Blackballed
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jhill804 — 11 years ago(November 16, 2014 03:10 PM)
It's amazing reading everything in this thread about the business side of Hollywood.
For me, as a regular guy/movie fan, Big Trouble in Little China, Escape from New York, The Thing and They Live were all huge successes and Vampires, on the other hand, is just one of a very long list of movies I honestly have no desire to see again.
Surprised to hear Vampires was considered a success by "Hollywood standards." But, then again, maybe that explains why Hollywood has steadily devolved into a gelatinous mass of uninspired rehashes. -
MrHooba — 11 years ago(March 19, 2015 10:57 PM)
Carpenter had a really good run from 1976 to 1988. He made nine exceptional films and two disappointments (the Fog and Prince of Darkness). Since then he has made one really good film (Mouth of Madness) and one fun flick (Escape From LA). It's hard to keep crank out consistently good films. His legacy is safe with his good films.
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andybob-3 — 11 years ago(March 25, 2015 10:09 AM)
Personally I think In the Mouth of Madness was brilliant, extremely under appreciated and one of the top reality-bender movies ever made, but after that I've lost faith in his ability (or desire) to tell the difference between a good and bad script. In my opinion Escape from LA was a tired, almost childish recycling of gimmicks from the first one, the casting of James Woods in Vampires was that film's only asset, and Ghosts of Mars was just plain awful.
I haven't gotten around to seeing The Ward yet, frankly I've been a little reluctant to, but hopefully I'll see a bit more of the Halloween/Fog/The Thing John Carpenter we all grew up with. -
joeyrenard — 11 years ago(March 26, 2015 02:47 AM)
New here
Sorry if what I am about to say does not fit in exactly with the line of thought for this thread, but I need to get my message out loud & clear !
"The Thing" (1982) is not only Carpenter's masterpiece,
it is the absolute penultimate sci-fi and/or horror film ever produced.
If it wasn't for Carpenter's genius, the 2011 (planet-shaking) prequel would not have been conceived.
This is a trilogy in the making.
The 3rd and final piece of the sequence must be made !
I demand a finale !
So should you ! -
MisterWhiplash — 11 years ago(April 04, 2015 08:49 AM)
He worked relatively steadily until Ghosts of Mars. Since then it's only been the two episodes for Masters of Horror - one of them was exceptional, the other was OK - and The Ward, which I didn't think was THAT bad, just not up to the standards of his better work.
It's probably tough to work in an industry that is now more concerned with repackaging the stuff he made - which itself was sort of repackaged anyway (Escape from NY and The Fog are basically horror/Western genre films with a bent, though Hollywood isn't anywhere near that creative), so we get The Fog (2005), The Thing (2011), and an "in-the-works" Escape from NY that hasn't happened yet but could any day once the bean-counters are done. And of course Halloween, but that's a franchise unto itself.
It'd be nice if he could get the keys to a really GOOD script, since it seems like he's not really writing for himself much anymore - but perhaps time has passed him. Luckily there are some good horror films in his spirit coming out, like It Follows. But it must be tough when genres are over-crowded with crap that's meant more for over-seas than the US.
As for They Live, that was actually #1 at the box-office. I suspect the failure of Memoirs of an Invisible Man and whatever else followed were what really did it, and maybe not being what Hollywood sees as a "team-player" (if the other films - Madness, LA, Vampires, Mars - were successful it was really overseas, I think I was the only one in the theater to see Vampires and Mars opening weekend back in the day) - same deal happened with George Romero.
My official blog:
http://cinetarium.blogspot.com/ -
alesisqs61 — 9 years ago(September 19, 2016 03:12 AM)
I think he's pretty much done directing. I've read he's going to help the creators of the "new" Halloween to make it "good" but that's about all I've heard.
He should direct the last Halloween , then retire officially. I mean he's old, makes 1 movie in 9 years. then 2 shows one of them sucked hard IMO Pro Life wow I thought it was so beneath him. The other one was good thoughstyle and everything was solid.
The Ward didn't really feel like classic Carpenter to me. He's old school and it felt way to "new" school to me. He should have done the music a lot of his style goes very well with his old school music style at least with Alan Howarth. His new album I enjoyed 2 tracks.
I mean that man has had a crazy career early success later in life not so much. Doesn't mean much to him as he has admitted he's lazy, directing is hard. Can't argue about that
http://www.youtube.com/user/alphazoom
https://soundcloud.com/#carjet-penhorn