Monday 3 May 2021

How To Film THE REBEL WORLDS

I would prefer an indefinite TV serial leaving nothing out to a single feature film. However, it is interesting to see how a partially authentic film adaptation is put together. Scenes can be conflated, omitted or added. In Stieg Larsson's The Man With The Dragon Tattoo, the villain, Wennerstrom, remains off-stage and Mikael Blomkvist:

receives a phone call in the Millennium office;
visits his ex-wife and their daughter;
visits his sister and her family -

- whereas, in the Swedish film adaptation:

Wennerstrom comes on-stage a couple of times;
Blomkvist has no ex-wife or daughter;
he receives the phone call while visiting his sister.
 
In Poul Anderson's The Rebel Worlds:
 
Dominic Flandry is briefed by Vice Admiral Kheraskov;
Flandry visits Shalmu en route to Llynathawr;
his rescue of Kathryn McCormac happens between chapters -

- whereas a film might:

incorporate information about Shalmu into Kheraskov's briefing;
dramatize the rescue (which maybe was left out of the novel for word count reasons).

Of course, if Kheraskov knew about conditions on Shalmu, then this would raise the question why the Empire had not taken appropriate action but such scene changes often raise such questions. If a script writer changes one plot element, then he might have to change others.

5 comments:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

I would love it if we got GOOD TV or filmed versions of some of the stories about Nicholas van Rijn and Dominic Flandry! I would for first doing that with one of the short stories, not a novel. Both to gain experience in doing TV/filmed versions of these stories and because I think having it based on one of the shorter stories would make it more likely to be ACCURATE.

I agree some scenes in such TV/filmed versions would probably need to be conflated or omitted. I am very doubtful about adding scenes not seen in the stories however. At the very least, something in the plots of these stories would need to be found to justify these additions.

I think Vice Admiral Kheraskov knew of at least the possibility of abuses like what happened on Shalmu occurring. As this bit from Chapter II of THE REBEL WORLDS shows, while discussing Snelund's governorship of Sector Alpha Crucis: "He left three years ago. Since then, increasing complaints have been received of extortion and cruelty." And, a bit later, while talking about Admiral McCormac's own investigation of Snelund: "A two-star admiral can get through. The Policy Board began talking about appointing a commission to investigate." So knowledge about Snelund's criminal activities was percolating thru channels and steps were starting to be taken about them.

Kheraskov would not yet have known about the atrocities instigated by Snelund on Shalmu, because they might have barely begun at the time he was briefing Flandry.

Ad astra! Sean

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

Sean,

But, of course, the sequence of events is often different as between an original text and its screen adaptation.

I would like to see the entire Technic History adapted in chronological order, starting with "The Saturn Game." Also, the Old Sequence multiverse and the Time Patrol with the same actor playing van Rijn in the Technic History and briefly in the Old Phoenix and again the same actors plating Holmes and Watson in "Time Patrol" and briefly in the Old Phoenix. I am a continuity purist.

Paul.

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

Your first one sentence paragraph: agree.

I am doubtful of the likelihood of ALL the Technic stories ever getting filmed. I would be grateful for a representative selection being made into TV shows/movies. And I agree with you in being a continuity purist.

Ad astra! Sean

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

Sean,

My ideas for screen adaptations of prose fiction do not fit into the way things are currently done in cinema or on TV. Also, I think that sequential art fiction should be occasional graphic novels, not monthly comic books.

Paul.

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

You know more about how TV shows/films are made than I do. And I was reminded of how Alexander Solzhenitsyn used used cinematic methods for part of his description of the battle between the Germans and Russians in AUGUST 1914.

So you prefer mangas over the far shorter comic books.

Ad astra! Sean