Discworld: The Movie

Havelock

Was discussing the prospect of a Discwold movie with some people and we came to logger heads over who could play the roles.

My list:

Vimes : Harrison Ford (Indian Jones Days)
Havelock: Richard E. Grant (Darkly) or Christopher Eccleston(From 28 Days Later)
Wizards: The Dean - Billy Connelly
The Bursur - Steve Buscemi
Ridicully - John Cleese (Full of excuberance and not understanding why
no one else is)
DEATH: Vincent Price (Well the voice there of)
Rincewind: Adrien Brody
Cohan: Sean Connery

Any ideas for others?

jongore

Just a few suggestions, rip 'em apart with fun.

Captain Carrot - The Rock
Nanny Og - Dawn French
Nobby - Mike Meyers
Colon - Tom Green
Cassundra - Verne Troyer (Mini Me)
Aguna - Angelina Jolie

echomadman

I'd say Charlize Theron would make a better Angua, Angelinas colouration wouldnt suit her breed.

Sarky

Inquisitor Vorbis- Christopher Lee.

That man just REEKS of evil style!

superconor

i think eric idle would suit rincewind, he did the voice in the game and therefore im used to it!

but if they did a film, would you have it live or animated like the game?

id have it lookin EXACTLY like discworld 2 on PC.

Sgt. Colon should be played by someone fatter!, like bryan blessed!

Vetinari - some guy that looks stone cold and harsh as ****, i dunno....ideas?

AL][EN

I'd base the movie on the Guards (cos there my favourite)

Vimes: mel gibson
Vetinari: Christian Bale (from american Phyco and equalibrium)
DEATH: CGI charachter with the Voice of Christhoper Lee
Sgt. Colon: Jack Black (he's been in the jackal)
Carrott: The rock or Vin Diesel
Aguna: Sarah Michelle Gellhar (BUFFY BUFFY BUFFY BUFFY)
Detrius: Ving Rhames (MI and MI2 and con air)
Nobby Nobbs: mike myers

cherry littlebottom/constable downspout/reg and the rest of he watch can be played by pretty much anybody,


Camio rolls for
Cohan: Arnie (he's old enough now)
Rincewind: john Cleese
Librarian: CGI ape i guess no need for anyone famous "OOK" doesnt require you to go to acting school

Sarky

I'd imagine it would be rather similar in style to Monty Pythin and the holy grail. Big, dramatic moments, suddenly going down the toilet as everyone starts debating some niggling little point. Or is that the boards? Oh well...

The Soul Music and Wyrd sisters cartoons certainly had the right atmosphere about them though, so yeah, maybe animated film would be the way to go...

Havelock

I had meant for an actual film. But cartoon would have to be supervised by Terry himself.

Why the Rock or Vin Disel, Carrot is mean to be intelligent, gentile and caring, not just a slab of brainless brawn.

jongore

I think that a film rather then a cartoon would be the way to go, CGI has progessed far enough to allow for size differences and to create characters that can't be played by actors.

I picked the Rock to play Carrot for the look, a good director can make anyone look intelligent, gentile and caring (Though I admit that the rock would be a challange:) )

With the success of Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter hollywood would seriously look at the discworld books as a rich vien so we can all hope.

echomadman

AFAIK, some guys in england are shooting a low(no)-budget short called The Troll bridge,
Its got Cohen in it.

AL][EN

Havelock i cant think of many actors in the movie busniess who are gentle and caring yet still give the impression that they are a well buffed action hero

carrott was the only one i had any REAL trouble with in picking an actor for, from the books my impression of carrott is he's a well built buffed up lad hard as nails but as you quite rightly put it a kind caring man of course i could be wrong

in hindsight i suppose you could put in orlando bloom (the ELF oh god no!!!) as carrott he was VERY good in pirates of the carribean

Jim

C.M.O.T Dibbler - Danny deVito, or someone of similar height.

Raphael

The Death of Rats - Itchy

seriously though, orlando would be good as carrot

froodie

Orlando Bloom, much as i adore his skinny body, is too girly to be carrot.
Maybe that guy who played Riley in Buffy or someone similar. Sort of young and fresh faced, but still kinda hard. They'd need to buff him up a bit all the same.

Angelica Houston would make a class Granny Weatherwax.

Oh and Cathy Bates as Mrs Vimes, all aristocracied up.

Oh, and Eddie from Frasier as Gaspode the Wonder Dog

Havelock

Maybe an unknown, it could be someone big break. I left Carrot out of my orginal post as I couldn't think of one. Is bloom tall enought or buff enought. Plus would he look good with ginger hair?

