Re: Best Sci-fi films never made

In article <6PCdnfybjNIr6q3VnZ2dnUVZ_rTinZ2d@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>,
Petrea Mitchell  <pravn@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>At Mon, 12 May 2008 19:14:28 -0700 (PDT),
>zonker <rahman70810@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> strode forth and proclaimed:
>
>> What sci fi movie would you like to see made? based on a book, TV show
>> or just your own idea. Uller uprising by H. Beam Piper. I would love
>> to see that. maybe i
>> will have to make it myself.
>
>Leaning over toward fantasy, I wanna see someone try adapting
>_Ruddigore_ again, now that special effects are finally capable of doing
>justice to the ghost scene.

I saw a cartoon _Ruddigore_ on the tube once that did rather
well.  Not only did we see the ancestors flying over castle and
churchyard as they sang "The Ghosts' High Noon," but every time
Mad Margaret relapsed her hair would go flying wildly out of
control, only to retreat smoothly back into its chignon at the
stroke of Basingstoke.

If I were directing a filmed version of _Ruddigore_, when Richard
started singing "I ****pped, d'ye see, in a Revenue sloop" we
would cut to a shot of the little Revenue sloop out at sea, and
as Richard sang his tall tale we would see what *really*
happened, with the sloop running away with her tail between her
legs and the darned Mounseers laughing and (could we but hear
them) making remarks about elderberries.

>
>(It's been done once, in 1983, in a PBS TV production that was made in
>one week and looks it. They got Vincent Price to play Sir Despard,
>unfortunately proving in the process that while you don't need career
>opera singers to do G&S, you do have to get people with a certain
>minimum amount of singing ability. It's available on DVD, but I only
>recommend it to really committed G&S fans.)

Well, what I wish I could get hold of is an old Met production of
_La Perichole_ with Cyril Richard as the Viceroy.  During the
overture they had a scene of the busy market in Lima, with the
Viceroy (for plot purposes) disguised as a peasant and riding a
donkey.  He beckoned one of his minions (also suitably disguised)
to his side and stage-whispered, "Do you know that this is the
first time the Metropolitan Opera Company has hired a singer IN
SPITE OF his voice?"

And Rex Harrison couldn't sing at all; he did _My Fair Lady_
entirely parlato.
>
>I'd like to see someone try _A Bridge of Birds_ and its sequels in the
>anime style, as long as they'd be willing to generally stick to the plot
>(by which I mean, keep it the hell away from the Miyazakis).

Amen.  Trouble is, _Bridge_ is so *long.*  They'd either have to
cut it beyond comprehensibility or make it longer than _The Ten
Commandments_.

Dorothy J. Heydt
Vallejo, California
djheydt@[EMAIL PROTECTED]