MartinBlank

Someone was trying to tell me the other day that Sam Raimi was the director of Waterworld, or atleast started directed and pissed Costner off, or something like that. Does anyone know of what I speak?

RocShemp

I thought the director was the guy who directed Robin Hood: Prince Of Thieves and then Kevin Costner re-edited the film to his liking. Kevin and the director had a falling out and then a couple of years later became friends again. I think that's how it went.

I never heard of Sam Raimi ever being involved.

Anyhoo, Waterworld is an underated movie. It's no masterpiece but is a lot of fun.

jaeufraser

Yeah, what he said above is correct. Sam Raimi had no involvement I know of.

DRG

Sam Raimi did direct Kevin Costner in For Love of the Game.

Joe Molotov

One good thing you can say about Waterworld is that of all the movies that have tried to rip off The Road Warrior over the years, Waterworld did the best job of it. Bonus points for going for something other than the standard desert wasteland milieu. No Sam Raimi involvement, but it did have Movie Trailer Voice Guy do the opening narration.

Fincher Fan

Although I haven't seen it since it's theatrical run, I do remember enjoying most of it albeit a bit long.

Wazootyman

It started out with Kevin Reynolds as the director. As time went on, and they went overbudget and ran over, tempers began flaring. Eventually Reynolds left with about 2 weeks left, so Costner took over and completed it.

animalmystic

^co-sign

Def not a piece of cinematic history, but I really liked the idea. It was a little over the top with the bad guys and stuff, and I didn't like that they didn't incorporate some more "futuristic" stuff in the movie, its like the caps melted overnight, but in the beginning says future, I would liked to have seen some busted down spaceships or something.

I like some elements of the movie, the boat Costner was on was sick (tri-marin (sp) I believe) everything from the "pee converter" at the beginning (which Taco Bell didn't like and pulled there promotion from the movie) and the Valdez ship, dirt being worth sooo much money and the cute floating tomatoe plant, LOL.

Would love to have a SE of the movie. This was the first movie I ever got to show off my home theater system to my friends, LOL rofl

Dr. DVD

I remember seeing this on its first day and wondering what in the world the most expensive movie in history (which it was at the time) was doing opening with a shot of a man peeing into a cup, recycling it, and then drinking it.

However, as an action movie it delivered the goods, but it should have cost about $100 million less than it did.

Giantrobo

Yeah but why should you care how much it costs? Are you getting a cut of the profits? Dr. DVD I'm not trying to be a smartass I'm just trying to make a point.

Waterworld and Titanic are two movies that got bad word of mouth by folks who hadn't even seen them yet, but still felt the need to put it down because of how much they cost to make. I've never understood this. Unless you're a studio head who cares?

scott shelton

I think large egos and budgets turn off a lot of potential audiences. And the media loves to report on both, which also creates animosity.

And others just hate the numbers because sometimes, the moviegoing experience just doesn't correlate with the monster budget presented.

Giantrobo

ok...fair enough. But it still seems a bit silly.

Joe Molotov

The ticket price is still the same though, whether it costs $2 Million or $200 Million.

PopcornTreeCt

I think people have a false sense of expecting more from a movie with a bigger budget. (Car chases, big battlefields full of hundreds of soldiers, etc)

misterchimpy

Ultimately, the problem with Waterworld is that the Road Warrior is just a much better movie, across the board. But it definitely had its moments, even if it was too long. If it hadn't been so derivative of the Road Warrior, it might have been better received.

BTW, it was on cable the other night, and I looked up Enola(Tina Majorino), who played the little girl...she was Deb in Napoleon Dynamite!

Dr. DVD

Giantrobo: FWIW, the budget of a movie doesn't play much into my enjoyment of a movie nowadays as I don't follow that aspect of them as much.

You have to understand that when WaterWorld opened in the summer of 1995, all anyone ever heard about it was its immense budget of $175 million. Back then it was rare a movie cost that much, now it seems to happen on a weekly basis depending on who your sources are for what film . I went to it wondering what the most expensive movie ever made would look like, and after seeing what the previous record holder was, T-2*, I was really underwhelmed and couldn't buy into how it cost so much.


*I was still under the impression it was T-2, I have heard talk and remember reading some newspapers at the time stating that James Cameron's True Lies had exceeded T-2 in the budget department, and was the big one until WaterWorld.

Troy Stiffler

FYI, a HUGE part of the budget was due to having to build TWO Waterworld cities, after the one was ripped apart by a storm...

It's kind of like Gilliam's Don Quiote movie, only the studio didn't back down after some troubles.

I thought the whole thing was fun. The montage of Costner coming to save the little girl was pretty badass.

Also, the sets were GRAND. Just BIG - HUGE! Today, ha. Today a producer would make all of that crap out of GC, and the movie would be made for 50mil.

Giantrobo

Thanks Dr. DVD.

But like I said, I remember many many folks putting WW down before they even saw it and the only reason was it's huge budget.

Dr. DVD

Well, if it helps, I waited until I saw it to form an opinion. I have to admit that the press didn't help much, as every photo they showed from the movie was either of the ugly people that were the smokers or of Costner making some face of rage, undoubtedly selected to portray him in a negative light, though the photo was of the character and not the actor.

chanster

Very bad movie. Of course, compared to the follow up The Postman it looks golden. My dad really wanted to see the Postman so we went to see it in the theaters...that was the most boring 3 hours of my life.

UAIOE

I didnt like "Waterworld"...but i merely thought it was an ok action flick.

I liked "The Postman" more than "Waterworld"....maybe actually seeing more reminants of the former civilization had something to do with it.

dadaluholla

I like Waterworld. It's an entertaining movie. I actually just bought it in the Wal Mart Discount bin for $5.50 this weekend. Good stuff.

RocShemp

I actually enjoyed The Postman more than Waterworld but both are two very different types of post-apocalyptic films. Comparing them isn't really a good thing to do.

I should pick up Waterworld. I wonder if the DTS version is still available. Speaking of which, is the DTS version a 5.0 track like the DD version?

mmconhea

Didn't the studio also build a large water tank/set for this?
I remember reasing an article that said a great deal of the money went into the tank, but the studio has since made 100x it back using it for other pictures.

Michael Corvin

Correct! Kevin Reynolds, also made the Counte of Monte Cristo. He left mid-movie and Costner finished it up.

Correct! It sunk and couldn't be retrieved.


Depspite flaws, it is a pretty entertaining flick.