John Carter hits the big screen

John Carter hits theaters March 9 (this Friday) and looks like a promising action adventure film. It is based on a novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs A Princess of Mars. Burroughs is most known for creating the Tarzan character, but he also wrote many science fiction and fantasy stories some of which have been made into movies. John Carter was another popular character that he created. Another film based on the same novel which kept the original name, Princess of Mars, was recently released directly to DVD in 2009 and starred Antonio Sabato Jr. as the hero. The new film by Disney looks like it will be very entertaining, and I'm going to check my local library for the original books. Willem Dafoe stated in an interview recently that there would have been no Star Wars or Avatar had it not been for the John Carter stories. I am interested to read a series that apparently is one of the grandfathers of modern science fiction, so I'll have to check it out.




John Carter has appeared in several books by Burroughs, as well as short stories, comic books, and comic strips. The film's producers have released a sneak peek of the film on the Internet Movie Database, and a making of video which you can get to here.




While some aspects of this movie remind me a little of Star Wars Episode II and the mediocre Conan remake from last summer, I recognize that it comes from rich original source material by a master of science fiction. Still, that arena scene looks like the second bout on the fight card in Star Wars land. I can imagine the dialogue. "Hey after they kill the Jedi's, there killing a Conan look alike and a green thing, we should stick around man." The special effects look superb so far, so maybe the same masters of digital magic created them. Sadly, this film will not feature Jar-Jar's death in any way that I am aware of. Yeah, I know it's cheap to take a stab at Jar-Jar but after the release of Star Wars Episode One in theaters again, I can't help it. I can say John Carter looks like an entertaining flick drawn from great source material, and I'm planning on seeing it. Still high on my list is The Grey, an interesting film about Liam Neeson taking on a pack of wolves. I think a double feature might be in order my next day off. Yeah, I'll see Episode One in theaters again if it's still out there.

The Novel A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs, and the last film version Princess of Mars are available for purchase at Amazon.com. Below I have included a sneak peak of the film made available by Disney. Enjoy!