From Cinescape

"After struggling with the aborted SUPERMAN movie project and the still developing GHOST RIDER, Nicolas Cage finally got a comic based property in CONSTANTINE. Cage will play the title role of John Constantine, a man who lives on the fringes of the supernatural world and manipulates others to defuse situations that threaten all life on our world. The movie is based on the DC Comics series HELLBLAZER."

This is abominable. Absolutely wrong, wrong, wrong.

-Andrew

How wrong it is depends on many things. I can't see Cage as Constantine, but then I keep remembering the original Keaton/Batman screams. Since then, I take a wait and see stand.

Dunno Steve,
Constantine is a complete mystery character. Charismatic, off-beat, and unlike anyone or anything in comic books, and also VERY freaking British.

Keaton (arguably) succeeded as Batman (I didn't like him) by playing 25% of the character (Wayne) well and spending the rest of the time in a mask. Hearing that a one or two note actor like Cage is going to play someone so far against type like John Constantine is, for me, like hearing that Keanu Reeves is going to take a stab at, I dunno, portraying someone like Abraham Lincoln.

They'll have to uproot and create a new character for him to play. Which makes the license moot.
-Andrew

No... no... NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
WHY?? WHY???
This is just horrible. I haven't read that much Hellblazer, but from the 5 or so comics and the Sandman-story I think I have some grip on the character. And Nicolas Cage is not even close to being it.
Every emotion in Nicolas Cage is like some momentous event, when he doesn't have his "I'm made out of wood"-expression.
I hope this won't become reality..

He fits the role of Constantine (or Superman for that matter) about as well as Rossane Barr would fit the role of Wonder Woman... no matter how hard I try, I just can't imagine it.

Take a clue from X-men, folks...get an actor that fits the part, don't mutilate the part to fit the actor.

ay caramba.
Wasn't Gary Oldman BORN for the role of Constantine?

Jeff, even if he wasn't, but he's *more* than enough of an actor to pull it off.

-Andrew

I'm not sure that much of John Constantine will be left in a movie version. Lesser known comics, not like Batman, Superman, Spiderman, X-Men for example, (to me) make so many changes the character is gone. For example, I enjoyed the movie version of BLADE, but I didn't see much of the Tomb of Dracula character in there. Much has been written about FROM HELL movie/gn already. Aside from the name, I suspect Constantine will have little in common. Why license the character? Beats me.

(First Constantine exposure - Books of Magic, then in Sandman -- I'm not a big Hellblazer fan, FWIW)

Yeah, you're right, maybe that makes me saddest of all. I don't particularly care or expect much from comic book films, Cage can be Ghost Rider all he wants, but that character and his backdrop are too good to make an average movie about. It's a real shame.

First Constantine exposure:
Swamp Thing under Alan Moore. This was the debut of the character and the arc JC introduced, American Gothic, is horror comics at it's absolute finest.

Moore channeled Gaines and EC comics for those.

-Andrew

How about the agent from the Matrix there was just a thread about?

Huh?
There was a thread about Joey Pantaliano... but he was the bald Judas character. Cypher. Not an agent.

-Andrew

Sting is the perfect Constantine. Alan Moore said so.

Actually, Gary Oldman might be too old now that I think about it.

Ewen McGregor?

How about the limey on the new Enterprise show?

Drew Carey?

Speaking of Alan Moore saying things:
http://www.theonionavclub.com/avclub3738/avfeature_3738.html

-Andrew

How about Guy Pearce?

Gee, thanks, Andrew. As if I weren't down enough already today. ;-) How could anyone make this decision? I mean, why license Hellblazer at all if you're going to just use the name of the lead character? Same with From Hell. Why license the book when you're going to toss the whole thing out and do a generic Jack the Ripper thriller?

