Thursday, April 15, 2010

Saw This From A Country Mile Away: The Seth Rogen Green Hornet Movie

An adventure wherein your favorite Mad Pulp Bastard yet again ensures he will never get a studio job by biting the hand that feeds. 

According to IESB  Sony is a little shocked that a Seth Rogen-starring GREEN HORNET movie is well...

CAMPY.

To quote Valerie D'Orazio :

#1: You hired Seth Rogen to play the Green Hornet. You hired Seth Rogen to play the Green Hornet. You. Hired. Seth. Rogen. To. Play. The. Green. Hornet.

#2: Michel Gondry lists Superman III as a movie making inspiration in general.

#3: You hired Seth Rogen to play the Green Hornet.

You get what you pay for... 

This is disappointing that you came to the realization that Seth Rogen is a comedian.  One supposes you were going for the same chemical stew that was the Michael Keaton Batman .

And it's not like they couldn't see the camp in other aspects of the movie. Case in point:  THE BLACK BEAUTY. 

I'm disappointed, but I certainly can't say I didn't see this coming. 

For me, I would like to see a Michael Mann,  HEAT - inspired version of the Hornet out there.  Hell, I'll even let him shoot it on that HD video he likes so much.

He just has to capture the grim, crime-infested world that is the Green Hornet's territory.  The one where cops are on the take,  criminals hold office, and it takes someone crazy enough to dress up in a trenchcoat and mask and pose as a violent, sadistic, near-mythical underworld kingpin in order to see that justice is done.

The Hornet is the Keyser Soze of crime. When he shows up people - poof! - disappear.  When other criminals get in his way he makes sure they go down.  He's everywhere and nowhere at once, and if you cross him -- you're gonna get stung.

Say, maybe that's what happened here.  The Hornet found out someone was trying to film a movie about his exploits so he made sure his myth remained intact by making sure Rogen got the job no matter what.

After all, who'd believe The Green Hornet was real after seeing Seth play him?

Seems Sony's the one who got stung this go round.

6 comments:

RJ said...

Too bad they decided to go campy. Campy worked in the 1960s. It doesn't really work today. A wasted opportunity.

I really enjoyed the Green Hornet fanfilm that was released on the internet a few years ago. If they had chosen to do that, then this movie would have been a classic.

Paul Bishop said...

I'M SHOCKED, I TELL YOU! SHOCKED! SERIOUSLY, WHAT WAS SONY THINKING?

Roger Alford said...

Someone should have told Sony about that little movie called THE DARK KNIGHT that made over a BILLION dollars. Oh, wait... I think we all did.

Christian Lindke said...

Wow, that open collar and loosened tie sure make GH look totally badass. 0_o

WTF?!

We told them so. Maybe they should have read the Pulp 2.0 and Cinerati blogs. Maybe they should have hired some up and coming cop procedural director.

Cunningham said...

Open collar and loosened tie...

in the middle of the day!

Talk about not understanding the character. At. All.

I hope Green Hornet Inc. mad them pay a HEFTY upfront fee for the license.

DecoderRing said...

Campy didn't work in the '60s. Batman was a hit, but it was a short-lived fad that faded fast, and it's sister-series Green Hornet wasn't really that campy at all.

This movie will suck balls, and it will ruin the character for a generation.

BTW, Radio Spirits is releasing some nice box sets of radio episodes of Green Hornet with brilliant sound quality, and a lot of episodes not heard since they first aired. Give them your hard-earned dollar, and tell this movie to go to hell.