Hollywood would kill Neuromancer, if it was ever to be a hollywood film then Gibson would have to keep very tight control to stop it becoming some bloated CGI farce.
It would be better as an Anime as companies such as Gynax and Production IG have used it extensivly as isperation and would respectthe book enough to give it a proper adaptation.

I agree with your opinion Jimmy, also would prefer Neuromancer done Anime style as i've said over and over again! But u never know If the right people are brought together to do it, It might be the greatest sci-fi ever made. Just look at the Lord of the rings trilogy for example. Tolken's been dead for decades but see what can happen if u have the right peeps...Magic

well, i think in the thread on democratic film making, i pretty much came to the conlusion nobody would do a good enough job to please everybody, when you talk about adapting neuromancer into any cinematic form. i really dig anime, loved the look of GITS2: Innocence, the first five or ten minutes of that don't even look like cel animation, it looks like what i see when i picture the sprawl in reading Gibson's works. but i prefer the look of real people to animated people, and i think an animated version would appeal to a smaller audience, since it fo sure ain't gonna be a for kids movie... i think if you went and looked at how GITS2 did at the box office in comparison to a movie like Garfield or your random shitty Hollywood crapfest, you'll see what I'm talking about...

That might be good, but, even if the film was independently made, if you're interested in seeing sequels, there needs to be money involved, and money would only show up if there was much interest in the first film. (Altho I bet the home video market for a live or animated version will still outsell any theatrical runs).

I don't really want to see Hollywood kill Neuromancer either, but I would like to see it in a theater if it gets made, because the story just screams out to be shown on a huge screen with an ear shredding megasound system...

Gibson nolonger has control of the flim rights to any of books, he said he sold they long ago and has no idea who owns them at the moment.

Although I love Nueromancer as a book but, it would be the hardest of his books to make. I think Count Zero or Mona Lisa Overdrive make an easier book to adapt to a movie.

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Originally posted by madevilbeats:
well, i think in the thread on democratic film making, i pretty much came to the conlusion nobody would do a good enough job to please everybody, when you talk about adapting neuromancer into any cinematic form. i really dig anime, loved the look of GITS2: Innocence, the first five or ten minutes of that don't even look like cel animation, it looks like what i see when i picture the sprawl in reading Gibson's works. but i prefer the look of real people to animated people, and i think an animated version would appeal to a smaller audience, since it fo sure ain't gonna be a for kids movie... i think if you went and looked at how GITS2 did at the box office in comparison to a movie like Garfield or your random shitty Hollywood crapfest, you'll see what I'm talking about...

That might be good, but, even if the film was independently made, if you're interested in seeing sequels, there needs to be money involved, and money would only show up if there was much interest in the first film. (Altho I bet the home video market for a live or animated version will still outsell any theatrical runs).

I don't really want to see Hollywood kill Neuromancer either, but I would like to see it in a theater if it gets made, because the story just screams out to be shown on a huge screen with an ear shredding megasound system...

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Don't have to necessarily preconceive so much of what a democratic participatory film production process might look like, or install such limits; I think that you are assuming too much.

There are lots of ways to raise money, lots of ways to take books into a visual form, lots of competing (currently really theoretical) models to the studio system.

Universal, it certainly would be my intention to make the best possible version of Neuromancer that could be made. As I'm sure, in a democratic situation (and here we should go back to discussing such details in the democratic film making thread) there would be many many opinions as to the best way to do that, the end result might turn out to be a movie that pleased no one except a few fans, who marveled at their own brilliance in creating a 'to the letter' adaptation of a novel that no one else is going to bother watching.

Perhaps you should face reality, that a film will have a potentially wider audience than a book. If your intention is to create a large scale movie to bring the story of Neuromancer to people who wouldn't otherwise ever be exposed to it because they don't read books, then there needs to be either a lot of money or a very singular viewpoint directing the film production to give it that slick cohesiveness people respond to.

Now I'm not saying it's not possible to produce something people like in a democratic situation. Just very unrealistic to assume so. If I fall back on the old ways of film creation it's because they are known to work. I understand the catalyst to the discussion of democratic process for film making was the LOTR movies, which, while maybe pissing off a handful of hardcore fans of the books, was by all other indications a slamdunk success, finacially, technologically and critically, making a ton of money and winning Oscars while pushing further the envelope of special effects.