But anyways, Vertigo's already done a great job of destroying Hellblazer. So this'll just finish things off. American Brian Azzarello has been writing the book for a couple of years now, and Constantine's been turned into a Yank. The stories are putrid. That great British atmosphere is long gone, all of the stories are set in the US, and even the supernatural has been ditched for crap like internet porn and white supremacy. Azzarello's completely reworked the Constantine character. There's no tortured former mental patient or self-analysis -- he just struts around, appears suddenly out of the shadows, says one or two words and then vanishes. It's pretty much been unreadable since I got back into it a year-and-a-half ago. Pick a copy up. You'll be amazed at how bad it is.

Wow, cool interview Bub. Thanks for pointing it out. Moore's comments on Watchmen were fascinating; I was absolutely obsessed with Watchmen (circa 1986?) at the peak of my comics habit.

Why is this a surprise? We are talking about an industry that cares for nothing in a source material except name recognition. They will rape the ideas and characters of what made them unique and turn it into another generic, crappy Hollywood movie. After all, they are trying to make a Sandman movie where he's an edgy superhero. I wish things would change but I might as well wish for a hot tub full of gorgeous women while I'm at it....

Chris

Your welcome Atwood,
Moore is the definition of eccentric. I find his comments on writing, on anything really, fascinating. My favorite part of the interview (other than the Watchmen & From Hell stuff) was when, at the beginning, he was so diplomatic about the filmed From Hell. Then at the end he described a cliched scene from Ripper movies... and dollars to doughnuts that scene is in the film. I haven't seen it, but I bet it is. Especially the line about Hollywood starlets pretending to be lower class whores.

Oh, if you liked Watchmen, please pick up V For Vendetta. It's almost it's equal, if not in scope or impact.

-Andrew

Heck, I remember people complaining that Garth Ennis turned Constantine into an Irishman.

The actor who plays Spike on the Buffy series might not be half bad as JC.

Heh. Spike's so cool.

Gary Oldman is a genetically engineered SuperActor that can do anything.

Is that a fact?? I wasn't aware.

Proving once again that Quarter to Three comprises the culmination of all knowledge!

(And they say that you don't learn anything from computer games!!)

James Marsters is one talented sunuvabitch. Why he's not swimming in Emmy statuettes, I'll never know.

Brad Grenz

Agreed on Spike. He's been the best character on that show for quite a while now.

Yeah, and he's in with such a TALENTED bunch...

(Note: Read this with a moderate amount of sarcasm, because, while I don't think that they're the most wonderful group of actors I've ever seen, I enjoy the show too much to make any completely disdainful remarks about it.

Still, I can't disagree with the fact that, with the possible exception of Buffy herself, and only because she's Sarah Michelle Gellar -- which is to say, she's gorgeous -- Spike is definitely the best character on the show.)

"Huh?
There was a thread about Joey Pantaliano... but he was the bald Judas character. Cypher. Not an agent."

Wonderful. That whole time I thought you were talking about the guy who plays the lead agent.

"Then at the end he described a cliched scene from Ripper movies... and dollars to doughnuts that scene is in the film."

I have scene the movie, and I'd like comment on this, but I can't find the quote from the interview.

Anyway, I thought it was a decent movie. However, I haven't read Alan Moore's graphic novel, so that probably has a lot to do with my opinion.

It might. I've noticed that reviewers familiar with the graphic novel seem to dislike the movie more (Salon for example) while other reviewers are giving it higher marks.

The cliched scene Moore described (too long to post here, and I don't feel like cutting and pasting) goes like this:
"Too pretty Hollywood actress walks the prettily squalid streets of London while humming or singing some period English ditty. Flash to shadowy figure following her. There's an awful lot of mist everywhere. She notices the follower and begins to get nervous, she turns toward an alley to give him the slip. Figure moves closer. Knife flashes, scream, blood, etc., Flash to a Bobby finding the body and frantically blowing his whistle."

I haven't seen the Hughes film, but the style of the trailer seems like they'd go this route. The graphic novel was much more clinical and avoided this sort of suspense, though I'm not sure the graphic novel is filmable.

Oh, Abberline didn't do drugs or have visions in the graphic novel either.

