15 great movies you'll never see

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

Tarkovsky's Idiot, Aronofsky's Batman and other legendary films that were never filmed, changed too much or were simply lost.

Sometimes a movie doesn't even have to be born to make history. Unrealized plans or unfinished tapes in the fantasies of potential viewers remain ideal, and for years everyone imagine how this or that project of the great master could look like.

1. Heart of Darkness

One of the greatest directors of all time, Orson Welles, back in the thirties, before the start of his stellar career, wanted to transfer the famous novel by Joseph Conrad to the screen. Now many people know the work "Heart of Darkness" from the film of the same name in 1993, but the main thing is that the plot formed the basis for the picture "Apocalypse Now".

Wells wanted to present the story in a slightly different way, showing all the experiences on behalf of the protagonist. The director himself planned to appear in the form of Walter Kurtz - in "Apocalypse Now" this role went to Marlon Brando.

But the project turned out to be too expensive, and soon the Second World War began, which brought down the rental. And then Orson decided to shoot Citizen Kane, and Heart of Darkness was forgotten for a long time.

This painting is just one of Wells's many unrealized or unfinished ideas. There is, for example, the script "The Other Side of the Wind" - the film was financed by one of the relatives of the ruler of Iran, but after the revolution all rights were transferred to the new administration. And the film The Miracle of St. Anne was even removed, but the only copy remained with the director himself, and then disappeared.

Many sketches and work frames can be found if you watch the documentary The Lost Films of Orson Welles.

2. Kaleidoscope

After the tremendous success of Psycho and the failure of Torn Curtain, Alfred Hitchcock decided to make his most violent and provocative film.

The director wrote a script about a handsome maniac who seduces girls and kills them. Of course, the bosses of Universal did not like the idea, since the action contained too harsh scenes of violence, murder and even necrophilia. But Hitchcock was even ready to understate the budget as much as possible in order to realize the idea: they were going to shoot the picture exclusively with a hand-held camera, and take little-known artists for the main roles.

But still "Kaleidoscope" never saw the light of day. According to rumors, Hitchcock was finally dissuaded from the venture by the famous Francois Truffaut. The founder of the French "new wave" himself, who once loved to provoke the viewer, was too shocked by the script. There are only a couple of color test scenes from the samples left.

3. Dune

This picture is often referred to as "the greatest non-existent film." Avant-garde director Alejandro Jodorowski, back in the seventies, decided to shoot a grandiose film based on the book by Frank Herbert. He greatly changed the plot of the original: now Paul Atreides turned out to be a clone, created from the blood of his castrato father. And in the final of the new version, the main character died, but the planet itself gained intelligence and went to travel through space.

To implement his idea, Jodorowski invited artists Jean Möbius Giraud and Hans Rudy Giger. Together they came up with a visual concept and created a huge storyboard tome. Bright and completely different artists were invited to the main roles: David Carredine, Mick Jagger, Orson Welles and even Salvador Dali. And the music was supposed to be written by the Pink Floyd group.

Jodorowski sent out the script and storyboards to all the studios. But I did not take into account one fact: the film turned out to be 12 or even 20 hours long. Of course, no one undertook to implement such a project.

The director later said that George Lucas took many of the ideas for his Star Wars from his script. However, there is no confirmation of this. In 2013, the documentary film “Khodorovsky's Dune” was released, where the authors talked about their ideas.

4. Napoleon

The seventies could be marked by the release of a grandiose historical canvas from the creator of the film "2001: A Space Odyssey". Stanley Kubrick undertook to study all the details of the biography of Napoleon. In the role of the emperor, he saw David Hemmings, and Josephine was to be played by Audrey Hepburn.

The scale of the idea is also emphasized by the fact that the Romanian government was preparing to provide the director with about 50 thousand soldiers for battle scenes. Perhaps this film could be a triumph for the reconstruction of historical events.

But in the early seventies, two films about the Napoleonic wars from Sergei Bondarchuk were released at once: first "War and Peace", and then the disastrous film "Waterloo". And then the producers doubted that the world needed another story about the famous emperor, and all Kubrick's ideas were buried.

