Ava DuVernay's A WRINKLE IN TIME, based on the Madeleine L'Engle book

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So we got trailer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4U3TeY2wtM

Ned Raggett, Saturday, 15 July 2017 22:48 (seven years ago)

Complete side note -- I had not only completely forgotten Disney tried this once before

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Wrinkle_in_Time_(2003_film)

But that it was memorably rubbished here

Disney's version of A Wrinkle in Time : TOTAL FAILURE

This one looks rather different.

Ned Raggett, Saturday, 15 July 2017 22:50 (seven years ago)

I have never read the book, nor seen the first attempt at a movie adaptation, but I'm all in on this just based on the cast/director.

Ⓓⓡ. (Johnny Fever), Saturday, 15 July 2017 22:52 (seven years ago)

It'll be massively interesting if they're planning on going full franchise with this because how in the hell will they handle the Welsh/Native American subplot in A Swiftly Titling Planet?

Ned Raggett, Saturday, 15 July 2017 22:57 (seven years ago)

Ooh! Time to revisit the novel!

some sad trombone Twilight Zone shit (cryptosicko), Saturday, 15 July 2017 23:24 (seven years ago)

I love the book.

the Rain Man of nationalism. (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 16 July 2017 00:26 (seven years ago)

Me too, even if it's kind of Jesus-y

SO EXCITED YOU GUYS

horseshoe, Sunday, 16 July 2017 00:49 (seven years ago)

four months pass...

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DO2A0k5XkAUi7cW.jpg:small

mookieproof, Friday, 17 November 2017 20:27 (seven years ago)

fingers crossed on this.

akm, Friday, 17 November 2017 20:30 (seven years ago)

'be a warrior'?

mookieproof, Friday, 17 November 2017 20:39 (seven years ago)

you know Disney will muck around with the characters, the plot and the message until they are properly formulaic and easily digestible

A is for (Aimless), Friday, 17 November 2017 21:18 (seven years ago)

I don’t remember this book at all, just A Wind in the Door where they travel into the kid’s DNA and have to convince the mitochondria to behave themselves. This movie looks pretty gooey.

bumbling my way toward the light or wahtever (hardcore dilettante), Friday, 17 November 2017 21:40 (seven years ago)

I have various bits of hardware network-named versions of Farandola from reading that book nearly 40 years ago. It feels like I hallucinated it.

attention vampire (MatthewK), Friday, 17 November 2017 22:50 (seven years ago)

i reread these books as an adult and wind in the door is the most insane thing ever, the last three or four chapters are almost incomprehensibly bizarre.

(The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Friday, 17 November 2017 22:56 (seven years ago)

i remember loving it, and swiftly tilting planet, rather more than a wrinkle in time

also seems like it would be completely unfilmable

http://the-toast.net/2015/03/09/three-adults-discuss-wind-door-seriously-length

mookieproof, Friday, 17 November 2017 23:02 (seven years ago)

wow, this looks like it will be even worse than the last time they tried to film this.

erry red flag (f. hazel), Saturday, 18 November 2017 08:36 (seven years ago)

I read this book with my daughter a few years ago, and besides along with "The Phantom Tollbooth" being one of the headier kid lit tomes, it ends on such a brazen cliffhanger that I, ironically, never wanted to read the other books.

Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 18 November 2017 15:24 (seven years ago)

i read a wind in the door after planet because I couldn't find it when I was a kid for years. I remember it being completely nuts.

I don't think anything is unfilmable these days

akm, Saturday, 18 November 2017 16:53 (seven years ago)

Numbers 7:12-17

fuck you, your hat is horrible (Neanderthal), Saturday, 18 November 2017 17:02 (seven years ago)

i was into the arm of the starfish as a kid but all i remember from this one is how much i hated charles wallace

difficult listening hour, Saturday, 18 November 2017 17:26 (seven years ago)

i reread these books as an adult and wind in the door is the most insane thing ever, the last three or four chapters are almost incomprehensibly bizarre.

― (The Other) J.D. (J.D.),

I reread it last year and it's all a bunch of artificial climaxes. OK, so Mr. Jenkins was saved. Now we gotta find Sporos. Then we gotta name! Only then can we save Charles' mitochondria!

morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, 18 November 2017 17:27 (seven years ago)

A Swiftly Tilting Planet has this rather adult section set in the 19th century that stops the book cold. I did find Gaudior more compelling than Blajeny and Proginoskes.

