What About Kerry Conran?
 

So its been 7 years since Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. I know it kinda bombed at the cinema, but i personally think it was really great and had a style all of its own. It certainly did not deserve to ruin a guys career....many other movies worse than this even in a real haters view.

I realize that he was tied to John Carter of Mars for a while, but the guy has not put out anything since SCATWOT. So anyone else like to see him make another movie?

Re: What About Kerry Conran?
 

According to Wikiepedia, he's also directed this:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdnWplvu29U

Re: What About Kerry Conran?
 

Absolutely not. The only good thing about the film was Angelina Jolie. If I want to experience her in an actual, y'know, good movie, I can just re-watch SALT.

Re: What About Kerry Conran?
 

This is Hollywood. You're only as good as your last picture, so...

Re: What About Kerry Conran?
 

If you're trying to champion this guy I'm not sure calling his only movie "SCATWOT" is the best idea.

Re: What About Kerry Conran?
 

:lol:

The problem with a lot of first-time directors is they wait until the release of their film to book their second directing job. Which, in reality, could be both a good or a bad idea. If your film is an Awards darling or a financial hit, your value is worth more in the studio system. If your film sucks, you're fucked.

If I was getting press and publicity galore before my first film was released and I was offered to do a second job, I would take it just to guarantee me a job.

Re: What About Kerry Conran?
 

I loved Sky Captain but could see why others don't. After the film tanked, I heard his name attached to two other films - John Carter of Mars (mentioned above) and Silver Surfer (without the FF). Back in 2006, my LCS owner said Conran came into the store and bought up a ton of Surfer stuff. But that was the last I heard of that project. Don't know if it morphed into Rise of the Silver Surfer or not.

In 2008, I was working on a project with one of the Sky Captain layout artists. I praised the film and he sort of shrugged it off. He said most of the animators and artists got involved because of their love for the film's concept. But once work started, it became tedious and miserable because Conran never knew what he wanted. He was constantly changing his mind and over-thinking decisions. This was his dream project AND his first film so he was apparently very nervous. Due to this, the film missed it's original opening date and was pushed back to after the summer season (which I feel hurt it's box office).

Don't know if that was a factor in why Conran hasn't worked since but there were a lot of behind-the-scenes stories I loved hearing. Doesn't change my view on the film. I love the hell out of that movie.

Re: What About Kerry Conran?
 

You thought Salt was a good movie? I thought it was a piece of shit. At least Sky Captain was something different, not like Salt that felt like a horribly dated shitty 80's action flick. Truly terrible movie.

Re: What About Kerry Conran?
 

Kerry Conran? He's having high tea with Steven Lisberger...

Re: What About Kerry Conran?
 

His next projects couldn't be any worse than any Kurt Wimmer directed films.

Re: What About Kerry Conran?
 

He should direct something with Klinton Spilsbury in the lead.

Re: What About Kerry Conran?
 

:lol:

I think most would agree that Equilibrium was a fluke. However, he wrote some shit (cough, Sphere, cough) before that too.

Re: What About Kerry Conran?
 

Different from what? SKY CAPTAIN reminded me of so many older, better things--sci-fi films, serials, cartoons, anime--that I would much rather have re-watched. SALT had its flaws, but I had a good time and thought Jolie was pretty awesome as an action heroine.

Re: What About Kerry Conran?
 

Final draft was by Attanasio, so not sure how much if anything changed on it, especially with the history surrounding its stop and start to finally being dusted off the shelf for a disappointing theatrical run.

Wimmer did, however, write Salt. :p

Re: What About Kerry Conran?
 

I really enjoyed his movie, too bad there's not more pure adventure stories being made. But, from the documentary on the DVD, it sounded like there were huge production problems with time and cost over-runs on all the computer graphics work. Studios don't care if you put out crappy movies, but if you can't manage a budget/schedule/team, you'll have a lot of trouble finding work.

Re: What About Kerry Conran?
 

Kevin Conran, Kerry's brother, put together a website not too long ago featuring a bunch of Sky Captain art, and even some video, up on it. Kevin Conran was the production designer on Sky Captain, and worked with Kerry from the very beginning when it was just the two of them

Can't post links yet, so add the appropriate Ws and change {dot} into a period.

kevinconran{dot}com/kevinconran/Home.html

On the "About Me" Kevin talks some about working on Sky Captain, including the following line:

For the curious, the usual budget estimation for Sky Captain runs around $70 million.

I'd love to see Conran get another pulp style movie into production or well any sort of sci-fi movie really. I think Sky Captain is a great film (and would have been greater still if Paramount hadn't meddled and left Kerry's original vision for the movie intact)

Re: What About Kerry Conran?
 

All... two of them? I loved Equilibrium :(

He's written some decent stuff, I liked Law Abiding Citizen (until the end) and The Recruit :shrug: