Does anyone else see the hypocrisy of Alan Moore? I mean I love (most of) the guy's work, but does anyone who cares NOT know that he wrote V for Vendetta, the graphic novel that is the basis for the film that opened this week? Increasingly unhappy with result of Hollywood adaptations of his work (From Hell, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Constantine), and the fact that producer Joel Silver wrongly claimed Moore endorsed the script for V, he had his name removed from the credits of the film.
Ironically (or perhaps not), more non-comics people now know that Moore wrote the original V for Vendetta. The writer has done an unprecedented amount of mainstream media interviews talking about his work and how he does NOT endorse the movie version of V for Vendetta. Even the review of the movie in this week's Philadephia Inquirer mentioned it.
In the past week, Moore has done a TV interview on the BBC (see video link below), was the focus of a lengthy article in last Sunday's New York Times, and is featured in another interview on MTV.com (MTV?! How much more mainstream can you get?), not to mention the March issue of Giant magazine (a much longer version of the interview is featured on the comics blog, The Beat: Part 1; Part 2) How many people who weren't comics fans knew Alan Moore wrote the comic version of From Hell or League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, which feartured his name in the credits of the movie versions. Interestingly, V seems to be the first Moore adaptation that may actually be considered to be pretty good. All of the articles/interviews are very good by the way, and well-worth reading.
So while the cynic in me calls Moore a hypocrite here, it's also important to note that everyone of these interviews prominently features Moore talking about his newest comic work -- "Lost Girls" a pornographic comic featuring the heroines of Wizard of Oz, Peter Pan and Alice in Wonderland, surely a pitch that piques the interest of non-comic readers, while at the same time scaring off Hollywood.
So remember, the movie version of V for Vendetta, the best Moore-to-movie adaptation yet, is not endorsed by Alan Moore. Got that?
1 comment:
It could be nothing short of a brilliant marketing ploy by Moore to use mainsteam media to re-establish his street "cred" as a radical; to promote his new work and establish himself as one of the dominant forces in pop culture (beyond mere comic books, which I think the NYT article aims at); and, perhaps most importantly, to tie him inextricably to "V" as it's father among the wider, non-comics audience.
Hypocrisy? Maybe so. But he's walking a line that allows him to essentially say "pay no attention to the man behind the curtain." For a man so shrewd, it's hard to believe that he doesn't negotiate better contracts with his publishers.
Or maybe he's just plain crazy. There's always that.
Post a Comment