John Carter

[brian nordstrom]

Hi , I got the DVD called " John Carter " out the other night , you know the Disney new reliese , ;) come on you all must be interested as to what its like ..?
Well its science sux .:shrug:, but apart from that its a really entertaining movie , with great EFX , cool monsters and aliens , I could not ask for more , :thumbsup:.
I liked it .
Oh yea its a kids kind of movie .
Has anyone else seen it yet ?
Brian.

[leon]

Cant say I have Brian, glad you enjoyed it mate.

Leon

[JohnOS]

We watched it last week on DVD. l was not sure what to expect but l was very surprised to view a really fun family movie.
As Brian said a kids kind of movie but lots of entertainment for all ages.

John

[omegacrux]

I liked the dog thing , ZOOM !

David

[Jeffkop]

Saw it at the cinema months ago ... thoroughly enjoyed it ... thought they put it together pretty well, mixing the west with space .. ending was great too .. a twist I wasnt expecting.

[brian nordstrom]

:D Yea couldnt that , strange ? doggy,? thinggy ? , zoom alright , I liked him as well . He was cool with a big heart .
What a mate to have .
Brian.

[Paul Haese]

It was ok and effects were good but I wonder how many of the series will be made. Edgar rice Burroughs wrote a lot of books about Barsoom and John Carter was one of the characters.

As to the movie it was a little lacking in story depth but overall entertaining.

[brian nordstrom]

:D The more the merryier , thats a Barsoom saying . ;).
Brian.

[Profiler]

The name of the "dog-thing" is Woola and in the Barsoom tongue is a 'callot' (martian dog). It is John Carter's loyal companion/pet after he saves it from being bludgeoned to death by a white ape - actually Woola rescues JC first and then he can't turn his back on the creature which went to rescue him in the first place. (This information comes from the books not the movie)

Wow - this is somewhat embarrassing but the ERB martian chronicles were the first books I read and re-read when I was 12 or 13 yo and really loved them. ERB is internationally famous for Tarzan but IMHO the martian stories are far superior. The irony is that so much of contemporary sci-fi is heavily derivative of ERB and the Martian stories. Tattoween and the whole sand cruiser battles in return of the jedi are essentially the flyers, planet and battles from the John Carter books. The 'speeder bikes' in Ewok land from ROJ are also straight out of JC. Jedi fighting with swords and super strong able to jump and dodge all over the place - or the fiesty head strong space princess who can fight, lead and be a love interest princess deja thoris - oops I meant Princes lea - all JC once again written in 1912. Suffice to say George Lucas is heavily indebted to the non-litigeous nature of ERB's estate,

For almost 3 decades Hollywood has been talking and trying to make a JC film and largely limited by the special effects. The big problem being how to make the 15 foot high four armed sword fighting green martians come to life (when shrunk are also known as 'Sand people' in lucas land). Both James Cameron and Ridley Scott had both expressed interest in trying to make a JC film over the decades. Sadly the film is regarded as a failure because while they recouped their money it didn't make a spectacular profit as the producers had hoped and hence it is unlikely there will be another one. :(

[Blue Skies]

Yes, we need to remember this and that the story was written 100 years ago. I kept that in mind as I watched it was was just happy to watch the story unfold, simple as it might have seemed. I thought they did a good job getting Mars looking as we know it is today - dry, dusty with a pink sky. I had tried to find the books about 20 years ago but no luck so I was curious to see the movie and find out about the story that had inspired so much!

[omegacrux]

Hey Profile
What's the name of those books ?
They usually read better than movies ( Battlefield Earth )

David

[Profiler]

As is always the case the books are far better than the movie and I can certainly recommend them.

The first three are the best (I think ERB wrote 6 Martian books before he died) and none of the books are particularly long. The first 3 relate to John Carter and thereafter the subsequent books are about other characters/hero's etc but not from earth and thus not super strong like JC.

From memory the first three books are:

A Princess of Mars
Gods of Mars
Warlord of Mars

Ironically, I saw only yesterday that the first three books had been reprinted into a single paperback volume for $17 at my local Dymocks

[omegacrux]

Cool thanks

David

[Profiler]

This is the Amazon link to the compiled John Carter book I saw at Dymocks

http://www.amazon.com/Mars-Trilogy-Princess-Gods-Warlord/dp/1442423870/ref=pd_sim_b_2

[Liz]

Very cheap at Amazon for the lovely Kindle ...

