Brad Bird's Earthquake Movie '1906' In Trouble?

I'm hoping that this doesn't wind up being another project we wish they made, but Brad Bird's first live-action film may be in jeopardy. The director of The Incredibles, Ratatouille, and the vastly underrated Iron Giant has been been developing a historical drama based on the San Francisco earthquake of 1906, one of the worst natural disasters in US history. 1906 is something Bird has talked about for years, and he's proven with each film that the strength of his creativity is in storytelling. So something like this, with a huge scope and pretty good narrative built in, should truly come to life in his hands. But the Pixar/Warner Bros. co-production is stalling, according to Film Shaft, which says Warners is having issues with the budget and the size of the screenplay. I can certainly see that side of it, too. It's either going to be a massive effects movie on the scale of 2012 or you're going to need a lot of crumbling sets, and probably a combination of the two. Let's not discount period costume and production design, as well, which would both be major factors in creating the movie Bird wants to make. Plus, you know, actors and stuff. That all adds up, even if you do a good deal of it virtually (and Digital Domain basically created a phony San Francisco from the Bay and at street level for Zodiac, so it can certainly be done). It might seem strange, given WB's incredible fortunes over the past two years, to see the studio balking at another big project. But so much of Warner Bros.' success recently has been modestly budgeted films that wildly exceeded expectations. So sinking a huge chunk of change into a concept that is admittedly a downer with a director in a totally new segment of the medium is not necessarily a money-making formula. Bird apparently has this year to put the pieces together, which probably means cutting down his script, which would in turn shave some zeroes off the budget. I'm optimistic he can get it made, and he's so solid with stories that I'm not concerned with him taking a scalpel to the script.

Comments

[Jeremy]

Man, I hope this thing gets made! It'll be interesting to see what he does w/ live action.

[J.Bradley]

If it's just "Earthquake"(1975) just set in San Francisco, 1906 , then bleh. Sure, this hasn't been covered cinematically but still they need to do something effective dramatically. If it's like say "Grave of the Fireflies" but set there and then, now they might have something.

[jeff fastov]

There was a movie about the 1906 earthquake and some other subplots starring Clark Gable made in 1936 called San Francisco also starring Jeanette Macdonald and had some good effects for its day.

[Jp]

My english is not good but your site is well thought out and great for learning English better

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