In 1934, King Features Syndicate
hoped to create a sci-fi adventure comic strip headlined by a character that
would be a match for the already-debuted “Buck Rogers.” Alex Raymond would
build up from KFS’ failed bid to adapt Edgar Rice Burrough’s “John Carter of
Mars” by conceptualizing “Flash Gordon,” chronicling his adventures in the
planet Mongo, leading rebellions against Ming the Merciless. The property was
popular enough to gain three 1930s serials, a 1980 movie made famous by its
theme song sung by Queen, and several TV live-action and animated series. A new
“Flash Gordon” project by Taika Waititi is supposed to be animated, but might
be going live-action instead.
Empire has it that a planned “Flash Gordon” movie being produced by
20th Century Studios for Disney with writer-director Taika Waititi,
may now be shifting formats from animation to live-action. This was revealed by
one of the producers, John Davis, who revealed that the New Zealand filmmaker
made the decision to go live after originally pitching the project to be
animated. Waititi himself is taking cues from the 1980 film directed by Mike
Hodges, produced by Dino Del Laurentiis for Famous Films and distributed by
Columbia-EMI (UK) and Universal (US), with the Queen theme song.
“It was a movie that was a huge
influence on [Taika] growing up. It is one of his favorite movies," says Davis
about the “Flash Gordon” movie with Sam Jones, Max Von Sydow and Brian Blessed.
"He initially said to me, 'Let's do it animated.' I said, 'Okay.' Then we
got into it and started developing it and he said, 'No, let's do it
live-action.' I said, 'Even better.'" The producer, who has worked on
varied films like “Waterworld,” the 1998 “Dr. Dolittle,” “Alien vs. Predator”
and more recently Disney’s “Jungle Cruise,” praises Waititi’s vision for the epic
sci-fi project.
“[Taika Waititi] is the greatest
guy in the world. He is the funniest guy in the world. And he thinks on a
different plane. And this movie embraces everything that's special about Taika,
and his vision," adds Davis, who hopes that Waititi, who has been writing
the story for “Flash Gordon” but is unsure if he can actually direct (with
projects like the MCU’s “Thor: Love and Thunder” in his busy schedule), might
actually find time to sit in the chair all the same. There are no further
details yet about the film so far.
Image courtesy of Collider
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