Celluloid speculation and other such irrelevance

With Hollywood set on purposefully raising and dashing our hopes and memories of all things good, with a never ending crescendo of ill advised adaptations, remakes and belated sequels. It is difficult to muster excitement when the prospect of yet another beloved childhood programme being exhumed, butchered and handed over to Shia La Bouf.
Difficult, but not impossible.

There is a part inside all of us, even the most cynical, that leaps a little when we hear about an old show or movie or even toy line that is being altered into a potential summer blockbuster. It is usually swiftly followed by disappointment, apathy and regret, but then again so is sex, but that doesn’t mean that we will all become celibate for fear of evoking these feelings.

We were all excited when we saw the Transformers trailer; we were all excited when we saw the new Indiana Jones trailer (Both vehicles of the omnipresent La Bouf) however your take on the finished product may be. If there is one thing that movies have utilised the internet for, to their considerable advantage, is pre release excitement. A trailer can now be up eighteen months before the movie in question is released. It seems that we are finding out in advance about movies oftentimes sooner than some of the parties involved. Well, maybe not quite, but you get the idea.

So, June 12th 2009. A little over one year away. Why is this important? It quite possibly, will not be important, however, it will most definitely have a few people’s interest as it is the proposed release date for the A-Team movie.

Yes, indeed, they are making an A-Team movie. Should we get excited, the answer is simply, I don’t know. It breaks down as follows; John Singleton will be directing. “But I like John Singleton, he made Boyz N The Hood and Higher Learning and they were great movies” you may well cry and this is true, though Boyz N The Hood was made in 1991 and Higher Learning in ’95. He has also been responsible for such questionable offerings as Poetic Justice and Shaft 2000. Not to mention, more recently, Four Brothers and 2 Fast 2 Furious.

In fact, he seems to have had such a good time making 2 Fast 2 Furious, that he has decided to give the scriptwriter some follow up work by allowing him to pen his latest project. First major script news is that they are Iraq war veterans, desperate to clear their names after they are accused of a crime that they didn’t commit. So, who has been allocated for the all important roles? Three names are currently attached to the project.

Howling Mad Murdoch – Woody Harrelson
BA Baracus – Ice Cube
Hannibal Smith – Bruce Willis

Make of this what you will. It is important to remember that the A-Team was a very tongue in cheek show, there was a playfulness to it that could easily be lost if condensed into a new format, with a restricted running time. Silliness could be assisted in it’s new guise, albeit unintentionally, by the sheer lack of intimidation posed by “Are we there yet? and Are we done yet’s.” Ice Cube as BA.

There is a possibility that this project, a quarter of a century after the show began, may be a little too late. The names associated would have garnered a very different reaction had this project been announced ten years ago. It feels almost as if this is being made because there are less and less shows that have remained untouched and so, it’s just the next in a long line of movies cashing in on our own misplaced nostalgia.

Was it the show that we loved, or were we were when we watched it? The age that we associate with it? Who we watched it with? Maybe the reason that so many of these adaptations and modern versions seem so misplaced because they are missing the point. There is a strong possibility, that as we hold so many things dear to us throughout our childhoods that to see them disfigured, modernised and mishandled leaves us colder than just seeing a bad movie.

Harrelson as Murdoch is a damn good choice though.

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