We Can Only Speculate What 'Noah' Will Be Like Under Darren Aronosfky

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Aug132011

Saturday, August 13, 2011 at 3:58PM

Speculation abounds on Darren Aronofsky's next project Noah. How could someone who's made such challenging movies as Pi, Requiem for a Dream, The Fountain, The Wrestler and Black Swan, make what would seem to be a straightforward Sunday School story. Looking at some of the past attempts at the story may provide some insight to his approach.

The 1928 silent film Noah's Ark was one of the most expensive movies of it's time. It featured portions in sound - then a revolutionary process treated as a gimmick, as 3D might said to be now. The spectacular flood sequence in the last quarter hour of the movie was notorious for the death of a few extras during it's production. The story intercuts the love triangle between three World War I era characters and the biblical story. Could Aronofsky's attempt also use a similar historical juxtaposition device to tell the tale? Interestingly, Warner Archive's Made On Demand service has just released this movie in it's shortened form sans the sound portions which are thought to be lost.

1966's The Bible - sort of an anthology movie of biblical tales. The Dino De Laurentis production - like all of his movies - had that "big production" stature. It was one of two movies shot in the Dimension 180 widescreen process, only used again on Patton. The Noah's Ark portion of the movie really opens up the widescreen after the creation story revealing the mammoth ark and even gets a little comedic it it's portrayal of an eccentric Noah hearing the voice of God.

There's no talk of any novel, revolutionary processes on Aronofsky's production although his version IS being made in the CGI era, so certainly it will be as visual - and maybe even more so - than past translations. Aronofsky hasn't been too receptive of 3D, but with a 150 million tent-pole pricetag, the studio MAY want him to play 3D ball with this one. The overly melodramatic tone of '66's "The Bible" may not be reached for again but certainly Aronofsky will go for as challenging a dramatic tone as he's gone for in his other endeavors.

Of course a few years ago Evan Almighty proved to not be able to save itself from a flood of mediocre reviews and little of an audience on board. Steve Carell's usual style of deadpan humor just wasn't humorous enough for contrast with the outlandish premise of a modern-day, suburbanite Noah.

Another interesting one to look at to get an interesting stylistic idea of what might be in store is the African film "Genesis" which is the story of Abraham told from a North African point of view. The film has an almost primordial feel to it, as though you may be looking back at some unrecorded, ancient culture that may have inspired the stories of the Bible. I encourage one to take a look at it.

Speculation rises like the waters of the biblical cataclysm itself for Darren Aronfsky's next project and they'll only grow higher as we get nearer to the release but looking back at previous efforts to translate this story may provide some idea as to the type and tone of his effort.