Idris Elba appears to have now been officially cast as Roland Deschain. Since Gilead is never described as having any problems with racism as far as I remember (I actually think I remember Roland being confused when he hears about the U.S.' problems with racism), this probably won't affect the story much, and he definitely has the chops to pull it off. I'm ok with this casting. It also appears Matthew McConaughey has been offered the role of the Man in Black, which is another piece of fantastic casting if true.
We also have a release date (January 13, 2017), and Akiva Goldsman (A Beautiful Mind, Fringe) will be writing and producing, with Nikolaj Arcel (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, A Royal Affair) directing.
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Cēterum cēnseō factiōnem Rēpūblicānam dēlendam esse īgnī ferrōque.
“All for ourselves, and nothing for other people, seems, in every age of the world, to have been the vile maxim of the masters of mankind.” -Adam Smith
Meh. I'm thinking that I never would've been satisfied with the casting, since my mental images of the characters are completely based on dead actors. Roland is Lee Marvin, and the Man In Black is Robert Mitchum.
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"Her eyes in certain light were violet, and all her teeth were even. That's a rare, fair feature: even teeth. She smiled to excess, but she chewed with real distinction." - Eleanor of Aquitaine
The more I think about it the more I like it. Idris is charisma incarnate and totally believable as a gunslinging badass. I also appreciate the producers thinking outside the racial categories box. We need more of this kind of open-minded casting approach.
eta Lee Marvin?! Robert Mitchum is genius, though.
The original plan was to make a movie for the first book followed by a TV series and then maybe another movie to finish things off. It’s not clear whether they’re still doing this, but it seems like the best way to handle things. The Gunslinger is way shorter than the other books.
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Cēterum cēnseō factiōnem Rēpūblicānam dēlendam esse īgnī ferrōque.
“All for ourselves, and nothing for other people, seems, in every age of the world, to have been the vile maxim of the masters of mankind.” -Adam Smith
Though I still feel a little suspicious about the movie (because of the nature of hollywood and how this series languished in development hell for so long), this poster is straight up fire, y'all.
LOOK AT IT AND REMEMBER THE FACES OF YOUR FATHERS.
"I just love being a gunslinger, I get older, the world keeps moving on"
I thought I couldnt see him as Roland, then I found out Idris is going to be Roland and McConaughey is going to be the Man in Black, I think that works much better.
I really just can't even. And not in the good way. Last I looked on the Tomatoes it was at 19%/62% (critic/audience), and I think that's p charitable. It's not really a movie for fans of the book, in my opinion. There are things to recognize (besides the characters, I mean) but that's about it. Oh, yeah, there's a tower and multiple worlds and stuff but the movie isn't really about that. Not completely anyway.
This is what we get with multiple screenwriters taking a stab at something larger than one movie, many years stuck in development hell, multiple directors, multiple ideas for multimedia scattershot marketing. A great big nothing of a movie.
By my limited familiarity with the series (I have not read any of the books), it seems like this would have been better as a pre-planned trilogy ala Lord of the Rings or even a mini-series (HBO/Starz/etc.), which several people in this very thread suggested.
This is disappointing, I was looking forward to the movie.
I Bort
no not really
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The best way to make America great is to lower the standards!
You should have heard Mrs. Reason's rants about this movie. She was not happy
I recently read The Dark Tower, and read one or two of the other books in the series a long, long time ago. Mrs. Reason has recently gotten them all on Kindle and read them.
This movie doesn't go through the plot of the first book, it's a large portion of the entire series wrapped up in one movie. Once I realized this movie was going to go through elements of the story I had no knowledge of, I just accepted it. It's comprehensible to a newbie, but only if you are willing to pay close attention.
Mrs. Reasons tells me the story I just learned is barely connected to the actual Dark Tower books. It was an entirely different story "inspired by" the books.