Mandatory: "10 of the Greatest Films Never Made"

[JamesG]

10 of the Greatest Films Never Made
by Matt Branham
July 15, 2014


Some of the greatest films to not be made or see the light of day are seemingly more worthy of our attention than many of the major motion pictures that get big budgets and multiple sequels.

Luckily, we still have our imaginations, and are hoping these films make it to real life someday.









Poe (Sylvester Stallone)

When he’s not throwing knives, blasting automatic weapons and knocking some poor bastard’s lights out, Sylvester Stallone secretly lives in a world where he gets to direct a biopic of the life and death of Edgar Allen Poe.

Although he may be a brooding man, Sly has taken a keen interest in classic literary figures, citing his interest in this project for over a decade now. And according to Stallone, there’s only one man qualified for the role: Robert Downey, Jr.







Halo (Peter Jackson)

Gaming junkies wait with bated breath of a thousand stale potato chips in anticipation for the Halo video game brought to life by The Lord of the Rings directing genius Peter Jackson (as producer).

Since 2005, the project has been in the works with millions thrown at a spec script and District 9 director Neill Blomkamp penned as director. The film was spread across two studios with Microsoft backing the project, but in 2006 when production and development costs ran high, Microsoft backed out on their deal and the project fell apart.







Kaleidoscope (Alfred Hitchcock)

Shortly after a few commercial flops in the early 1960s, Hitchcock moved towards an original project in 1967 under the working title Kaleidoscope.

The film, also titled Frenzy, was a sexual serial killer film about a necrophiliac murderer who would kill and then rape the dead women, all for under $1 million.

Despite the small budget, there was discomfort with financiers who thought the film would struggle with success considering its lewd content.







Lord of the Rings (The Beatles)

It’s a lesser known fact that around the time of their Sgt. Pepper record, The Beatles were considering doing another one of their eccentric films using the enduring work of J.R.R. Tolkien’s 1950s The Lord of the Rings fictions.

After box office success with Help! and A Hard Day’s Night, Apple films pushed the idea of the best-selling band getting involved with the best-selling books, and the band responded with interest.

John Lennon was to play Gollum, Paul as Frodo, George as Gandalf and Ringo as Sam (once again, Ringo got pushed to the back of the line). Although the band was interested, Tolkien was not while still owning the rights, so the project died.







Napoleon (Stanley Kubrick)

After conducting much research on the historical French emperor - nearly 500 books - in wake of his 1968 success 2001: A Space Odyssey, Stanley Kubrick had big intentions for a Napoleon Bonaparte biopic.

Scouting locations in France and America, the film was set for production with David Hemmings and Audrey Hepburn as the two leads. Because of location costs, the competition of War and Peace and a Napoleon-based flop all falling together, the film lost ground.

Kubrick’s vision carried on for decades, citing it would be “the best movie ever made,” but now Steven Spielberg has expressed interest in carrying on the late Kubrick’s legacy by creating a television miniseries in his honor instead.







Batman v. Superman (Wolfgang Petersen)

Around 2001, Warner Bros. studio was debating a Batman/Superman film where the two superhero worlds would intersect, as well as a script from J.J. Abrams.

Instead of carrying on with that, Warner Bros. opted to send the superheroes off in their respective directions, green lighting Batman Begins for 2003 and Bryan Singer’s Superman Returns - a super cinematic abortion - in 2006.

The studio has finally made its way back to the idea after a highly successful Batman trilogy and Man of Steel reboot in 2013. Zack Snyder’s Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice is slated for a summer 2016 release.







The Moviegoer (Terrence Malick)

Based on the Walker Percy novel, Malick had high hopes of bringing the tale of a New Orleans man who lives better vicariously through movies than he does in real life to the big screen in 1994.

The project had Tim Robbins and Julia Roberts on board, but with Malick’s involvement with The Thin Red Line at the time, and then Hurricane Katrina’s destruction of the old New Orleans the book portrayed, the project lost its original luster and eventually faded away.







Don Quixote (Orson Welles)

A heartbreaking failure of Orson Welles was his passion project about Don Quixote. Beginning in 1955, Welles worked to get the film off the ground as it went through an obstacle course of changes.

Despite some financial backing from Frank Sinatra, Welles went in and out of other film projects over the course of 30 years in order to raise enough money to finish this particular project, but to no avail.

All that remains is 300,000 feet of film and an unfinished, unorganized project. Welles also failed to complete potential literary-based masterpieces like Heart of Darkness and The Little Prince.







The Man Who Killed Don Quixote (Terry Gilliam)

As early as 1998, Gilliam collected $32 million to shoot the Miguel de Cervante-based screenplay with French actor Jean Rochefort and Johnny Depp as the leads.

In 2000, the film was suspended because of flooding, illness of Rochefort, insurance difficulties and financial problems - the plagues of the film industry.

In 2005, the project was revived with backing and Robert Duvall as Quixote and Depp returning. Depp then had to drop out because of scheduling conflicts and in 2010, Gilliam announced the project failed again through lack of funding.







Megalopolis (Francis Ford Coppola)

The heavily pined-for Megalopolis from Francis Ford Coppola was going to be his big comeback film, but never came to be.

The high-budget, overly-ambitious film about a futuristic New York was every actor’s dream job - and several thought it was theirs - with the likes of Robert De Niro, Kevin Spacey, Nicolas Cage and Russell Crowe all attached at one time or another.

A one-two punch of 9/11 and the distributor going bankrupt ended in a sad fate for Coppola’s late stage success, nearly 25 years after his film directing prime.

http://www.mandatory.com/2014/07/15/...ms-never-made/

[Torgo]

Originally Posted by JamesG

Lord of the Rings (The Beatles)

It’s a lesser known fact that around the time of their Sgt. Pepper record, The Beatles were considering doing another one of their eccentric films using the enduring work of J.R.R. Tolkien’s 1950s The Lord of the Rings fictions.

After box office success with Help! and A Hard Day’s Night, Apple films pushed the idea of the best-selling band getting involved with the best-selling books, and the band responded with interest.

John Lennon was to play Gollum, Paul as Frodo, George as Gandalf and Ringo as Sam (once again, Ringo got pushed to the back of the line). Although the band was interested, Tolkien was not while still owning the rights, so the project died.

Lord Of The Rings had been attempted a few times to be made into film before Bakshi's animated film, and eventually Jackson's trilogy. I recall reading somewhere that someone tried to get it made in the 50's after the books came out. And John Boorman (Deliverance) tried to obtain the rights, but Tolkien's estate turned him down and sold the rights to Ralph Bakshi.