On the other hand, the concept of Echthroi as fallen angels I translated to my toy universe in seventh and eighth grade.

morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, 18 November 2017 17:29 (seven years ago)

I don't think arm of the starfish is really an entry in this series though is it? I had that at one point and couldn't get into it at all (when I was like, 12). I never read the last two, Many Waters and An Acceptable Time.

akm, Saturday, 18 November 2017 20:29 (seven years ago)

iirc all her books are connected, but some only barely

mookieproof, Saturday, 18 November 2017 20:43 (seven years ago)

meg showed up. mostly unconnected.

difficult listening hour, Saturday, 18 November 2017 22:03 (seven years ago)

Here's the new trailer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhZ56rcWwRQ

Ned Raggett, Monday, 20 November 2017 17:30 (seven years ago)

that....looks terrible

morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 20 November 2017 17:36 (seven years ago)

I mean...I just realized OPRAH is in this and was thrown out of the trailer, tessered if you will.

morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 20 November 2017 17:37 (seven years ago)

C'mon, man, be the light.

Ned Raggett, Monday, 20 November 2017 17:37 (seven years ago)

two months pass...

Anyway, new (final?) trailer, presume tickets will be on sale soonish.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9Ezoiqt2HU

Ned Raggett, Monday, 22 January 2018 17:00 (seven years ago)

the trailer i saw before last jedi was spectacularly terrible
kinda bummed out :/

bhad and bhabie (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Monday, 22 January 2018 18:09 (seven years ago)

yeah it horrified me

morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 22 January 2018 18:11 (seven years ago)

The trailers I've seen have looked M. Night flop terrible.

Josh in Chicago, Monday, 22 January 2018 18:11 (seven years ago)

Yeah, that one looks terrible, too.

Josh in Chicago, Monday, 22 January 2018 18:12 (seven years ago)

Disappointing because Disney only seems to comprehend a fantasy movie as breathless spectacle. There aren't many stories less-suited to that angle than A Wrinkle in Time.

erry red flag (f. hazel), Monday, 22 January 2018 18:16 (seven years ago)

I dunno, I think this'll be entertaining in its own way and don't really care about if it's 'the book' or not. We'll see, of course. Every time they show Chris Pike's character in that weird orange prison cell I think it's a great bit of 70s sf design.

Ned Raggett, Monday, 22 January 2018 18:22 (seven years ago)

Some of the character design is giving off fudderwacken vibes.

the smartest persin in the room (Old Lunch), Monday, 22 January 2018 18:25 (seven years ago)

i can't see this. it's far too bright. in my mind this book was dark; everything was at night; it was stormy; everything was shrouded in mystery. what is this garish double rainbow bullshit

akm, Monday, 22 January 2018 18:34 (seven years ago)

I dunno, I think this'll be entertaining in its own way and don't really care about if it's 'the book' or not.

That was certainly a great recipe for the Hobbit movies.

erry red flag (f. hazel), Monday, 22 January 2018 18:36 (seven years ago)

i reread the book a month ago (second reread as a grown-up) and found myself thinking that the actual plot, like the planet with the ppl who all act the same and the evil computer or whatever, is the weakest part of it. but everything else -- the interaction between meg and charles wallace, the three visitors, aunt beast -- is wonderful. i think l'engle, much as i love her books and her characters, was kinda bad at plotting. everything about wind in the door is incredible except the actual point of the story, which involves an incomprehensible stream-of-consciousness fight inside a made-up microorganism.

(The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Monday, 22 January 2018 18:37 (seven years ago)

It looks like a kid's movie for kids, unlike the book, which (while not my fave) does not talk down. It and Phantom Tollbooth.

Josh in Chicago, Monday, 22 January 2018 18:37 (seven years ago)

i can't see this. it's far too bright. in my mind this book was dark; everything was at night; it was stormy; everything was shrouded in mystery. what is this garish double rainbow bullshit

sounds like you need a happy medium

mookieproof, Monday, 22 January 2018 18:40 (seven years ago)

It’s not fun to look at, and the line readings throughout all the trailers are so, so bad.

El Tomboto, Monday, 22 January 2018 18:49 (seven years ago)

A Wind in the Door has the dumbest New Age-inspired climax ever. And who cares about Sporos?

morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 22 January 2018 18:56 (seven years ago)

i'm afraid to reread swiftly tilting planet which i recall had a cool framing story and then a lot of stuff that felt imported in from other more boring books.

(The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Monday, 22 January 2018 18:58 (seven years ago)

I can't see how Swiftly Tilting Planet would even work, given there's a whole bit about the Welsh explorers or princes who ended up in North America well before Columbus and somehow helped reshape Native American culture. THAT'LL go over well.

