f13.net

Stephen Speilberg, Harrison Ford, and the guy from Bond (and not Indiana Jones).

http://movies.yahoo.com/feature/cowboys-and-aliens.html

Spielberg's only producing. Jon Favreau is at the helm.

/pedant

I am all over this movie.

Looks like fun

Looks awesome. 

I really appreciate movies that tell stories in different settings.  I recently watched Sean Connery's Outland on Netflix and had a strong appreciation for that movie too.  It's a simple detective story set in a scifi environment, which is why I like Blade Runner too.  Anyways, can't wait.

As long as they don't let Lucas within 15 miles of this...

This looks awesome but they could have done the entire movie with cardboard box cutout sets and I'd still watch it just because it has Olivia Wilde in it and I'm weak.

My guess is that it was originally titled something else, but Harrison ford told them "Fuck you, my career still hasn't recovered from goddamn Indiana Jones and the alien invaders, if this movie is going to have aliens in it, they had better be in the fucking title instead of a horrible but unsurprising reveal in the middle of the movie"

Hence, Cowboys Vs. Aliens

(http://eplay.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/2008/10/09/southparkindy2.jpg)

Spielberg isn't the Producer -- he's an Executive Producer. Brian Grazer and Ron Howard are the Producers.

Sweet.

Could be great. Could also be high-concept sounded-good-at-the-pitch-meeting poop.

The pitch meeting probably went

"Hey, there's this really good graphic novel called 'Cowboys vs Aliens' that came out a few years ago and we should totally make a movie out of it."

Yes, because great high-concept graphic novels have a consistent record of turning into fantastic movies.

That's the Spirit!

It's based on a graphic novel that was called "Cowboys vs. Aliens." No Ford prima donna shit needed.

Outland is basically a space version of a Western called High Noon I believe. It's also a great Connery movie.

Very good!  :awesome_for_real:

Daniel Craig  :heart:.

Ford's one major line in there ("I want that man... and I want him now!") was a little  :awesome_for_real: but all the top talent on this thing combined with a very popcorn movie concept means this is going to make assloads of money.

Bastard.  As I scrolled down, I'd hoped I would be the smartarse.  Even though most on the board are aware, of course.

 :heartbreak:

I like the title, very straight forward.  Like "Snakes On A Plane".

And Ford's career is spiraling down.  Only playing Han would help him now since they casually abused Indy.

Dude's made his money. Whatever motivation he has for playing movie roles is anyone's guess though. If he's still like he was in his Star Wars days, then he's picking them for his personal reasons and not for any other factor, but what those reasons are now is a bit more questionable than "I only do good, intelligent roles."

I'm going to enjoy him here because it'll be Harrison Ford and not Indiana Jones, Han Solo, Deckard, etc...

I'd say the factors are Alimony's due and Calista needs more diuretics.  But I'm an asshole.

Harrison Ford is a terrible actor. Olivia Wilde is a terrible actress. I like Daniel Craig, but most of that is because I think his bond is slightly better than Cean Connery's.

Sooooo... two terrible actors with the range of boat anchors and what looks like a stupid as shit plot. The one possible saving grace of the whole thing, the aliens, look like they'll be kept off camera for as much as possible. All that combined with the fact it looks like they're taking the shit plot seriously means this is going to be Skyline sort of bad. Seriously, this thing is a holodeck episode but with shittier actors.

I don't tune into watching Olivia for the acting skills, but hey that's just me.  :grin:

Damn Bob, are you off your meds again? It looks like a fun movie. I'm a fan of some Westerns (Generally anything with Clint Eastwood or the more modern take on Westerns) and SciFi so I look at this movie and see "fun". You apparently look at it and see shit.

Bob looks at the entire world and sees "shit" though.

I guess I'm the only one who sees the "angry" in his handle?  :oh_i_see:

Dunno I agree with bob.  I actually posted it because I thought it looked hilariously bad, skyline's trailers looked more interesting and thought out than this.  The acting alone in the trailer looked bad, and it looks like the transition from cowboy stuff and aliens is going to be heavily disjointed (at least it does in the trailer)

I don't really get how people can dismiss skyline and such (based only off the trailers), but see this as "This is going to be amazingly fun".

Daniel Craig, Harrison Ford, Olivia Wilde, with Grazer and Speliberg behind the scenes, based on a story that was apparently a graphic novel, and isn't out to be taken seriously but out to entertain us with awesome.

