War Horse

[MacGuffin]

Spielberg rides with 'War Horse'
Disney, DreamWorks set release for Aug. 10, 2011
Source: Variety

Steven Spielberg has selected his next directing job: World War I epic "War Horse."

Disney and DreamWorks will release the film Aug. 10, 2011.

"War Horse" is based on Michael Morpurgo's novel of the same name, as well as a stage adaptation. Spielberg is producing with Kathleen Kennedy, Frank Marshall and Revel Guest. Scribes Lee Hall and Richard Curtis are penning the adapted script.

Set against the sweeping backdrop of the Great War, storyline charts the extraordinary friendship between a boy and a horse who are separated but whose fates continue to intertwine over the course of WWI.

The Great War was a natural topic for Spielberg to take on. He's already explored World War II in a number of projects, including directing "Saving Private Ryan." He exec produced HBO's "Band of Brothers," and more recently, the pay cabler's "The Pacific."

Spielberg's process is to develop several projects at a time before deciding which one he'll direct next. In this case, he also was weighing "Robopocalypse" and biopic "Gershwin."

The director is next in theaters with 3D family pic "The Adventures of Tin-Tin: The Secret of the Unicorn," which unspools Dec. 23, 2011.

Spielberg and DreamWorks co-chair-CEO Stacey Snider acquired the rights to Morpurgo's "War Horse" last fall.

At that time, Spielberg said he knew from the minute he read the book that he wanted DreamWorks to make the film. "Its heart and its message provide a story that can be felt in every country," he said.

"War Horse" was first published in 1982 when it was a runner-up for the prestigious Whitbread Award. Morpurgo is the best-selling author of more than 120 books for children including "Kensuke's Kingdom" and "Private Peaceful."

The hit stage adaptation of "War Horse," written by Nick Stafford and directed by Marianne Elliott and Tom Morris, was first produced at London's National Theater in 2007. It has since played successful repeat engagements in the West End.

DreamWorks also has optioned the rights to the stage play. Spielberg saw the play in London in March.

[Sleepless]

I got really excited,then I saw this:

Spielberg rides with 'War Horse'
Scribes Lee Hall and Richard Curtis are penning the adapted script.

storyline charts the extraordinary friendship between a boy and a horse

[Alexandro]

yes, this sound really bad.

[Gold Trumpet]

I can only imagine how E.T., Raiders of the Lost Ark, or Close Encounters of the Third Kind sounded in their initial press clippings. This sounds like a return to kid fantasy and since he has a better batting average there, I don't mind. I have no reason to know if this film will be any good, but all of his other potential projects (excluding Tin Tin and Abraham Lincoln) sound mediocre and since his last 5 films have been unmemorable, there may be more here because this press clipping has a lot of odd contrasts in the story. I'm intrigued because Spielberg still has talent. He's just been working with low ball material as of late.

It also reminds me of Empire of the Sun and I think that is an underrated film for him.

[Pubrick]

call me crazy horse but i think this is a good idea.

maybe it's cos i don't just fly off the handle without doing any research. at first i thought it sounded BORING -- not BAD, unless you're a spielberg hater it's a mistake to assume he would automatically make a bad movie. he has done so maybe once or twice a decade since the 80s, and supplemented those with either amazing films or just kinda boring ones. so to me it seemed more likely this would be BORING.. you know, Empire Of the Sun/Amistad/Munich-boring. not 1941/Lost World/Terminal-bad.

i found on youtube and you can immediately see the appeal. like GT said it's a kid fantasy kind of story since it's based on a children's novel, altho calling it a WW1 epic suggests it obviously wants to be taken more seriously than that. gives a good summary on the technique behind the amazing puppets used on the stage, and there's also taken by one of the actors which provides great insight on the process. what's clear from all this is that this is no doubt one of the best stage plays in recent years and absolutely mesmerizing visually.. ON STAGE.

but that still doesn't tell you much about the story, characters, or general themes other than it has been adapted by geniuses and so has obviously been taken seriously by at least one medium -- not to mention a radio play which was voiced by Timothy Spall, Brenda Blethyn (secrets and lies reunion!) and Bob Hoskins -- so instead of looking for a detailed synopsis of the story, knowing well that it's best to read the actual book for that kind of thing, i looked for something about the intention and meaning of the original book beyond its murky genre categorization. i found this write up by the author of the book, in which he explains the reason for writing this story, the research behind it, and the origin.. as well as alluding to some of the intended themes. something you don't get from a shitty press clipping or even the stage production material which is mostly technical appraisal.

after reading and viewing all that, as much as i'm willing to do on a lazy mid-week afternoon, i'm confident that this is great material for spielberg, or any director really. while it appear boring at first, as we've all seen horses being used for emotional effect in films before, the spirit (no pun intended) of this story feels nothing like the typical horse-and-unlikely-hero-to-victory of National Velvet and Seabiscuit or even Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken, it's not even a transpecies incarnation of Lassie. what i like about the potential of the film is a chance for Spielberg to have a happy ending -- FINE -- in that the horse probably lives and everyone is reunited, but for once he'll be working on a war film that isn't strictly about the ppl involved or about the effect it had on families, nations, or just ppl in general. the effect of this is a rendering of war in both glorified form, because even Saving Private Ryan with all its lauded opening still made war seem honorable, but also in playing to our alignment with the animal it becomes about our hand in nature..