If your intention is not to be succesful in that way, then there is really nothing stopping you from creating your version of Neuromancer anyway. Gibson pretty much gave permission in a blog entry last year that as long as you were nonprofit, legal action would more than likely not be persued against small scale adaptations of his works by him. (Of course, if a studio already owns the rights for N., they are perfectly capable of honing in on you no matter what Gibson says.) Of course if you intend to profit from the film, it only makes sense to create it in a way that people are used to being fed their films: the large budget Hollywood or very stylistic independent visionary film.

Yes, I assume a lot, but so far I have seen nothing concrete in your theory to persuade me I should think a production of N. should be made democratically. I offered up my own theories on how the process could work in a practical manner in that thread, but finally came to the conclusions that a) no one is really interested enough in the idea to participate and b) the resulting film probably wouldn't meet most of the participants expectations.

I just read Neuromancer again, so this is all fresh in my head.
Molly - Carrie-Ann Moss [I know, she's Trinity, but she looks right]
3Jane - Jennifer Garner
Linda Lee - Lucy Lui
Case - Jude Law
The Finn - Richard Dreyfus
Maelcom - Traa [from P.O.D.]
Armitage - Brad Pitt
Ratz - Vin Diesel
Lonny Zone - Snoop Dogg
Riviera - Orlando Bloom
Hideo - [that little asian guy that played The Keymaker]
Cass - Drew Barrymore
Neuromancer - ????????????

Allow me to change my mind...please.
Riviera - Leonardo DiCaprio

While I do think an anime version could be done better than a live version, I would have to say that my picks for the live version would have to be...

Director - Tim Burton (I think he could really pull off the heavy, dark feel of the book)
Case - Jhonny Depp
Molly - Angelina Jolie
Armitage - Jack Nickolson (If it weren't for his age I was thinking of saying Adam West)
Riveria - Matthew lillard (or maybe Owen Wilson)

Molly-looks like Kim Gordon (Sonic Youth) circa.1992, in my head.

I really couldn't say anything about a cast but a movie after one of William Gibson's books should defenetly be made and should have good actors.It's a totally different world which i must say i preffer to this one.

Personally, I could see Chris Elliott as Finn, too. Just a weird hunch of mine.

I saw a proposed screenplay of Neuromancer not too long ago. It sucked, plain and simple. I sure hope William retained the movie rights to at least some of his works.

Brand new to the board! My two cents on this is: I recently read an alleged draft of the NEUROMANCER script, written by Gibson himself and dated around 5/18/90, and I really hope it's a fake, because it seemed to do a grave disservice to the source material. However, both this questionable draft and the JOHNNY MNEMONIC movie seemed to suffer the same basic problem (studio interferece? Eight or nine unlisted screenwriters who never even read the story?): with Gibson, it's not so much the destination as it is the ride to get there. Both of these adaptions seemed to drop the "ride" aspect altogether: the great dialogue, the dense concept, the less-than-pristine protagonists, the scuzzy underbelly. Really, if you look at it, the story "Johnny Mnemonic" was an introduction to this whole genre-shattering universe, while the movie ... plays like a sequel to DEMOLITION MAN (in my opinion). It's like there were a bunch of guys standing around in a studio office, wringing their hands and going, "Okay, you think Bob Smith in Idaho's gonna get this? The guy's head's supposed to be a hard drive? The dolphin's a dope addict? Do the kids still like Dolph Lundgren? Maybe we should clean this up a bit ..."

What I really hope is, if they DO make the movie, they remember (or Gibson himself remembers!) to preserve the language and attitude that drew everybody to the story in the first place. You could easily adapt the novel verbatim and not drop much, if anything, and update the few things that would need changed (the concept of "cyberspace", as presented in the 1984 novel itself is really the only thing that comes to mind -- something Gibson himself would deftly update in VIRTUAL LIGHT, and probably the direction I'd take, if it were put to me!), while retaining all those great moments that made the novel such a mind-blowing read. Why not just have the Canadian government take care of their own and subsidize the cost of producing it there, take out the unnecessary Hollywood factor (believe me,as much as I get advised to emigrate there, or Europe, for a higher quality of movie work, I know it's at least possible!)? Oh ... and there's definitely ways to make "cyberspace" seem original, exciting and true to Gibson's vision without resorting to "Money For Nothing"-style graphics or by apeing the Wachowski Bros.'s "Neuromancer" ripoff (again, in my opinion). So much for a light-hearted first post ...

