The Greatest Sci-Fi Movies Never Made (Revised 2008) Book Review

David Hughes is a master at describing the “thrill of victory and the agony of defeat” that is the Hollywood movie mill. It takes a certain amount of skill to discuss a blockbuster that might have been in a way that leaves you wanting to find a way to buy the rights, get funding and shoot the damned thing yourself. The reality is people with a lot more experience, money and even enthusiasm have tried… and, in some cases, are still trying. Hughes, who also wrote Tales From Development Hell: Movie Making The Hard Way, does a masterful job of getting you right in the middle of all the fuss in his recently updated and re-released book The Greatest Sci-Fi Movies Never Made from Titan Books.

From the Foreword by legendary artist H.R. Giger (complete with several paragraphs complaining about his involvement in several near misses) to the Afterword by Harry Knowles, founder of the website Ain’t It Cool News, it’s pretty obvious that some fantastic stories have been under the watchful eyes of the movie moguls. It’s almost overwhelming to realize that some of the unrealized productions described in this book have already cost (pause for a deep breath) MILLIONS of dollars. In one case, Superman Returns, spent twenty million dollars to lock in Academy Award winning powerhouse Nicolas Cage, who was allowed to walk away from the film while the script was still in development. The scope, and the futility, of many of these movies is clearly chronicled by Hughes with a very necessary humor and an even more crucial frankness that leaves few doubts about why some of them could just never be made.

Hughes brilliantly displays his wit, and intelligence, in the ridiculous titles he has chosen for each chapter. The very first one, Destination: Development Hell has an obvious double meaning. The chapter talks about, supposedly, one of the most famous unmade Sci-Fi screenplays in Hollywood. From the way that Hughes tells it, ask almost anyone in town about Alfred Bester’s novel The Stars My Destination and they’ll immediately tell you the same story about a brilliant book that has always begged to be made into a movie. Many scripts have been written, money has changed hands, deals have been signed, storyboards inked and even directors, producers and a few actors have been scouted and approached, all without a single scene ever having been shot.

The original story that the book was based on was a four part series entitled Tiger! Tiger! in the science fiction and fantasy magazine, Galaxy. That story, according to many cyberpunk masters like the late William Gibson, is considered to be the first of it’s kind and, possibly, still the finest example of the genre. Gritty, dark and shocking it was unlike anything anyone had ever seen before, especially in the mid-1950s. The main character, Gulliver “Gully” Foyle, Mechanic’s Mate Third Class, becomes the sole survivor of the doomed starship the SS Normal. He’s a man of unlocked potential, both physically and mentally adept, who is described in his personnel file as one who requires a psychological nudge in order to awaken him. The nudge he requires does not, incidentally come with the destruction of the ship,. It comes after he’s been drifting in space for six months when he is ignored by a passing starship, the Vorga. Gully’s lack of ambition becomes a laser focused hatred and desire for vengeance that would give the Count of Monte Cristo pause. The style, scope and magnitude of the story, even though it follows a single, central character, have proved daunting.

Hughes goes on to tell about how men like screenwriter Stephen E de Souza (48 Hours, Commando, The Running Man), producer Joel Silver (Die Hard) and even actor Richard Gere have worked, unsuccessfully, on getting the right book to movie combination for The Stars My Destination. The story reaches it’s zenith when German producer Bernd Eichinger (The Neverending Story) buys the rights for the movie and takes on the quixotic task. Enlisting a brilliant illustrator, Neal Adams, to storyboard his ideas Eichinger desperately employs several brilliant screenwriters, one right after the other, to try and squeeze the essence of the book into something resembling a workable script. Over a decade later, in 2006, the rights for the story became the property of Universal Films, according to Variety, and the development hell it sits in seems as dark and lifeless as the space between the stars.

The Greatest Sci-Fi Movies Never Made was originally published in 2000, after spending a few years in development hell itself and, according to Hughes’ introduction, just begged a rewrite after so many of the films had finally made it to the big screen. The rewrite, therefore, has been changed to describe how several of the movies were “almost” never made, instead. However, that doesn’t detract from the suspense and a certain sense of amazement that one feels when reading this book. Sci-fi fans will surely want to own this book if only to have it for reference when discussing geek legends like the Star Trek films empire and it’s multiples deaths and rebirths (chapter 3: Where No One Has Gone Before) or how Frank Herbert’s Dune may still yet get the respect, on screen and off, that it deserves (chapter 6: Profits Of Dune).

Comic book fans will definitely find great satisfaction in the trials of making, or not, The Watchmen, The Fantastic Four, Silver Surfer and the greatest of them all, Superman (chapters 11 – 14). Many older readers will, no doubt, be shocked knowing that the doomed flight of Col. Steve Austin may never make the transition from the small screen to big screen glory, with an updated bionic budget, of course (chapter 15: The Six Billion Dollar Movie).

The entire book is, at once, a celebration of the Science Fiction genre and the grand movies it has produced as well as a cautionary tale told, in many case, in the words of those involved about how difficult, risky and expensive Sci-Fi movies can be. So, grab a copy of this book and crack it open the next time you’re sitting with friends and one of them says, “Hey, this would make an awesome Sci-Fi movie.”

The Greatest Sci-fi Movies Never Made (Fully Revised and Updated Edition) by David Hughes
Titan Books; Exp Upd edition (July 15, 2008)
320 pages

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