-Andrew

Ok, I reconsidered.
(oh the reason you missed this is that it was cut from the main interview and linked, in a tiny way, at the bottom of the main interview:
http://www.theonionavclub.com/avclub3738/avfeature_3738b.html )

Alan Moore
"With From Hell, given the nature of the material, given that this is essentially about one man killing five fairly anonymous women in the back streets of London's poorest quarter during the late 1880s, it didn't seem appropriate to me to dress it up in that kind of jokey clothing that the horror genre generally comes equipped with. I'd seen a number of Ripper films that almost became a kind of pornography, where the images were always the same. They would show you the unrealistically attractive 1880s prostitute walking down a street after dark, perhaps tunelessly and drunkenly singing some English song of the period. Then perhaps you'll see a shadow of a man in a top hat with a Gladstone bag, cast upon a glistening cold wall. She notices someone behind her. Her steps increase, echoing upon the cobbles. His steps increase. She ducks down alleyways, she's breathing faster now. He's following her. We perhaps get a shot of the knife upraised, her face, she screams, then blood splashes over, perhaps, a musical poster. The next shot is the policeman turning up, saying, "Oh my god," then blowing his whistle."

It's like the commercial verbatim! That's hilarious!

Nope. The movie largely avoided this stuff. All the "unfortuante women" except for Heather Graham were ugly and unkempt. Heather was inexplicably beautiful with a perfect complexion though.

The ripper in the film didn't stalk. He greeted them and they followed him willingly. Then he cut 'em up. Clinically. No actual knife cutting was shown, it was either seen hazily or our view was blocked by something, many times the ripper's back. However the sound effects were fantastic and were more than enough for you to know what was going on.

You may want to wait for rental or something, but I recommend the film for the presentation, scenery, and foley work, if nothing else.

Just don't sit thru it consciously comparing it to Moore's work and it should be fine.

I think Ewan MacGregor would make a rockin' John Constantine. Sting would also be good (can't argue with Alan Moore). Nicholas Cage, though? I have my doubts. A whole legion of them. I mean, he can be a good actor (though not lately, seemingly), but he is NOT John Constantine.

Bad casting director! Bad!

From Hell is complete and total shit. I'm saying that as someone who loves the graphic novel, mind you, but I think that I would feel the same way even going into this movie fresh. The Hughes brothers just didn't seem to understand what they were trying to film here. Was it a murder mystery? A social commentary on poverty and racism? A tale of a madman and his secret society? Or just a cop story? They just threw in everything and assumed that viewers would get something out of it.

Most of all, though, they couldn't get their heads around the fact that From Hell wasn't about murder. It was about human motivation. And here the motivations were confused in every way. Why did Depp care so much about these women, considering he was so depressed over the death of his wife that he was trying to kill himself with opium? Why did Jack kill the women in the way that he did? That's never adequately explained, and neither is the way that he's disposed of in the end. Why do the women get into the cab with the killer near the end of the movie? They know they're being stalked, and Mary Kelly has money and a place to stay so they're not desperate for cash. But some creepy stranger rides up and offers them grapes and they immediately forget that someone's trying to kill them? Huh? Why did Mary Kelly leave the room that last night, immediately after telling her roomie that she shouldn't be going out? And dammit, why did they get rid of the lesbian sex?!

I do think that the novel could be a brilliant series, of the 4-6 episode kind that is shown on the BBC regularly. It's very, very filmable, although there would have to be some condensing.

PS -- About the only neat thing about the movie was that the actresses looked a lot like the real prostitutes. Aside from Graham's Mary Kelly, of course. I could recognize them all as soon as they showed up on screen.

"of the 4-6 episode kind that is shown on the BBC regularly."

Yes, it would be brilliant if done this way. The budget would be reasonable as well.

Just about the only thing I liked about the film was the way the Hughes Bros. filmed the murders (particularly the first one). Very stylish and shocking.

My greatest problem with the movie was that it was pretty boring when someone wasn't being murdered.

Also, didn't it looked like Graham dropped about 30 pounds since Austin Powers? She looks like a bug eyed muppet now.

-Andrew