5. Ronnie Rocket

Even after the release of his first black-and-white films "Eraser Head" and "The Elephant Man", David Lynch announced that his next project would be "Ronnie Rocket". This is the story of a dwarf who is capable of being powered by electricity from the mains. Gradually, he learns to use energy for destruction, and also creates music with its help. The hero takes the pseudonym Ronnie Rocket and sets out to conquer the rock scene.

It's easy to see that these ideas are reflected in Twin Peaks and its full-length prequel, Fire Come With Me. Dwarf Kid Mike (aka Hand, or Man from Another Place) repeatedly hints at the connection of the inhabitants of the Black Lodge with electricity.

Ronnie Rocket was never made, but David Lynch continues to call it his next project year after year. Although, given the director's dislike for questions about plans, all this can only be a hoax.

6. Idiot

The great director Andrei Tarkovsky dreamed of filming Dostoevsky's novel The Idiot for many years. He wanted to tell the story first from the point of view of Prince Myshkin, and then from the side of Parfyon Rogozhin. Most likely, it would be a serial film. According to rumors, the role of Rogozhin was predicted to Alexander Kaidanovsky, and Myshkin could be played by the director himself or some novice actor.

However, the management of the State Committee for Cinematography has not given permission to implement the project for more than 10 years, motivating the refusals with the high cost, ambiguous content and insufficient experience of the author. During this time, Tarkovsky had already completely thought out the script and even imagined how the final scene would look like. But filming never started.

Goskino gave permission only in 1983, but a year later Tarkovsky already announced that he would not return to the USSR. Next, the likelihood of staging the film in Italy was discussed. But it never came to a point, besides, the author saw in the role of Nastasya Filippovna only Margarita Terekhova.

7.900 days

Now it’s hard to believe, but after filming the film “Once Upon a Time in America” Sergio Leone planned to take on a picture of the blockade of Leningrad. The director was very impressed by the book by the American journalist Harrison Salisbury "900 days", and the master decided to transfer the real events to the big screens.

Leone has been writing a script for many years that will be understandable to Western audiences. As a result, he made an American correspondent in a besieged city as the main character. Sergio planned to take on the main role of Robert De Niro. As planned, the film began with a scene where the orchestra performed Shostakovich's Seventh Symphony, and then the action switched to a large-scale battle.

In 1989, Sergio Leone visited Lenfilm, where he agreed to shoot. But he died soon after, never starting work.

8. Crusade

After successful collaboration in the fantasy action movie Total Recall, Arnold Schwarzenegger and director Paul Verhoeven decided to create a large-scale historical canvas about the First Crusade. The filmmakers wanted to release something no less grandiose than "Lawrence of Arabia", and have even begun to prepare for filming. In Spain, they built the scenery, and the scriptwriters thought over the battle scenes.

But then it turned out that such a picture would cost more than $ 100 million, and the studio did not dare to invest that kind of money. Funding was stopped and the project was frozen.

9. Batman

After the failure of Batman & Robin, but before the start of Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight trilogy, director Darren Aronofsky could shoot the darkest version of the story of the man in the bat costume.

As a basis for the project, he took the comic "Batman: Year One" by Frank Miller and added even more cruelty to it. According to Aronofsky's idea, Bruce Wayne, after the death of his parents, lost his family fortune and works as a mechanic. And at night he fights criminals, and without any high-tech gadgets and, perhaps, even without a suit. Catwoman in this version turns out to be a prostitute, and the picture itself began with Commissioner Gordon planning suicide.

Previously, it was assumed that the director saw the same Christian Bale in the lead role, who later ended up with Nolan. But then Aronofsky said that he wanted to invite the master of transformations Joaquin Phoenix to the role of Batman. It is ironic that now this actor has played the Joker in a solo film about the character.

The project remained at the development stage. And the formation of the hero was shown in the film "Batman Begins". It also includes some ideas from Miller's comics, but in a much lighter version.

10. Superman is alive

In the late nineties, Tim Burton, who once relaunched Batman's story in a darker, more gothic vein, could have tackled Superman as well. After leaving the franchise, the director had two major failures: "Ed Wood" and "Mars Attacks!". So being able to turn back to the superhero that made him famous seemed like a great way to return to successful cinema.