John Carter of Mars, Books 1-6 for ... $0.99!! :eyepop:

Book 1 : A Princess of Mars
Book 2 : The Gods of Mars
Book 3 : The Warlord of Mars
Book 4 : Thuvia, Maid of Mars
Book 5 : The Chessmen of Mars
Book 6 : The Master Mind of Mars

http://www.amazon.com/John-Carter-AUDIOBOOK-Illustrated-ebook/dp/B008DIX4H2/ref=sr_1_11?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1341582427&sr=1-11&keywords=edgar+rice+burroughs+kindl e+books+free#reader_B008DIX4H2

[FlashDrive]

Zoom Zoom ..... :rundog:

Flash ... !! :D

[Liz]

:lol::lol:

[Profiler]

Although very cute and a nice touch the speed factor of the callot (i.e.Woola), if memory serves me correctly, is purely an invention of the movie. In the actual ERB martian books the creature description of callots is essentially correct as a somewhat 'frog' like looking creature with multiple legs but it features a huge head and mouth full of teeth. So the general concept of Woola was an alien bull-dog.

[JethroB76]

I got it for my kids and warned them that it may not be that great given it was supposedly a bit of a financial failure, but we were pleasantly surprised when we sat down and watched it - a decent family movie I thought

[Profiler]

It is not a bad movie at all IMHO - the frustrating thing is that in movie producer world the ambition is to make a gigantic profit everytime - not a modest profit - off their ventures. They spent some 260 million making it and certainly didn't lose money but it wasn't an Avatar, Titanic, Up, Toy Story type return for them and hence in their mindset not a successful film. Ironically, the controversy about the movie was that many millions were spent on advertising which was not regarded as effective. Interestingly, in all the time it was showing in the cinema's all I could see of it in terms of ads was one bill-board on a highway and another at the Sydney IMAX. My fingers are crossed that they will one day make another.

[jjjnettie]

There are 11 books in the series. :)
The first one I ever read was Thuvia, Maid of Mars.

1. A Princess of Mars
2. The Gods of Mars
3. Warlord of Mars
4. Thuvia, Maid of Mars
5. Chessmen of Mars
6. Mastermind of Mars
7. Fighting Man of Mars
8. Swords of Mars
9. Synthetic Men of Mars
10. John Carter and Giant of Mars
11. Llana of Gathol
12. John Carter of Mars

At the moment I'm re reading Heinlein's "The Number of the Beast" and there are plentiful references to the Barsoom series. In fact two of the leads are named Deety, short for Dejah Thoris and Zeb John Carter. LOL

I saw the John Carter DVD for sale at Target the other day. I'll have to have a look see. :)

[mithrandir]

If you can't find them, they are all available as e-books on Gutenberg.

"Captain Zeb John Carter" if you please. :) "Beast" was last week's book. A few weeks back it was "Stranger In A Strange Land". This week is "To Sail Beyond The Sunset". I don't have a complete RAH set, but do have most of them. RAH is always good for another read when I run out of new books.

[jjjnettie]

I've got his complete works. :) I re read them regularly.
Have you read "Tramp Royal" and "Grumbles from the Grave"?

[mithrandir]

No I haven't Nettie, and the bookshelf is getting a bit full. :(

The one RAH I try to keep an eye out for is "The Past Through Tomorrow: Vol. 2", preferably the late 70s NEL edition to match the Vol. 1 which I have.

[jjjnettie]

Here you go. :)
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Past-Through-Tomorrow-Bk-2-Robert-A-Heinlein-/380448794575?pt=Fiction&hash=item589483e7cf#ht_2466wt_905

[Profiler]

Hi JJnettie

Would you know whether all 11 Martian stories listed were written by ERB? I keep on encountering information on the net and elsewhere of people debating whether some of the latter stories were actually written by ERB? I seem to get different messges so I was wondering what was your understanding of the situation? It seems pretty clear that the early stories were indeed by ERB but the debate seems to be around the latter stories.

[jjjnettie]

His son wrote one of the stories.
All the info is on Wiki. :)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barsoom

[Omaroo]

Hooked. Watched the movie tonight on Apple TV and thought that it was superbly produced and most entertaining. I'll be reading the whole series I think. I'd forgotten all about Edgar Rice Burroughs.