LOS ANGELES, CA – Industry and critical circles were thrown into an uproar this week by an announcement that a major motion picture scheduled to hit theatres later this year will not be based on any previous film, book, tv show, toy franchise or comic.
The upcoming film – whose title reportedly does not end in a number, not even the current year – is set for a summer release, and will apparently not be a reboot, reimagining, sequel or prequel to any pre-existing movie or other creative property.
“Given the current media landscape, releasing a film based on nothing is an incredible gamble,” said Pavel Lemberg, professor of Cinema Studies at the NYU Tisch School. “While the risk of ruining a viewer’s childhood is virtually nil, the film is also exposed to the wild and predictable range of emotions audiences could – hypothetically – experience when not busy remembering the 80’s or 90’s.”
A trailer for the film – in which no pre-existing pop songs are covered in a different style for sinister dramatic effect – was released online this week, to vastly divided response. Keen-eyed viewers have since spent hundreds of hours combing the footage frame by frame for any indication of a comic book character conceived the better part of a century ago, but have yet to spot one.
“We had assumed that this film, like most films, would at least depict the death of Spiderman’s Uncle Ben in some way,” reported prominent film blog MovieRoller.com. “But we’re beginning to think Uncle Ben doesn’t die in this movie. In fact, we’re beginning to think Uncle Ben isn’t even in the movie at all. How was this green lit?”
Sources say the film may feature Harrison Ford as some sort of strange new man who did not appear in Star Wars, Indiana Jones or Blade Runner.
