Quote Originally Posted by MacMillan of Rathdown View Post
Anything is possible in Hollywood, but in the scenario you've described who is going to play Mad Jack? Forget the script for a moment and concentrate on the lead actor. You need a Scot (or at least a Brit who can play a Scot) who can open a non-franchise move world wide. Right now there doesn't seem to be a British actor who has the box office draw of a Tom Hanks or Tom Cruise (and Cruise's WWII yawner Valkyre didn't exactly set box offices on fire).

And the Script. Mad Jack had a multi-decade career-- what are you going to focus on? What is the subplot? Where is Gweneth Paltrow in all of this?

Everyone can pick holes in Braveheart because to tell the story Randy Wallace played fast and loose with history. That the picture got made at all is down to Wallace's ability to get his script into the hands of the one guy who could afford to produce it-- actor, director, producer, Mel Gibson.

When it comes down to it, unless you have a franchise, like Fast and Furious or Star Trek studios don't like to take chances on pictures costing more than $100,000,000.00.

After all, they aren't the Federal Government.
Spot on, Rathdown. As much as I'd love to see a movie about Mad Jack (who was born in Hong Kong to English parents), I just don't see it happening -- now a documentary I can see. Give the History Channel enough time, and they might just pick up on it. I'd much rather see a well done docuementary then a poorly made feature film anyday.

Of course, we can give Hollywood credit for a very good movie such The Great Raid, which was about 80-90% accurate, and did look to historians who had researched and written books about the subject as advisers.

Regards,

Todd