Regarding "That Neuromancer Script", there's a piece in the blog. I can certainly forgive anybody for not being able to find it, since only a few of us have access to the advanced search technology (*cough*OCD*cough*) necessary.

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THAT NEUROMANCER SCRIPT

I did not write that. (I'm assuming there is still only the one, which as far as I know is by Chuck Russell.) I had absolutely nothing to do with that. The problem is that shabby Dickensian script-floggers throw away the original title-page, forge one with my name on it, then charge more. This is an item I refuse to sign. (Though I have signed a few, bleeding heart that I am, when some poor sucker has stood in line for an hour or more; I sign them "I didn't write a word of this – WG.")

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Edit: I'm also pretty sure that the rights to Neuromancer are at least optioned-- that is, any film to be made of it is pretty much out of WG's hands unless the film maker asks for his help. But I'm too lazy to go looking for the proof.

Edit2: Welcome to the board! I hope you will not be offended by any low opinions I might express concerning a certain film starring Bruce Willis.

regarding film rights... I don't know why, but I thought, that after nothing became of the film project that resulted in the script talked about above, Gibson had the rights returned (either they had expired and the holders lost their retention or he managed to buy them back), because he seemed very involved in realizing a film project with Chris Cunningham; there was even a website up for awhile. I have seen many people talk about film rights for Neuromancer but have come to the conclusion nobody knows what the hell they are talking about, including me.

Other interesting observations about JM can be found under the thread of same name. I agree it would be fun to see a non-Hollywood version of Neuromancer. I don't think an update of cyberspace would be needed, chronologically I always figured Virtual Light happened before Neuromancer, so a film could retain the same hugeness as the novels. At this point there is no need really to justify anything from the novel in a technical way, it is what it is, and a lot of the fun (for me) would be lost in making such a large change.

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Originally posted by madevilbeats:
Universal, it certainly would be my intention to make the best possible version of Neuromancer that could be made.

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Myself as well; I just am sure that we differ as to whether or not the studio system would ever give us that...

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As I'm sure, in a democratic situation (and here we should go back to discussing such details in the democratic film making thread) there would be many many opinions as to the best way to do that, the end result might turn out to be a movie that pleased no one except a few fans, who marveled at their own brilliance in creating a 'to the letter' adaptation of a novel that no one else is going to bother watching.

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I'm not sure I agree; I think that the "ground rules" would belaid out and agreed to by Gibson, and, like any set of decision-rules governing a process or a group of people, would have to be adhered to. When you say 'no one else' is going to bother with such a film springing from such aprocess, are you talking about the type of commercial success enjoyed by other films? I think that NEUROMANCER, were we to bother to take it out of its book form in a democratic filmmaking process, might, in terms of alternative distribution models, outstrip the "success" of many other films, sci-fi or no, in terms of getting installed units in homes. Whether or not it matched the commercial success of other films in terms ofthe dollar amounts brought to various parties (beyond Gibson) may or may not be relevant, depending on the set of decision-rules...But I think that ALL KINDS of people would watch it; I'm not too sure that any other criteria, as honed and developed by the frame of the studio system, makes any sense to employ at all at this point. Hell, maybe NEUROMANCER can pioneer an entirely different form of visual and aural presentation of content, a real alternative to film...we don't know, nor do we have to know, at this point, to begin a democratic filmmaking alternative approach to the work.

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Perhaps you should face reality, that a film will have a potentially wider audience than a book.

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Seen in the light of dogmatic studio system thinking to which I allude above, you might see why I have move on from this statement, and marginalise to that place that will give us the same films, the same way, over ad disgustium...

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If your intention is to create a large scale movie to bring the story of Neuromancer to people who wouldn't otherwise ever be exposed to it because they don't read books, then there needs to be either a lot of money or a very singular viewpoint directing the film production to give it that slick cohesiveness people respond to.

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If you were part of this project, this limited approach would be your contribution, and it would be welcome. But I do't think for a moment that any aspect of the discussion would end here, at these dead ends that, again, point us back to conceptions of moving pictures of ideas that already exist, and already produce a healthy amount of garbage alongside the occasional moving work...

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Now I'm not saying it's not possible to produce something people like in a democratic situation. Just very unrealistic to assume so.

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It really seems as if you are trying to impose your own sense of the limitations of what can currently be done in the current studio system upon this concept, upon this approach; I'm simply saying that what's "real" right now is that there are all kinds of ways to conceieve of a project, and that the studio system, and whom it benefits, and what it does to work, is just one of many.

