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World War Z $200 Million Production Nightmare Exposed

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JdFoX187 said:
Because someone at some point wanted to make a World War Z film. Then Brad Pitt got personally involved -- instead of sitting back and letting his production company handle this -- and vouched for Marc Forster, who wanted a huge action film. If that Vanity Fair article is correct, Forster is probably the one to blame for almost every bad decision on this film.
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I think the adaptation was doomed the second they (apparently) started viewing it as a launching pad for a Brad Pitt Zombie Franchise. There is possibly no work of zombie fiction more ill-suited for launching a single-hero-oriented franchise than WWZ. In order to pull that off, you have to accept diverging from the book enough to make one guy the driving force behind it and leave things open enough for sequels.

Forster's action focus guaranteed further diversion, certainly, but I'm guessing it was doomed before he got there. It may end up being a decent summer diversion, but it really does sound like they bought a book nothing like the movie anyone involved really wanted to make. I'd say "At least they get to use Yonkers" but for some reason it sounds like they won't even use that (the perfect action set piece that would allow the hero to go on a big speech about how he warned them, but they wouldn't listen!)
 
RedStep said:
What's funny about this is that I was at F&F 6 yesterday with my wife and the trailer came on (we've seen it several times). She was like "who are they even fighting?". She had no idea it was zombies. Not good marketing - it just looks like generic "war" at this point.
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My wife said directly after seeing the television ad: "Is that a Zombie movie?"
 
I really wish they could have gone with the documentary direction. It would make more sense with the book and probably be significantly cheaper.
 
MiKeD said:
It'll be just fine and I don't think it's going to bomb.
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Have zombie flicks ever made so much money? Most successful I think Resident Evil movies are the best anyone has ever done, and that peaked at 300 mil WW.

They need this movie to do over 400mil to not be a bomb.
 
Count Dookkake said:
This so much.

I don't think the kids understand just how, uh, dead the genre was before RESIDENT EVIL.
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How fitting is it that the zombie genre is threatened by a bloated rotting corpse of a big studio movie like World War Z. Just the name alone feels too big to work. This whole situation is funny and sad.

Peter Jackson should return to his roots and gives us another quality zombie movie.
 
BattleMonkey said:
Have zombie flicks ever made so much money? Most successful I think Resident Evil movies are the best anyone has ever done, and that peaked at 300 mil WW.

They need this movie to do over 400mil to not be a bomb.
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'I Am Legend' comes to mind. Ok, not really Zombies, but it comes close.
And I think Brad Pitt as a lead will have a big impact worldwide.
 
Jinger said:
Out of curiosity, why do people have beef with Straczynski? I've liked a lot of what he's done over the years. Or maybe it's my Babylon 5 bias.
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I'm curious too. But I'm also a B5 fan.

Personally I hope this bombs hard and takes the zombie genre with it.
 
Count Dookkake said:
This so much.

I don't think the kids understand just how, uh, dead the genre was before RESIDENT EVIL.
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28 Days Later really was amazing (28 Months was also great - Robert Carlyle <3 and an early appearance by Jeremy Renner). I kind of wish we'd gotten the depressing ending they filmed to 28 Days though. Zombie movies should not end on a happy note - one thing that 28 Months got right. I also like the 2004 remake of Dawn of the Dead. Also a bleak ending. Fast zombies, ftw.
 
BattleMonkey said:
Have zombie flicks ever made so much money? Most successful I think Resident Evil movies are the best anyone has ever done, and that peaked at 300 mil WW.

They need this movie to do over 400mil to not be a bomb.
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It does seem like a problem. Zombie movies have done well when they're made cheaply and therefore can turn a profit on semi-decent returns. Like the Dawn of the Dead remake made $102 million on a $28 million budget, or 28 Days Later doing $82m on $8m. This sort of budget seems suicidal.
 
iammeiam said:
I think the adaptation was doomed the second they (apparently) started viewing it as a launching pad for a Brad Pitt Zombie Franchise. There is possibly no work of zombie fiction more ill-suited for launching a single-hero-oriented franchise than WWZ. In order to pull that off, you have to accept diverging from the book enough to make one guy the driving force behind it and leave things open enough for sequels.
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They weren't necessarily wrong with the idea of taking WWZ and trying to make a more traditional story focused around a single character that still followed the basic scenario that played out in WWZ.

Like, I don't know. Make a movie based around Todd Wainio's parts of the book (which, on its own, could easily pad out a story of a soldier dad getting his family to safety, fighting the losing battle at Yonkers, and then joining in on the effort to retake the country) and then sprinkle in elements from other chapters (like have him come across the downed pilot or the little girl who was on the run from the crazy cult). Then if you want sequels, you have all the stuff implied by the book but never covered. You could have a whole movie alone based around Pitt's character being a part of the crew sent in to investigate what happened in North Korea.

The problem here is that Forster completely jettisoned everything from the book, and the stuff they came up with sounds downright awful.
 
LakeEarth said:
They just made War of the Worlds but with zombies instead of aliens. Man saves family from strange worldwide disaster. Why they paid millions to get the book rights and then do nothing with it (except keep the title) is beyond me.
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There's two common links here.

Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt are both major douchebags
 
Hari Seldon said:
Instead of bringing in the idiot from Lost, perhaps they should have brought in Romero.
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"We can shoot this ending for $50,000. Get me a barn, some gasoline, a bunch of ketchup packets and some cardboard guns. I'll save this movie".
 
Megalosaro said:
Here is how I would have made the movie.

I would have kept the interviewer frame work. Movie features the UN Analyst flying around the world meeting various people and interviewing them. The interviews themselves would be flashbacks, a la Interview with A Vampire. Of course not every story could be worked into a movie. Some would have to be combined.

