Down Goes the First One, Down Goes the Second One, Oh How They Wiggle and Squirm
Sorry to keep giving you movie news today. Sometimes that's just the way it crumbles, cookie-wise. Now we won't rehash the old How To Eat Fried Worms debate (re: Whether the movie sucks or not via the recent Creative Screenwriting article about it), but I heard something today that is of particular interest. While attempting to get my tired body back from the hectic world of high-speed Delaware to lazy/peaceful Manhattan, I happened to hear this piece on NPR. Entitled Making Kids' Films Is Not Kids Stuff, the piece attempts to figure out what determines a successful children's film. Amusingly enough the people speaking mention A Little Princess and how no self-respecting boy would have been caught dead seeing it (hence its financial failure). Consequently, How To Eat Fried Worms should do very well indeed since it will be seen by both boys and girls. What amused me the most about this piece, though, was the utter bafflement felt by anyone and everyone connected to the not-so-hot Hoot. No one can quite figure out why it did so poorly (bad adaptation aside). Definitely worth listening to.
posted by fusenumber8 @ 8:39 PM
2 Comments
2 Comments:
Do NOT get me started on this topic (one that is near and dear to me as it is my livelihood!). This is hashed around over and over year after year after year. There is no magic formula. Some bad movies make money. Some good movies don't. There are sometimes some clear reasons (and I have theories about Hoot, for example), but at the end of the day, the classic William Goldman quote about Hollywood is equally true about trying to figure this particular issue out:
Nobody knows anything.
Which, essentially, is what the NPR piece said. Theories come and theories go, but I'm familiar enough with the moviemaking process to know that your average film goes through so many twists and turns that its amazing when a final product is coherant, let alone "good".
Out of curiosity, would you ever consider adapting a children's book to the screen, Greg? If so, which?
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