this is the perfect time for this film. no one cares about peace anymore or starving children but they do care about the massacre that everyone contributes to daily and that's the destruction of the environment. the role of the horse in this story is obviously something akin to ET, to give one example. it's a non-partisan non-human creature with whom a child has a special bond beyond any specific ideology. making us empathize with a non-human is one of Spielberg's ultimate strengths, it's definitely one of the reasons Kubrick chose him for AI. but ET was inoccuous, the stakes were not high, it was strictly fable. this movie won't bring about world peace but it could be a daring achievement in its own right. spielberg could bring a real anti-war message without betraying the staple war slogan that guides every anti-war film, "support the troops not the war", and without succumbing to its jingoistic associations.

the hidden function of the film thus becomes apparent in the title itself. the horse is a cog in this faceless warmachine in as much as it functions to facilitate the self-destruction of mankind, its role is impersonal but the association with the child requires its salvation. the war horse -title and concept- thus recalls the legendary trojan gift by hiding its true intentions under a veneer of impersonal business as usual: the conventional gesture of war in the cinema is the glorification act, which is then subverted by the extended message of peace among men AND nature. the great reality of the world wars was of being in the most unified act in global history, a model for the hyper-awareness of connectivity we take for granted today. making this film about a simple war horse is the natural course to take, it's an environmental war film!

and if he jerks a few tears while he's at it, well fuck, that's just good storytelling.

[children with angels]

i found on youtube and you can immediately see the appeal.

I know the main kid in that trailer! War Horse was his first job out of drama school, incredibly luckily (he's now got a role in a new HBO series off the back of it). The play is definitely a great theatrical experience, but mainly because of the incredible puppetry rather than the narrative. In a way though I can imagine the sweep and the melodrama of the story working better on film, and this is definitely prime Spielberg material. I think this movie is going to be massive.

[Alexandro]

Munich is a lot better than it gets credit for. I rewatched it a few weeks ago and felt it was a lot of things, but not boring. Certainly it's way more alive than Amistad (which suffers from too much syrup and the McConaughey) or Empire, one I tried to rewatch recently, but actually bored me for real.

Munich is tense, depressing, cruel and emotionally draining. The way it's constructed is very clever because it unfolds like a thriller or a "hitman" movie where you root for the good guys but then the good guys turn into soulless monsters forever traumatized and destroyed by their own paranoia. It has no room for a happy or even hopeful ending and Spielberg wisely, for ONCE, doesn't force one on us. And it has some pretty impressive aesthetic points in it's 70's espionage thriller look. It's stylish but always at the service of the story, I specially loved the way each time the characters had another hit to make Spielberg and Kaminski established the whole geography and proceedings of such hit within just a single shot pointing, panning and zooming at different places and using mirrors, reflections in cars, etc...

Ok, so part of what I'm saying is that Munich is actually very good in my opinion but also is that Spielberg usually improves when confronted with dark material like that. When he's dealing with real downers and depressing situations or characters where cruelty ensues he seems to turn into a more impressive director (Minority Report, A.I., Munich...hell even War of the Worlds showed him trying), but then when he just goes for something that easily fits his sensibilities his tendency is to be boring (Amistad, The Terminal). So, the basic premise of this together with the WWI background makes the whole thing sound unappealing. Also, E.T. was 30 years ago, he was a completely different person then and that film came from the deepest part of his soul. And it was really the last time in his career so far when he managed to be so sentimental and at the same time feel so genuine. He has achieved a lot emotional punches through the years with other films, but never in another of his "kid films".

[Stefen]

Munich is great.

For the first three quarters. Just like most Businessman Spielberg era movies.

This will probably be the same.

[tpfkabi]

i likes the terminal. or i think i did. all kinda punch-drunk loveinessness and kumar, too.

[The Perineum Falcon]

ugh, i hate the terminal. the only parts i liked were the ones that zeta-jones didn't stink up.

Munich is great, tho.

Also, when I read the synopsis of this movie, my immediate thought was of White Mane; has anyone seen that? I could see Spielberg going for something along those lines.

[MacGuffin]

Cast Revealed for Spielberg's War Horse
Source: ComingSoon

The cast has been revealed for Steven Spielberg's next film, War Horse, to be released by DreamWorks Pictures on August 10, 2011.

Set in 1914, the film centers on Joey, a beautiful bay-red foal with a distinctive cross on his nose that is sold to the army and thrust into the midst of the war on the Western Front. With his officer, he charges toward the enemy, witnessing the horror of the battles in France. But even in the desolation of the trenches, Joey's courage touches the soldiers around him and he is able to find warmth and hope. But his heart aches for Albert, the farmer's son he left behind.

According to Empire magazine, young actor Jeremy Irvine has landed the lead role of Albert and is joined by Emily Watson, Peter Mullan, David Thewlis and Benedict Cumberbatch.

Watson and Mullan play Albert's parents. Cumberbatch will play military man Major Stewart.

Rounding out the internationally diverse cast are Niels Arestrup as the grandfather of a young French girl (Celine Buckens) who takes Joey in, plus Nicolas Bro, David Kross, Leonard Carow, Rainer Bock, Robert Emms and Patrick Kennedy.

Also in talks to join the cast are Tom Hiddleston and Stephen Graham.

Produced by Spielberg and long-time producing partner Kathleen Kennedy, War Horse starts shooting in the UK in August.

[squints]

But who is doing the voice of Joey?!

[Marty McSuperfly]

First pictures from the set of War Horse

http://spielbergnews.blogspot.com/2010/08/first-pictures-of-spielberg-on-war.html

[Kellen]

the playlist just posted a trailer for the film:

war horse trailer

[cronopio 2]

i'm in.