jetboy wrote:Well I think you have to bring in the part of my post that says, "It deserved to be the sole version of the story for awhile". This is the crux of my argument. Its more about respecting the original movie than it is about making all these different things more relevant for different cultures.
Nothing "deserves" to be the "sole version" of anything irrespective of span of time. This isn't argument, it's not even opinion, it's sentiment, and it is not universally shared.
jetboy wrote:Catering to Americans who are willfully ignorant is not a good enough reason to disrespect the original. If they want to be ignorant, let them be ignorant.
Yes, let them, if that's what they want. Still and all, if you slam the door on LMI, you slam a gateway to LTROI for those who've seen the re-imagining and might be interested enough to want to see its original. LMI did not do well in the US; the movie screened for only a single week in my area, and not in a theater less than an hour's drive away. The DVD was available at Walmart for all of maybe two months. If you want to buy it now, it's time for Amazon, Ebay or just
maybe the FYE an hour's drive in the opposite direction. In the US, the movie is dead and buried. It won't be "discovered" easily by anybody anytime soon, its very existence won't even be suspected.
So, the question is: your love, is it for the story, or is it just for a particular telling of it?
jetboy wrote:As I said also, LTROI was made for people of all different cultures.
It was made by a Swedish director from a script written by the story's original Swedish author. I get the impression the target audience had originally been intended just to be European, chiefly Scandinavian. I err? If so, produce links.
jetboy wrote:Nobody would have known that the bullies werent as extreme as they could have been. Nobody, as far as I can remember, ever said "I'd like this movie if the bullies were meaner" before LMI came out. Quite the contrary, they were depicted as the real monsters in the movie. Now it seems to be a weakness in LTROI, which I find laughable but sad.
It's not a weakness, it's a difference in focus. LTROI stated: "Oskar was bullied." It said a lot of things about Oskar without dwelling on them. The net effect was mostly of giving the kids a backdrop to operate against and develop a relationship within. LMI's backdrop is more horrific. That's OK; so is Abby.
jetboy wrote:As for modern times, the only reason that LTROI was set in the eighties (but was downplayed in the movie to good effect) was because of the personal connection to JA Lindqvist. It had alot to do with the socialist environment and these plastic buildings they were putting up like they were going out of style and how that whole atmosphere brought a certain lethargy (how these adults could go so long without working) that seemed to be passed on to the kids. Sweden in the eighties was the catalyst for the whole story.
I'm still pondering the significance of maintaining the 80's in LMI. It seems to have religious and political implications, with some considerable economic influence. I wonder what it means that Owen meets his personal goddess just a short drive away from where Oppenheimer mourned over a newly glassed over desert and his new identity as Death, the destroyer of worlds.
jetboy wrote:USA in the eighties had nothing to do with the eighties in Sweden. The themes though, that of love, are universal so it really doesnt matter what era you put the movie in because it will be relevant.
And it doesn't really matter what country you put the story into... but LMI isn't really LTROI, is it? It's very similar, but it's not exactly the same.
Did not Lindqvist say he felt blessed having
two movies made from his novel? Did he not say he'd been pleased with LMI?
So, what is the basic [BEEP] problem here?