The original version of the script was written by Kevin Smith, and Nicolas Cage was invited to play the lead role. But after Burton's involvement in the work, the plot changed a lot. This became the main problem of the project. The new screenwriter was too loose with the characters from the comics, and at the same time overloaded the story with cruelty. They undertook to rewrite the plot again, but by that time the original plan to release a film for the hero's anniversary had already failed.

They decided to postpone the project, and then Tim Burton got carried away with the filming of "Sleepy Hollow", and over time, Superman was simply forgotten.

11. Alien-3

Here you need to make a reservation right away: the film "Alien-3" was still filmed, but its final version, which was directed by David Fincher, is very different from the original ideas. The project script was completely rewritten several times. For the first version, the author of "Neuromancer" William Gibson was responsible. His plot focused on two powerful companies from Earth (an allusion to the Cold War) that are trying to create the perfect weapon and adapting xenomorph DNA for humans.

But most of all, fans dreamed of seeing the embodiment of the script by Vincent Ward and John Fasano. They wanted to transfer the action to the monastery, which is located on a wooden planetoid. It was there that Ripley once again has to face an Alien, or rather a hybrid of a xenomorph and a sheep. The trouble is that the planet is inhabited by retrograde monks who refuse to believe the heroine.

But the project was reworked several more times, the scriptwriters were changed and as a result the wooden monastery was turned into a prison, and the monks - into prisoners.

12. Gladiator 2

Everyone knows that in the finale of Ridley Scott's epic film, the main character, the gladiator Maximus, died. But that did not stop writer and musician Nick Cave from coming up with a continuation of the story. According to his idea, the Roman gods returned life to Maximus and he turned into an immortal warrior who participates in all major world conflicts up to our times.

It is difficult to say what would have come of this venture, since the idea does not fit in any way with the original. Moreover, Cave wanted to devote part of the plot to how Maximus is offered to kill Jesus Christ.

It is not known what exactly prevented the authors from bringing the idea to life. According to one information, Russell Crowe did not like the script, according to another, the actor was not opposed to starring in a sequel, but he wanted the plot to be dedicated to the son of the hero of the first part, and the studio refused funding. Be that as it may, the film never made it to the filming stage.

13. Cleopatra

This film is a slightly different story. It was actually filmed in 1917, and it turned out to be one of the most ambitious film projects of the time. Cleopatra was played by the actress Teda Bara - one of the main sex symbols of the beginning of the century. More than two thousand people took part in the crowd.

In total, the project cost an unimaginable amount for those times - 500 thousand dollars. It featured large-scale scenes and decorations. The authors also allowed themselves a lot of provocations - the heroine appeared in the frame almost naked.

Unfortunately, now it is no longer possible to see this leading film of the early 20th century. Its only copy burned down in a fire at the Fox Studios in 1937, along with most of Teda Bara's work.

14. Apostle

It is often mentioned that Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is the first full-length cartoon in history. In fact, this is not the case. In 1917, the Argentinean animator Quirino Cristiani created the satirical animation film Apostle, which lasted about 70 minutes.

The cartoon tells how President Ipolito Yrigoyen went to heaven. After that, he wanted to cleanse his native Buenos Aires from crime and corruption, but he accidentally destroyed it.

The author used small models of buildings and flat puppets, which he moved around the shot background. And he worked right on the roof of his house to convey natural light.

The cartoon was released, and it even became successful. But later a tragic fate befell him. Most of the copies in those days were not kept, but melted for combs. And the only remaining copy burned out in a fire.

15.100 years

And finally, a completely unique case. This film has been filmed, and its only copy is safe and sound. But you can see it only after 100 years.

Director Robert Rodriguez created this project for the Louis XIII cognac brand. The main role was played by John Malkovich. Judging by the trailers that are on the Internet, the plot represents various options for the development of the future: from high technology to the destruction of civilization.

A copy of the tape was placed in a special capsule and hidden in the basements of the Louis XIII building in France. It will be possible to open it on November 18, 2115.

Of course, this is all a brand advertising campaign. But the main thing is that the film really exists and is good.