Sorry I just need more Daniel Craig as badass in my life.

Skyline looked like a generic aliens attack movie, with no budget for CGI, from the trailer.  This looks like cowboys having shootouts with aliens.  Which looks like good pulpy fun.  I don't see how you can compare the two trailers at all.

Saw it. Liked it a lot. Craig playing the taciturn badass is nothing new and he does it as well as he does anywhere else. Ford's character is much more nuanced than I thought he'd be and well... Olivia Wilde.

Estimated $36.2 millon opening, tied with Smurfs until they finish counting every last dollar, on a $163 million budget. Ouch.

Was ok.

EDIT: Skyline was much cooler.

You be trippin'

So according to an intervew with Favreau I heard on NPR this is supposed to closely follow the old school western formula and just replace "Indians" with "Aliens" (get it. ha.)  How'd it do on that front?

I'm surprised it even tied Smurfs, since Smurfs is a Family movie and this just looked too out there for folks to glom on to.

Smurfs was some derpydoo shit starring a TV actor, C&A was a $160 million would-be blockbuster. This is not good news for them.

We had a rare weekend without the kid, so we went to the movies to see HP7-2, had to wait 90 minutes for the next one and just said 'fuck it'.  We rarely go to the movies anymore because of, well, the other people.  I just find movie going to be a challenging experience anymore.  Don't fuck with your phone, don't bring a 1yr old to an R rated flick and don't fucking talk during it.  I don't understand why that's so difficult.

Anyways, every single person coming in the theatre was going to see Smurfs, and my kid saw it with the grandparents, too.  I liked the look of C&A, but I'll have to catch it on Netflix in a year now.  Along with HP7.5 now. 

I'm boggled it cost $160mil to make. There was some great CG in there but the set pieces were smaller and in less scale then say Deadwood, everything was framed close and not a huge amount of extra's.

Oh well, really enjoyed it. After 5mins of Skyline I wanted every character to die a horrible gruesome death, the characters in C&A actually had some thought behind them.

The weirdest Cowboys & Aliens tie-in. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71YsRO6G7Ks)

Freddie Wong is famous for his zero-budget special effects spectaculars. Functionally he (and the stuntmen involved) are advertising their own Hollywood businesses. Watch the making-of (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRLUY6dMF8k) linked at the end of the clip for a clue on why it costs $160 million to make movies for a studio.

100%  agreed. Everything Sucker Punch was not, a really really good guys summer action blockbuster.
Indians, cowboys and fucking aliens!

Harrison Ford was awesome!  :grin:

Isn't it funny how everytime I hear some variation of "Cowboys, ninjas, and zombies in the same movie? What more could you want?!" coming from some geek, the movie in question ends up being a giant (http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=warriorsway.htm) fucking (http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=suckerpunch.htm) flop (http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=cowboysandaliens.htm)? It's almost like everyone isn't six years old.

Because its only a good idea until you have to actually shell out cash to see it.  I'd totally see this movie for free.

Saw it this weekend.  The GF liked it, but I was pretty underwhelmed by it. 

Its worth the cash.

Because nerds get excited over the, "Wouldn't it be awesome if..." and are then dismayed when it isn't. We drown in our own in-jokes.

"Cowboys and Aliens" deserves to flop on the grounds it was the most cynically designed idea - it pretty much was written based on a fake movie poster and then the system gamed so that the IP owner got a pay day.

Says the guy that didn't see it.

Me seeing it or not (and it doesn't open in Australia until the 18th anyway) doesn't change the truth about what I said.

Doesn't change the truth, but it doesn't make you right either.

With a title like Cowboys and Aliens, one would not expect some serious attempt at being a western. That's why I did not find it very likeable. It was also a bad western, but they hit all the "must have scenes" even if it was completely retarded to do so ( looking at you, jump on space ship guy ).

As a western, it was one of the most cookie cutter westerns I have ever seen. As a sci-fi flick, its was just lacking.

Skyline WAS a better movie if you like Sci-Fi ( Even campy sci-fi ).

I love science fiction, Skyiine was lacking in so many ways in that category. It was an SFX movie with no soul.

I didn't like Cowboys and Aliens, but to compare it to Skyline is a bit low.  Cowboys and Aliens was a bit dull and too by the numbers, but I didn't regret seeing it or anything.  I watched Skyline for free at a friend's house, and still managed to feel ripped off. 