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If I fall back on the old ways of film creation it's because they are known to work.

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They are? What's the ratio of crap film production to solid film work, just on the studio system sole criteria of net profits alone?

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I understand the catalyst to the discussion of democratic process for film making was the LOTR movies, which, while maybe pissing off a handful of hardcore fans of the books, was by all other indications a slamdunk success, finacially, technologically and critically, making a ton of money and winning Oscars while pushing further the envelope of special effects.

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Well, again, making money and winning awards does not necessarily a classic film make. And if you know anyone in special effects, there wasn't much new in the field developed for LOTR; in fact, nearly all technologies employed on the film had been first used elsewhere; there was simply an economy of scale attached tothe project by New Line (AOL TW)'s cash infusion that allowed alot more of that technology to be employed alot more of the time.

So no, no real advancements of the field of effects in those trilogies. MASSIVE, the miniatures work, the foam modules on-set all came from other places, other minds, other projects.

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If your intention is not to be succesful in that way, then there is really nothing stopping you from creating your version of Neuromancer anyway. Gibson pretty much gave permission in a blog entry last year that as long as you were nonprofit, legal action would more than likely not be persued against small scale adaptations of his works by him. (Of course, if a studio already owns the rights for N., they are perfectly capable of honing in on you no matter what Gibson says.) Of course if you intend to profit from the film, it only makes sense to create it in a way that people are used to being fed their films: the large budget Hollywood or very stylistic independent visionary film.

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This is an interesting point, but wholly tangential to what I'm talking about; at this point, no option, no direction, need be cut off from discussion, including the notion of coming to some profit arrangement regarding the work that goes beyond some amount for WG, after which it could be about the work, for the work's sake... by the way, do you have any examples of films that were not driven by the profit center model that, because they precisely lacked that incentive, resulted in bad films?

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Yes, I assume a lot, but so far I have seen nothing concrete in your theory to persuade me I should think a production of N. should be made democratically. I offered up my own theories on how the process could work in a practical manner in that thread, but finally came to the conclusions that a) no one is really interested enough in the idea to participate and b) the resulting film probably wouldn't meet most of the participants expectations.

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Your thinking is interesting, and I appreciate your input; but what is important is not whether or not, given five posts on Google Groups and here, the idea of democratic filmmaking has "taken off," but rather how we might begin to, democratically, include more and more people in the discussion.

...no, No, NO Leonardo DiCaprio.

Just no. Please.

I have trouble seeing Johnny Depp as Case, he's just not right...

I think Jude Law and Jonny Lee Miller could work better... not sure what it is about them, but they fit better.

I don't have a good suggestion for who he could be... it's hard... but he really has to look like an everyman...

Jude Law? C'mon! He's too...clean...remeber, Case is a burn out when the book starts, and Jude Law is well...clean!

And no, not DiCaprio either...someone with a little more grit. Like Clive Owen.

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Originally posted by The 16th Spider:
Jude Law? C'mon! He's too...clean...remeber, Case is a burn out when the book starts, and Jude Law is well...clean!

And no, not DiCaprio either...someone with a little more grit. Like Clive Owen.

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Did you ever see "Road to Perdition". Jude Law was *not* too clean in that film. He's really amazing in it, largely because of the transformation he undergoes to become scum. And he's a good actor to boot.

My current pick for Case would be Adrien Brody. He's capable (while always looking like himself) of wearing many different hats, appearance-wise, and a damn fine actor to boot. Basing decisions on looks alone seems to be prevelant on this thread, doesn't anyone care about depth anymore?

universal - i'm replying to your post that was an answer to madevilbeats, since that's my old moniker.

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I just am sure that we differ as to whether or not the studio system would ever give us that...

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Well, I have no doubts a studio could screw up a movie version. It's really that we differ as to whether a 'democratic' system would be any better.

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I think that NEUROMANCER, were we to bother to take it out of its book form in a democratic filmmaking process, might, in terms of alternative distribution models, outstrip the "success" of many other films, sci-fi or no, in terms of getting installed units in homes.

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That would have to be one hell of an alternative distribution model. Care to share it with the rest of us?