You'd have to do the Guards books in order, but would it be the best introduction to Discworld. Wouldn't Mort or a Wizards book be a more comprehensive introduction?

echomadman

Thinking about it though, Would Discworld really transfer to film, so much of the charachters are developed by internal dialogue and how do you explain the intricacies of the discworld without* footnotes.

I think a direct film version of any of the books would be reduced to poor slapstick unless masterfully done.

I'm always afraid of filmmakers ruining my favourite books by cobbling together some hackneyed piece of crap and using the good reputation of the original work to peddle it.



*And without using corny voice-overs

Havelock

You could have soliques, whispers in the head, thought you are quite right that it may not transfere. I hate that about some books. Anyway. Damn.

jongore

They said that about Lord of the Rings too but it transfered pretty well, as did Harry Potter. A lot of the internal thought can be reproduced externaly.

Although a film can never perfectly achieve the complexities in a book a really good director could come pretty close.

I think that the big question now is not who would play the parts but who would direct the film.:cool:

Havelock

But you would lose the foot notes!

jongore

Hmmm... maybe a cutaway to a dictonary with a voice over each time a footnote would be encountered?

Havelock

The script would run like this.

Sceen 2.

Location: Watch House

[Aside to explain the odd chest of arms of the watch-house]
[Aside to explin the aside]

Camera on Sgt. Colons

[Aside to explain why since it was Tuesday, that Sgt.Colon was uncomfortable because his wife had made him her curry with raisins and he knew he would be guarding the Bridge all night]
[Aside to explain why he guards the bridge]
[Aside to explain Sgt.Colon's wife's Curry]

Who is asleep at desk,

Enter Carrot

[Aside to explain Carrot was found in the mountains, with a regular well balanced sword, was brought up by dwarfs. So despite being so very tall he is still a dwarf]
[Aside to explain what being brought up by dwarfs entails]
[Asign to explain the commlications of dwarf dating]

Accompanyed by Nobby Nobbs

[Aside to explain what Nobby is, could be his past]
[Aside, at this point writters walk off the film, having not enought words in the english lanuage to explain Nobby]

Havelock

It wouldn't work, espically with all the guilds. It could be a tv series.

jongore

Not a T.V series! We'd end up with a low budget piece of (rap.

As I said before your never going to get a film exactly true to the book. If you did every aside and every piece in any book the film would be 10 hours long!

A good director would be needed to make a film based on a book and true to the spirit of that book.

Many of the books are now in play form and it's a small step from there to a screenplay.

Sarky

A lot of the asides are there for helping new readers along, so I reckon you could do without most of them. There's enough money to be made from the fans that know what's going on, without having to work fiddly explanations in for the benefit of people who never read the books.

Recalling those cartoons I mentioned earlier, I believe they did a very good job at staying true to their respective books, without a whiff of a footnote.

I don't really see why they couldn't manage something similar with real actors...

Havelock

I never claimed it would be a good tv program.

echomadman

They said that about Lord of the Rings too but it transfered pretty well, as did Harry Potter. A lot of the internal thought can be reproduced externaly.

With the lord of the rings most of the doubts were regarding the ability to transfer the sheer scope and scale of an entire fantasy world to the screen convincingly, computer tech and sfx advancements in the 90s made it feasible.
With Discworld a lot of the humour is purely descriptive, or off the wall in a Douglas Adams style (look how long they've agonised over the THGTG movie).
A discworld movie, as depicted by Havelock above, would come off as a dragged out Monty Python sketch.
How long would it take to get thouroughly sick of

a cutaway to a dictonary with a voice over each time a footnote would be encountered

I hate it already.

Why does it need to made into a movie anyway, I've been thinking about this, rather like Vetinaris attitude to music, I like the discworld on paper, not being interpreted by crude bipedal organisms and re-transmitted through the controlled release of trapped lightning.
DID MOVING PICTURES TEACH YOU NOTHING???

Raphael

If they wanted a discworld movie, they shouldn't adapt a book, they should ask terry pratchett very nicely if he wouldn't mind writing them a discworld story purely for the screen. That or use the last hero, that 1 would transfer fairly well.

jongore

A few of the books have already been adapted for stage plays. As I said it wouldn't take much to turn them into a screenplay for a movie.

Books coverted to plays.
Wyrd Sisters
Man at Arms
Carpe Jugulum
Mort

Havelock

Moving Pictures: now theres one that should be considered.

The more I think of it, the more I prefere the books, they are far better. The voices I hear the characters speak with, their facial expressions, the voice that reads the footnotes, the smell of the city and the colour of it would be different to what a director, backdrop crew and actors would see it. I quite like my way of expierancing it all.

The whole idea was very C.M.O.T.D

jongore

True, I've never seen a film that lived up to the book it was based on. But if a film of one of Terrys books was to be made I rather it was done well.
With the plays out there and the current success of the fantasy theme in the cinemas (HP & LOTR) it's only a matter of time before someone decided that a discworld film should be made.