Ned Raggett, Monday, 22 January 2018 19:05 (seven years ago)

It's got that bad early 29th century romance folded into it. More Echthroi please!

morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 22 January 2018 19:10 (seven years ago)

wrinkle in time suffers from lack of echthroi, who i always found genuinely scary. maybe it's the fact that they're constantly being likened to birds.

(The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Monday, 22 January 2018 19:20 (seven years ago)

Echthros-Mr. Jenkins was the best

morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 22 January 2018 19:40 (seven years ago)

then they can make Wind in the Door 2: Echthros vs Skeksi

erry red flag (f. hazel), Monday, 22 January 2018 20:04 (seven years ago)

wow this looks really bad. I loved this book as a child and have a distinct impression of the imagery it created and this is not that by a significant margin.

Scam jam, thank you ma’am (Sparkle Motion), Monday, 22 January 2018 20:10 (seven years ago)

It's quite remarkable to me how many people I know who consider A Wrinkle in Time one of the favorite books of their childhood yet who have never read the sequels. Even though the first book ends on one of the most brazen cliffhangers I can think of!

I don't know how old I was before I learned The Lion, The Witch & the Wardrobe was also one of several books. And not even the first book, right? Aren't there several Oz books as well?

Josh in Chicago, Monday, 22 January 2018 20:22 (seven years ago)

yeah there are a ton of oz books

akm, Monday, 22 January 2018 20:24 (seven years ago)

lion witch and the wardrobe is indeed the first of that series unless you go by the new 'chronological' sequence which to me is heresy

akm, Monday, 22 January 2018 20:25 (seven years ago)

I recall reading them all but honestly I'm very hazy about what took place. The mood and the strangeness of everything is what stuck with me.

Scam jam, thank you ma’am (Sparkle Motion), Monday, 22 January 2018 20:31 (seven years ago)

There are something like fifteen Oz books written by Baum and then at least that many written by other authors. Now there's a 'franchise' whose perpetual lack of exploitation (or, rather, myopic exploitation of nothing beyond the first two or three books) is both mystifying and relieving.

the smartest persin in the room (Old Lunch), Monday, 22 January 2018 20:40 (seven years ago)

It's quite remarkable to me how many people I know who consider A Wrinkle in Time one of the favorite books of their childhood yet who have never read the sequels.

Could be as simple as A Wrinkle in Time being on a lot of school reading lists but the sequels not being on them... if you didn't read much outside of school, you might think "oh yeah, that's a great book" without really knowing there are more in the series. And it's a markedly different (and weird) book compared to the other standard school reads, so it would stand out.

erry red flag (f. hazel), Monday, 22 January 2018 20:53 (seven years ago)

wrinkle in time does end with an absurd cliffhanger but it's never taken up in any of the sequels, and the three mysterious visitors are never seen again -- tho we do get other characters who are more or less stand-ins for them.

(The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Monday, 22 January 2018 21:01 (seven years ago)

Mrs. Which >>> Blajeny

morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 22 January 2018 21:02 (seven years ago)

awful-sounding Lucasfilm name too

morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 22 January 2018 21:02 (seven years ago)

akm otm re narnia sequencing. possibly the v first thing i was ever a tiresome hipster about, gets me misty

difficult listening hour, Monday, 22 January 2018 21:11 (seven years ago)

Magician's Nephew has way more impact if you're already familiar with Narnia, never understood why they would suggest reading it first. Also the huge jump in time from Nephew to the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe makes the surprise! time jump at the start of Prince Caspian way less interesting

erry red flag (f. hazel), Monday, 22 January 2018 21:17 (seven years ago)

Seeing the trailer was incredibly jarring in that I had no idea what film it was for until the end, and thought.. wait, this is A Wrinkle In Time? I know I read it uncountably many times as a kid but apparently the image of it in my mind was completely different.

The second time, I was able to immediately connect characters and events to their on-screen representations, but there's still this cognitive gap between what I thought the book was describing and how they've realized it on screen

mh, Monday, 22 January 2018 21:35 (seven years ago)

Like Josh, I read The Lion unaware that six other books succeeded it, which made the disorienting opening chapters of Prince Caspian more effective: I didn't get to PC until three months after The Lion, mirroring the kids' own confusion about what had happened in the interim.

morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 22 January 2018 21:36 (seven years ago)

To start with The Magician's Nephew, follow it The Lion and The Horse's Boy is a...strange way to enjoy the series.

morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 22 January 2018 21:37 (seven years ago)

i too thought lion, witch was a standalone until my aunt and uncle gave me the boxed set of paperbacks for xmas

that was literally the best present i ever received

mookieproof, Monday, 22 January 2018 21:43 (seven years ago)

whoever did this chronological c.s. lewis box set thing is a monster, btw

mh, Monday, 22 January 2018 21:44 (seven years ago)

magician's nephew has so much more impact if you read it after reading most of the other books, i can't imagine it'd have much of an effect at all if you didn't already know who aslan or the white witch were.