From the Farverau interview, you can blame that particular flaw right on Stepen Spielberg's shoulders.  He had a meeting and lectured Farverau and the writers on all the necessary plot points, character arcs and inclusions in a western, and listed that one specifically.

Steve is apparently a REALLY BIG western fan.  Look at this as another piece of fan-fiction but with a really huge budget.

Err, isn't this a film adaptation of a comic book that came out several years back?

^ This. ^

Skyline was a fun romp with some great visuals and action, I also really liked the ending. Who said sci-fi needed a soul?

The movie has actually been in development since the late 90s.

Ah, interesting, just read the wiki.  So they came up with the idea of the graphic novel, then pitched it for a movie as well.  Both projects went forward, but the film got canned.  The comic came out in 2006, and then the rights to the movie where bought by another studio, who then adapted the comic into the film we have now.  Crazy.

Also, Robert Downey Jr. almost stared in it, heh.

I think this is a key point: if you do a genre mash-up, you can't have the product be a lesser example of BOTH genres. It's got to be a beautiful hybrid in its own right, a weird thing. Firefly and Wild, Wild West (series, NOT movie) would be good examples of Western-SF mashups that were quirky enough in their own right to achieve escape velocity.

So when does Dinosaurs vs Ninjas come out?   :why_so_serious:

Kinda sorta. (http://www.bleedingcool.com/2011/07/29/the-secret-story-behind-cowboys-and-aliens/) It was almost a pure pitch until the movie entered development hell, then the author gamed the system to get a 'best selling graphic novel' that in turn got the movie back on track.

Don't forget Adventures of Brisco County, Jr.!

Oh hella yeah. There's a show that really deserved more seasons.

The guys who love that stuff are a relatively small part of the populace and also increasingly relatively picky. Sure, they forgive some things because they're sacred cows to them (transformers, star wars) but are quite picky about non-IP movies.

I enjoyed this movie on Saturday, but it had a few issues so I see why it didn't do better.  I got excited at first that Harrison Ford was going to be a nasty character, but then, of course, that couldn't happen...

Woah. I never realized the Wild Wild West series was a mash-up. I guess I was too young to notice. Now after reading about it, I kinda wanna see it....

WAT


WAT

Skyline was an inexcusable, wholly derivative and utterly umeritable anal leak of sci-fi. It wasn't even camp. It didn't have the wits to be camp. Calling it soulless would be entirely redundant; it was a quick flash cash-in by a couple of FX nerds with absolutely no fucking idea how to make a movie during production down-time on another shit-house sci-fi blockbuster (Battle: Los Angeles). Skyline currently ranks at #1 on my list of the 5 worst sci-fi/fantasy movies I've paid to see:

1: Skyline
2: Chronicles of Riddick
3: Aliens vs Predator
4: Dungeons & Dragons
5: Daybreakers

with a special mention for Mutant Chronicles, which while I actually marginally enjoyed, still made me want my money back.

Oh, and the post I actually meant to write before I had an opinion freakout;

Really rather liked Cowboys and Aliens. It was hokey, and it was ok with that, and went with it. It's very much a hybrid movie so expecting the best of both genres present was always going to lead to disappointment; that said I was cautious going in and felt that Favreau did a good job of easing me in with the nice, gritty intro scene and the classic western build-up.

Daniel Craig is really fucking intense throughout the whole film. If it was another actor I don't think I could have taken the character remotely seriously but Craig has such an assuredness about him that he lets the comedy of the situations roll around him without demeaning the character. It's pretty much as if every one of the townsfolk understand how crazy the situation is but flocks around the rock of Jake.

As others have said in this thread, I could have done without the jumping-on-the-alien-jet beat, but knowing it's a Speilberg-suggested trope I can let it slide a little.

Also, Clancy Brown. CLANCY BROWN. More films need Clancy Brown.


and more naked Olivia Wilde.

Yes. Watch The Burrowers. It's a mediocre creature feature (and a western) but he's in it and raises overall quality of film.

Also, he should have been Judge Dredd (and I will continue to say that every time his name comes up in conversation.)

Just don't try to steal his burger formula.

Saw this one on DVD over the weekend. I enjoyed it. It was just about as deep and engaging as I expect a movie named "Cowboys & Aliens" to be. Harrison Ford's character was really the only character with any depth and he played it well. Everyone else was interchangeable for the most part, which was a bit of a shame because a talent like Sam Rockwell is kind of wasted on this character. It's not necessarily rewatchable, but it's a good way to spend 90 minutes or so.