Señor Juárez

twould be great if a series of cartoon films were made, one of each book... because we can argue til the cows come home about which book should be made into the film

jongore

Originally posted by marclar
twould be great if a series of cartoon films were made, one of each book... because we can argue til the cows come home about which book should be made into the film

I disagree, the cartoon option would end up cheap and shoddy.
Most cartoons are still aimed at a juvinile audience, a proper film with CGi where needed would appeal to a much bigger audience.

MarVeL

This thread set me to wondering and I stumbled across this in the IMDB. Anyone know anything about it?

The Beer Baron

There was talk of Terry Gilliam directing Good Omens.
But of course, like almost every project Gilliam done it was SNAFU'd. Still I think he'd be the only one who could do Pratchett justice- the 2 Terry's, yeah that'd be great.

Then again I wonder what liberties a full-on Hollywood production would take? No doubt it would desecrate it, all the subtly and dark humour would be gone, the characters would all be played by "beautiful" people and every inch of Ank Morpork populated by pointless CG eyecandy.

Book-to-film adaptions seldom work, and even anyone who doesn't agree and wants to cite Peter Jackson as an example obviously hasn''t been subjected to one of Echomadman's epic drunken "The Two towers is bollox!" rants:

...yes...I know, I know, and the Orcs had cockney accents...yes...and they left out the...yes you already said that...put the knife down please...c'mawwwn gimmie the knife...

af666x

You'll never get the same amount of thought, intricacy or humour into a film because your imagination makes it funny. And there'd be an outcry over the violence anyway. Bleeding heart liberals.

If someone did get up the courage to do a decent film I'd be all for it. But I also heard that an earlier attempt was stopped by Terry himself. Hollywood style people tried to make it into an epic action hero kind of thing and humour was told to take a back seat.

:mad:

Not gonna happen.

shock

you couldnt make an action film of the discworld, it just wouldnt be discworld.

Funky

Originally posted by MarVeL
This thread set me to wondering and I stumbled across this in the IMDB. Anyone know anything about it?

i came across this the other day and 'acquired' it... it seems to be the beginning of the "Reaper Man" book, i came across Soul Music too but couldnt get it

Capt'n Midnight

But not hollywood style

manga maybe - or lord of the rings ....
so you get the impossible sets and effects and a thousand elephants...

af666x

Why 1000 elephants???

5 not good enough for ya?

echomadman

Just one elephant, but you move it past the camera 1000 times, after getting the herder to say something like "we must advance the pachyderms in single file bwana, to counfound the ankhian devils"

af666x

A very cost effective idea there. And they could on location shoot in Ireland.

The Shades - Ballymun

shock

No theres too much grass in ballymun to be the shades, somewhere nearer the city centre where they havent seen grass in centuries. then you'd have to cover the roads in mud, and other substances.

Panda

Methinks Lord Vetinari could be played by Christopher Walken,

If they ever do a film its gonna be in years to come, no time soon.
I think they should concentrate on the City watch trilogy, it could be an epic to rival all epics!

Its got it all, a love story, humour by the bucket full, baddies, heroism
even big mad dragons!!!

Capt'n Midnight

Carrot would be your typical Hollywood hero
But Vimes would have to be a lot more subtle
- pity Roy Schneider / James Stewart are't available
Michael Dorn for Detritus ?

jongore

Carrot is subtle enough in his own way, most of what he says can be taken two ways. Vimes would be a 'Dirty Harry' type cop, who somehow found himself in charge.

amp

While I doubt that a film of Discworld could ever live up to the wonderful world it is in my head, I thought the same of LOTR.

Needs a big a budget, Pratchett on board and a director who "gets" the books style/humour etc.

I'd actually prefer if there weren't any big name thespians in it. Look at Band of Brothers and LOTR, not exactly A-list, and I think that lends more to the suspension of disbelief factor.

ozt9vdujny3srf

Personally i think it would be difficult to get it to work, much of pratchett's humour is in the observations he makes in the books, methinks that a fairly difficult thing to get in cinematic form, but thenm again loads of his books have been converted to plays, so i should probably read a few of them before i make any more observations.

Anyhows personally i would prefer if he directed his work towards writing more quality books.

shock

You might need a narrator to get some of the observation humour into it, like in the Hitch-hikers Guide to the Galaxy series.

Capt'n Midnight

How about blind IO as the narrator ?

Seriously the luggage would make a nice impartial one...

shock

If by impartial you mean homocidially physcotic with a grudge against.. well everything, then yes.

Macseamusa

a movie would be hard to make, but if they did the bloke with the duck on his head would have to be in it. and how would you get the ankh to look like it should.