(The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Monday, 22 January 2018 21:47 (seven years ago)

the ideal narnia box set would have lion/witch/wardrobe first, magician's nephew last, and omit the last battle

(The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Monday, 22 January 2018 21:48 (seven years ago)

and Lewis does Jadis' Big Reveal rather well, and the book ends beautifully.

morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 22 January 2018 21:48 (seven years ago)

one month passes...

Anyway, this Friday! (Well, Thursday for me.) I think it'll work.

Ned Raggett, Tuesday, 6 March 2018 04:43 (seven years ago)

welp

https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2018/03/a-wrinkle-in-time-review

mookieproof, Wednesday, 7 March 2018 18:20 (seven years ago)

I couldn't make last night's screening, but the reaction was...not good.

morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 7 March 2018 19:02 (seven years ago)

Saw a trailer for this today and for all that the cast is exciting, it looked like some Inception-lite foolery

imago, Wednesday, 7 March 2018 19:05 (seven years ago)

Mind you it looked a DAMN sight better than the trailers for Duck Duck Goose and Peter Rabbit, which are going to ruin waterbirds and Britain respectively

imago, Wednesday, 7 March 2018 19:06 (seven years ago)

"Kaling is tasked with delivering little inspirational tidbits from the likes of Rumi and, in perhaps the film’s most groan-worthy moment, Lin-Manuel Miranda."

jmm, Wednesday, 7 March 2018 19:06 (seven years ago)

hooo boy

Simon H., Wednesday, 7 March 2018 19:08 (seven years ago)

This really does look like some Last Airbender shit.

Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 7 March 2018 19:10 (seven years ago)

There's just no way Disney can make a good movie out of a L'Engle novel. The DNA is just totally incompatible.

erry red flag (f. hazel), Wednesday, 7 March 2018 19:16 (seven years ago)

Honestly I'm kinda amused at how L'Engle would have reacted to her specifically Christian book turned into something NOT that!

Ned Raggett, Wednesday, 7 March 2018 20:04 (seven years ago)

By reciting Charles Wallace's rune from A Swiftly Tilting Planet?

morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 7 March 2018 20:11 (seven years ago)

"So why are you Welsh again?" "Look, shut up."

Ned Raggett, Wednesday, 7 March 2018 20:13 (seven years ago)

The book has a particular homespun charm and sheer weirdness that's impossible to pull off at the scale the studio intended. Plus, how do you show IT in 2018 without the audience rolling in the aisles?

morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 7 March 2018 20:17 (seven years ago)

i get Golden Compass vibes from this, though i think this is probably more expensive.

omar little, Wednesday, 7 March 2018 20:26 (seven years ago)

Seventies Disney could have made a good movie out of it... like, call John Hough and let him take a crack at it

erry red flag (f. hazel), Wednesday, 7 March 2018 20:28 (seven years ago)

decidedly mixed reviews

https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/5450-the-daily-ava-duvernay-s-a-wrinkle-in-time

ice cream social justice (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 7 March 2018 22:24 (seven years ago)

This is a weird movie to spend a hundred million dollars on . The story could be served by ten million and some far-out editing.

rb (soda), Wednesday, 7 March 2018 23:18 (seven years ago)

While waiting in the theater lobby before Black Panther this weekend, I spent several long moments standing before the Wrinkle In Time display and contemplating the random assemblage of objects pasted on Oprah's face, and I could so clearly visualize her character breaking into an impromptu futterwacken. It was disheartening.

I'm not meltdown. (Old Lunch), Thursday, 8 March 2018 00:43 (seven years ago)

Anyone heard the Sade song?

calstars, Thursday, 8 March 2018 00:52 (seven years ago)

if the book is filmable, it seems to really want to be a mid-budget 70s/early 80s thing with a lot of eerily-lit and grainy/ugly uncanniness. like a "something wicked this way comes" or "watcher in the woods," or "children of the stones" ... something slow and unsettling. something that feels like the old book jackets. this seems wayyyy too bright, colorful, and pacey.