It's not that I don't think fans would be interested, it's just that I don't know that there are that many fans. Awhile ago I had to take one of those mass media classes, and Neuromancer was on the required reading list. The main complaint from the class was how difficult it was to understand the terminology Gibson used. These are college level readers, not stupid people by any means, but perhaps the majority of WGB members are higher than average intelligence, and we just can't see the obstacles involved for a lot of people. Mainly I am basing interest on how many people have bothered to join up for the WGB, it's only a few thousand after 2 years. In contrast a local rave message board for the city of Houston party people started a few months ago already has something like five thousand registered users. So when I talk about 'no one else' watching the movie, I am referring to this nonscientific numbers reasoning. It suggests to me that more people in one city are more interested in dancing in night clubs than the world population is interested in the works of William Gibson, Neuromancer being the most popular book. I do not think commercial success is a necessity, but cultural success, ie, reaching a mass audience would be nice. Otherwise I think you will have the scenario I outlined, where a few fans please themselves.

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It really seems as if you are trying to impose your own sense of the limitations of what can currently be done in the current studio system upon this concept, upon this approach...

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You seem to be the one imposing limitations, but I don't mean this to be an accusation. I am willing to listen to ideas about doing things different. If I seem a bit rude or crude it's only because the discussion is moving along so slowly. If we were actually working on a movie, things need to be done in a timely manner. If we were working on some sort of uberwebsite, things would need to be completed on a timely basis. If we were out spending money, you can be sure the people investing in the project would want to see indicators of progress being made. This is not a factor of studio imposition, it's simply business. Another reason to move quickly is the fact that when you buy the rights to do a film version of a novel, usually the contract is for a set time. If you don't go into production of the film within that time frame, you lose the contract! That is simply how they've been doing business in the entertainment industry for decades. At the rate of discussion we are having (it took about 2 months for your reply to my last post on this subject, and I have never seen any comments about my postings in the original thread) it won't matter how we approach making the film, we'll lose the rights to film it long before we even think about what type of film stock to use, or what DV format to choose from.

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What's the ratio of crap film production to solid film work, just on the studio system sole criteria of net profits alone?

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I have no idea, but as I said above, my criteria is not based soley on net profits. I'm sure for every story that gets published there are hundreds more that get filed in the circular cabinet. What is different about film production, is the cost involved in creating a piece of media. So there is more incentive for Hollywood to recoup their initial investments and simply present their crap along with their gems in the hopes some sucker will pay for it. And there is a long history of people paying for crap from Hollywood, so why would they ever change their business model unless it stopped working for them?

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So no, no real advancements of the field of effects in those trilogies.

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At the time the movies were conceived of, and the technology was demonstrated to the studio, that amount of effects work had not been attempted, nor had we seen such a large integration of the various fields. Just the use of AI for the massive battle scene CGI renderings was pretty significant in my opinion. If you can name other movies that utilized that particular type of effect technology prior to LOTR, please enlighten me. Advancement is not simply coming up with new technology, it also includes using existing things in ways no one else has done yet.

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...This is an interesting point, but wholly tangential to what I'm talking about; at this point, no option, no direction, need be cut off from discussion, including the notion of coming to some profit arrangement regarding the work that goes beyond some amount for WG, after which it could be about the work, for the work's sake... by the way, do you have any examples of films that were not driven by the profit center model that, because they precisely lacked that incentive, resulted in bad films?

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Well, I'm not sure what you are after. You seem to want to make money off the production of whatever media, while saying the traditional models for creating a movie aren't really worthy of discussion, but other than saying how nice it would be to have an alternative you avoid any concrete reality based examples of how that could be achieved. When I suggest an alternative means of creation that doesn't involve profit, you seem uninterested. Just because you have posted profusely about the subject and naysayed everyone else's opinions does not mean you have made viable suggestions yourself. I cannot truly answer your question since I do not have a list of movies based on what the people were thinking when they made the films. The closest example of people doing movies they loved and not simply for profit which turn out bad as publicly perceived would be most of the works of Ed Wood. I do not think you will find many people willing to admit they made a bad movie, especially when they put their heart and soul into it and were not simply going through the motions to receive a paycheck. I can also say that at the student level I have seen many works produced which the people involved were very passionate about, but simply would be laughed at by most people outside the classroom. Good or bad is a relative thing in film.

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...how we might begin to, democratically, include more and more people in the discussion.

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Good idea. I still think there are not many people interested in the notion. A good thing about democracy is anyone should be aable to have their say. Thanks to the message board, anyone CAN have their say. Nobody else seems to be talking. I think a big step in the right direction would be shortening the length of these posts, and then more people might bother reading them.