 1991.

So I told you all that so I could tell you this: Mr. Bluth is still hoping to turn the original Dragon's Lair into a feature-length movie. In an interview on the recently-released Blu-Ray Dragon's Lair DVD, the producers mention that not only do they have a completed script, but also that they've taken a few meetings in recent months. (Seems like a fine idea to me. Those who know and remember the video game will undoubtedly want to see the flick, while those who don't might want to simply enjoy an animated adventure movie.) To make the news even more compelling, producer Gary Goldman insists that the Dragon's Lair movie would be done via traditional animation and not CGI. Also, it'd be a prequel that details Dirk's adventures prior to delving into the legendary "lair." Sounds good to me!