concept: modern worldliness narrarated in elizabethan english

[jjstoneproductions]

When you think about it, the history of film making has it's roots in the history if story telling, and the story telling of the elizabethan / victorian age is really the closest kind of story telling that exists which is both near enough to our own ways of speaking which also does some justice to the real purpose of story telling, which is to convey lessons or morals, humor and drama being just vessels for that purpose, in my opinion.

Then people started making fun of people who were all up their own asses about morals and preachiness, and that became it's own genre of morality and preachiness. satire.


The only way to make real money from a bare-bone concept, without decking the movie out costly cinematopigraphical techniques, is to hit up that historical narrative deal with relevant points!

So Im going to try and write a script about living in the modern world in elizabethan english, which I think is a surefire method to strike ironic goldmines of observations about the artificiality of 500 years of satire-crazy story telling.

What do you all think of my perspective?

 

[Charli]

Gina Davis tried to make a film with her director husband (I think) at the time in a truer "Pirate" language. The movie bombed. Your concept is for a small demographic who will want to wade through the antiquity of the language. Now mix Elizabethan English with a crime/action concept and you might just get an audience.

I'm just saying.

 

[jjstoneproductions]

Yeah but the irony will be that it will be better-sounding then the way people talk normally.

 

[Charli]

Doesn't matter if it sounds better, it only matters if the audience wants to hear it.

 

[j1clark@ucsd.edu]

When you think about it, the history of film making has it's roots in the history if story telling, and the story telling of the elizabethan / victorian age is really the closest kind of story telling that exists which is both near enough to our own ways of speaking which also does some justice to the real purpose of story telling, which is to convey lessons or morals, humor and drama being just vessels for that purpose, in my opinion.

Then people started making fun of people who were all up their own asses about morals and preachiness, and that became it's own genre of morality and preachiness. satire.


The only way to make real money from a bare-bone concept, without decking the movie out costly cinematopigraphical techniques, is to hit up that historical narrative deal with relevant points!

So Im going to try and write a script about living in the modern world in elizabethan english, which I think is a surefire method to strike ironic goldmines of observations about the artificiality of 500 years of satire-crazy story telling.

What do you all think of my perspective?

About the only two successful movies of late, made by an 'english' speaking person, using 'dead languages', are "The Passion of the Christ"(2004), and "Apocalypto"(2006) (Ok, Mayan is not a dead langauge... but definitely not mainstream American...).

As for 'elizabethian' English... too close to either Shake-a-stick, or King James... in the later case, any 'moralizings' would be taken to be the futile attempt subject religious views onto the viewer...

 

[clang]

'Shakespeare in Love' shows it can be done, as have a number of Shakespearean films that retain the Bard's original lines ('Romeo+Juliet' might be the closest to what you're aiming for). But it has to be done carefully and well - the language can repel some audiences real fast. Some people can't even cope with Victorian language.

 

[j1clark@ucsd.edu]

'Shakespeare in Love' shows it can be done, as have a number of Shakespearean films that retain the Bard's original lines ('Romeo+Juliet' might be the closest to what you're aiming for). But it has to be done carefully and well - the language can repel some audiences real fast. Some people can't even cope with Victorian language.

You're right... I don't do 'he-cow'... ever...

But I'm not quite certain that Shake-a-stick actually represents 'street' language... Although, some people do sort of claim that because those in the 'colonies' sort of split from the main root, that some so called 'americanisms', are in fact archaic englishisms...


Then there's pronunciation...

 

[jjstoneproductions]

My idea was more to like, to maybe just watch a few bbc movies, read a novel from the period, and do like a bad imitation of elizabethan english in order to invoke a sense of awareness of history.Then do something light, on the order of stranger than fiction (2006), where maybe merlin's team of druids do a crystal ball deal to look into the future -- nothing necessarily accurate -- and basically use this kind of device to drive home the message that the way people live their lives today would come across as dumb and ridiculous and juvenile to some of the cultures of the past.

 

[Charli]

I think you want a rubber stamp of approval that this is cool and go for it. Just write and see what happens. It will either work or it won't. It's that simple.