Doctor Casino, Thursday, 8 March 2018 13:58 (seven years ago)

xpost -- yup, it's a treat.

Ned Raggett, Thursday, 8 March 2018 13:59 (seven years ago)

As Meg’s precocious brother Charles Wallace, young Deric McCabe shows plenty of pluck, but his character’s shtick soon grows grating.

sounds about right

difficult listening hour, Thursday, 8 March 2018 14:08 (seven years ago)

I haven't read L'Engle in a long time, but I recently found a copy of this children's book she did.

https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51bOPO1IC8L.jpg

I got it because it has nice Giotto prints, but L'Engle's style has this amazing tone for a kids' book, like Biblical cadence mixed with simple writing for kids.

Jesus was spared from the slaughter because Joseph had taken Mary and Jesus and fled into Egypt.
When Herod was dead, again an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. "FEAR NOT! Herod is dead. Take the child and return to the land of Israel, for those who wanted to murder him are now dead."
Did Jesus know about all the babies killed because of him?

Peter said, "Lord, I am prepared to go with you, even to prison and to death."
"And I say to you, Peter," Jesus said, "that the cock will not crow today before you deny all knowledge of me three times."
Judas left the upper room. And it was night.
And Judas went out into the dark.
Into the dark.

Caiaphas then tore his clothes in the prescribed ceremonial gesture. And they all agreed that Jesus deserved to die.
Peter wept bitterly.
And Judas went out and hanged himself.

They spat at him, took the reed, and hit him with it. How is it that human beings find it easy and even, alas, pleasurable to hurt another human being? Jesus came to live with us to show us how to be human, truly human; and for this love he was betrayed, mocked, feared.
Will we ever learn to be human?

jmm, Thursday, 8 March 2018 14:41 (seven years ago)

I love her so much.

Conic section rebellion 44 (in orbit), Thursday, 8 March 2018 14:48 (seven years ago)

Okay, just saw it and hands down GREAT, simply wonderful -- it made me absolutely happy to see a film that quite simply avoided cynicism. Earnest in a very moving way, a fusion of the original book's plot and general characters and DuVernay and team's skills. There's absolutely a ton going on on various levels in terms of making a very mid-century and white American story a much more current one on many levels, and then expanding on it -- and believe me, it's a story that aims directly at a young female audience and, from my own inevitably removed perspective, surely hits several bullseyes over and again. Plus it's just gorgeous to look at. Sorry any cynics, this is a keeper.

Ned Raggett, Friday, 9 March 2018 05:47 (seven years ago)

glad to hear it!

mookieproof, Friday, 9 March 2018 05:59 (seven years ago)

I don't want to see it, but my daughters - young and female both - do, so I will let you know if they feel inspired and empowered.

Josh in Chicago, Friday, 9 March 2018 12:43 (seven years ago)

three weeks pass...

I took children to see it and they loved it. Especially the two 12 year olds girls. They were crying, gasping, hiding their eyes, immediately requesting to see it a second time, etc. Agree that it's nice to see a children's film that is sincere. And also not animated - so sick of the look of cgi kids films and I think my children are too.

Some lovely songs to hear ultra-loud in the cinema too.

everything, Monday, 2 April 2018 18:34 (seven years ago)

I only just discovered the other day that Sade briefly emerged from hiding to record a song for the soundtrack before disappearing back into the ether.

Arthur Pizzarelli AKA The Peetz (Old Lunch), Monday, 2 April 2018 18:48 (seven years ago)

I really didn't care for this at all, and even my son - who's fairly uncritical of most movies - was pretty 'meh' and preferred the book. Too brightly lit and colorful as noted upthread, it needed more eerieness. Fudderwacken mention not far off the mark.

No energy, only great chaos (Dan Peterson), Monday, 2 April 2018 19:21 (seven years ago)

My kids (10 and 13, girls) and wife were all meh.

Josh in Chicago, Monday, 2 April 2018 20:20 (seven years ago)

My 8 year old nephew was disappointed in it. He loves the books.

Acid Hose (Capitaine Jay Vee), Monday, 2 April 2018 20:24 (seven years ago)

two months pass...

saw this on an airplane and my god it is atrociously bad. principal kid actors put in a great effort (Meg and Calvin were great, Charle Wallace was... OK) but it's like... did anyone involved even read the book?

com rad erry red flag (f. hazel), Monday, 11 June 2018 19:43 (six years ago)

yeah really glad i skipped this one

i'm guessing they're not filming the sequels?

(The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Monday, 11 June 2018 20:56 (six years ago)


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