The Moab Fusion

May 19, 2003 11:57 AM

A new fusion of cinema and cyberspacewill be seen in Peter Greenaway's upcoming film "The Moab Story" (NYTimes article). Unlike other Hollywood websites, the film's site will deepen the story beyond imagination. Greenaway's "megalomaniacal" plan is to create "The Tulse Luper Suitcases" ("The Moab Story" is the first phase), which will "eventually include three to five films, a 16-part television series, a touring theater production, several books, DVD's and Web sites and an online computer game."
posted by jacknose (13 comments total)

Oh well, another wankfest from Greenaway instead of one of his good films...
posted by Zurishaddai at 12:07 PM on May 19, 2003

Or to put it another way, Peter Greenaway discovers the allure of marketing tie-ins. I'm surprised Happy Meals aren't on the list. Sorry, I can't take seriously a FPP containing the phrase "deepen the story beyond imagination".
posted by hattifattener at 12:24 PM on May 19, 2003

Oh, goody! The director will deign to communicate with his worshipful fans! And, he'll sell us stuff too!

I don't know what it is, I just know it isn't Scottish.
posted by FormlessOne at 1:04 PM on May 19, 2003

Peter Greenway is the Joe Jackson of cinema.
posted by drinkcoffee at 1:27 PM on May 19, 2003

one cannot fuse cinema and cyberspace, because there is no such thing as cyberspace.
posted by quonsar at 1:31 PM on May 19, 2003

Some related links here...
posted by misteraitch at 1:37 PM on May 19, 2003

misteraitch, thanks. a reverberating double-post, my bad.

hattifattener, think about the phrase "deepen the story beyond imagination." Hmmm, am I being literal, figurative, facetious, or serious? (What good is fiction if there is nothing left for the imagination?)
posted by jacknose at 1:56 PM on May 19, 2003

As his disillusionment with film grew in the 1990's, he said, it occurred to him "that maybe cinema was not the ideal medium for me to express my fascinations."

Well stop making them, you tired, joyless snob.
posted by dydecker at 2:33 PM on May 19, 2003

Jesus, what the hell's wrong with Greenaway? I'll take Greenaway's audacity, immaculate visuals and experimentalism over derivative junk like The Matrix Reloaded any day.

I suppose you folks should knock that Stephenson punk for doing something similarly elaborate. And that Lynch guy should be hanged for selling his work online.
posted by ed at 3:52 PM on May 19, 2003

Some of the sites have been up for a while, but not really developed (perhaps they will soon). I'm glad to see a return to Tulse Luper, who featured in some of my favourite Greenaway films (the early funny ones - A Walk Through H, Vertical Features Remake and particularly The Falls. Generally I've lost interest in a lot of Greenaway's stuff in the last decade or so, but The Draughtsman's Contract is one of my favourite films (well over a hundred viewings).

A lot of his films have a lot of background - there was a companion (unmade, but precised in a book) to Drowning by Numbers for example, called Fear of Drowning, about the early years of Cissie Colpitts.

What I really want is a remastered Falls and the original four-hour cut of Draughtsman and possibly a pony, although a Greenaway pony would be sprawled dead on a table, surrounded by rotting fruit. Hopefully this will be fun.

Greenaway's supposed to be fun. Not many people realise that. Possibly not Greenaway himself.
posted by Grangousier at 4:04 PM on May 19, 2003

Drowning by Numbers was fun. Good film for a late-night drunken gathering of friends. I meant the Joe Jackson comparison in a good way. I keep meaning to see The Draughtsman's Contract ever since it showed up in a deck of cards I own called 52 Great Films You've Never Seen (or something like that; I've since lost it).
posted by drinkcoffee at 5:52 PM on May 19, 2003

Oh well, another wankfest from Greenaway instead of one of his good films...

Greenaway has good films?

And that Lynch guy should be hanged for selling his work online.

Nah. There are plenty of other reasons to hang Lynch.
posted by solistrato at 6:34 PM on May 19, 2003

Jesus, what the hell's wrong with Greenaway? I'll take Greenaway's audacity, immaculate visuals and experimentalism over derivative junk like The Matrix Reloaded any day.

word.
you can't make anything significant without some measure of pretentiousness and arrogance.
posted by juv3nal at 3:58 PM on May 20, 2003