Between interviews, the interviewer himself would have flashbacks, in order to build an emotional bond with him.
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Life of Pi did it like this too, and it was a decent structure.
 
Nairume said:
They weren't necessarily wrong with the idea of taking WWZ and trying to make a more traditional story focused around a single character that still followed the basic scenario that played out in WWZ.

Like, I don't know. Make a movie based around Todd Wainio's parts of the book (which, on its own, could easily pad out a story of a soldier dad getting his family to safety, fighting the losing battle at Yonkers, and then joining in on the effort to retake the country) and then sprinkle in elements from other chapters (like have him come across the downed pilot or the little girl who was on the run from the crazy cult). Then if you want sequels, you have all the stuff implied by the book but never covered. You could have a whole movie alone based around Pitt's character being a part of the crew sent in to investigate what happened in North Korea.

The problem here is that Forster completely jettisoned everything from the book, and the stuff they came up with sounds downright awful.
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This would definitely have worked. Pitt could even have played Todd Wainio being interviewed after the fact, instead of the interviewer (played by Shia LaBeouf, lol). Have almost the entire movie be a flashback.

EDIT: ooh, have Fassbinder be the interviewer. Probably too small of a role for him though.
 
Nairume said:
They weren't necessarily wrong with the idea of taking WWZ and trying to make a more traditional story focused around a single character that still followed the basic scenario that played out in WWZ.

Like, I don't know. Make a movie based around Todd Wainio's parts of the book (which, on its own, could easily pad out a story of a soldier dad getting his family to safety, fighting the losing battle at Yonkers, and then joining in on the effort to retake the country) and then sprinkle in elements from other chapters (like have him come across the downed pilot or the little girl who was on the run from the crazy cult). Then if you want sequels, you have all the stuff implied by the book but never covered. You could have a whole movie alone based around Pitt's character being a part of the crew sent in to investigate what happened in North Korea.

The problem here is that Forster completely jettisoned everything from the book, and the stuff they came up with sounds downright awful.
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Exactly. Forster had his idea of a movie he wanted to make and the source material be damned. If that's the case, I can't figure out why everyone stood by and let him run with his contrived idea that anyone with common sense had to know was going to end in complete and utter failure.

What I can't figure out is why even give Forster that big of a budget anyway. They should have known Quantum of Solace would have done major box office dollars whether it was Forster in the chair or an untrained monkey flinging poo. That monkey would probably be able to direct better action scenes. So you take a director who's one sole action film was raked over the coals by EVERYONE and give him $150 million to make an action zombie film. Paramount deserves to have a bomb on its hands.
 
Chinner said:
so is the complete audiobook for world war z meant to be good??
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I don't understand. Are you asking because you're listening now and aren't impressed or because you're about to purchase it and want to know before hand?
 
thanks for taking the time out of your day to respond. I appreciate that you are busy and fairly sought after because of your expertise. I hope the rest of the day is pleasant for you.
 
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Chinner said:
thanks for taking the time out of your day to respond. I appreciate that you are busy and fairly sought after because of your expertise. I hope the rest of the day is pleasant for you.
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Behave.


I can definitely see WWZ making its budget back and I understand why Pitt went the route he did with the film but even still it could have been handled so much better. Adapting the ip to the screen directly would be impossible but that doesn't mean he should butcher it and use it in name only, he still could of kept the spirit of the book.
 
vgJames said:
Behave.


I can definitely see WWZ making its budget back and I understand why Pitt went the route he did with the film but even still it could have been handled so much better. Adapting the ip to the screen directly would be impossible but that doesn't mean he should butcher it and use it in name only, he still could of kept the spirit of the book.
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There's no way they could have adapted the ENTIRE book to the screen. but they could have easily taken a few of the more exciting moments, such as the Battle of Yonkers, and thrown them in via flashbacks ala Interview with a Vampire. And then if the movie is successful, do another with more of the stories. This shit writes itself. But then it wouldn't be a huge CGI-infused blockbuster with generic Brad Pitt starring.
 
Patryn said:
That's an HBO miniseries, not a summer tentpole film.
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Even if I believe that someone like Blomkampf would have been able to make such an angle work, that's the thing with World War Z. This property is horrible for becoming a summer tentpole film, full stop. Paramount just thought "derrrrp, zombi sucessful book, will make zombi sucessful movie, herp" and went with it. This is a great example of everything that is wrong and creatively bankrupt in Hollywood.
 
Ikael said:
Even if I believe that someone like Blomkampf would have been able to make such an angle work, that's the thing with World War Z. This property is horrible for becoming a summer tentpole film, full stop. Paramount just thought "derrrrp, zombi sucessful book, will make zombi sucessful movie, herp" and went with it. This is a great example of everything that is wrong and creatively bankrupt in Hollywood.
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They also thought, "hey we have this new CG ant colony crowd tech. Lets throw that in too."
 
Pitt wins

http://www.deadline.com/2013/08/bra...llion-ww-to-become-his-highest-grossing-film/

Paramount Pictures reports that World War Z had passed the $500 million worldwide gross mark, surpassing Troy&#8217;s $497.3 million to become Brad Pitt&#8217;s highest grossing film ever.
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According to Paramount (which co-financed with Skydance), WWZ has set several records for Pitt, whose Plan B produced. It set a personal best with a $66 million opening on June 21, and a total $197.4 million in the U.S., both of which exceeded Mr. & Mrs. Smith&#8216;s total domestic gross of $186.3 million and $50.3 million opening weekend. The film has earned $305.2 million at the international box office, to date.
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bradpitt-blog-jpg_211117.jpg
 
What a handsome man

That pic gave me a little tingle in my nether regions

Happy for him, it's a great movie.

He really makes you question your sexuality though
 
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