Spaceboot1
New Member
I'm sorry if I'm jumping the gun on this question, but I've noticed it come up a couple times, and I'm too eager to get my opinion out there. I think we're in some ways agreed that some kind of budget is important as a constraint, because that is precisely the difference between a movie and a book. A book kind of does have an infinite budget.
My conceit for a Silmarillion adaptation is that, if it were to happen in real life, it would be a big freaking deal. Think about the hype surrounding Jackson's adaptation of the Lord of the Rings, and how a huge segment of the film and special effects industry was mobilized just to make those films. Now think about how Game of Thrones has demonstrated that there is an audience for huge fantasy on television. A Google I'm Feeling Lucky search tells me that Game of Thrones averaged $6 million US per episode (some episodes cost more than others).
Given that a Silmarillion title might not even start production for another decade (in our imaginary alternate universe where this happens), I'd suggest a tripling of Game of Thrones's budget. Some things will go down in price, like the film equipment itself, while other things will go up. And of course we will give into the temptation to scale it up in terms of pure awesomeness of what can be achieved on screen.
That said, $18 million per episode is a lot, but it's not infinity, and there will still have to be choices to make, and occasional compromises. Even for Game of Thrones, there were sometimes scenes that were too large and epic to do with the show's budget. And it adds up over time; if you do ten episodes per season for ten years, that could be $1.8 billion, with a B, all told.
My conceit for a Silmarillion adaptation is that, if it were to happen in real life, it would be a big freaking deal. Think about the hype surrounding Jackson's adaptation of the Lord of the Rings, and how a huge segment of the film and special effects industry was mobilized just to make those films. Now think about how Game of Thrones has demonstrated that there is an audience for huge fantasy on television. A Google I'm Feeling Lucky search tells me that Game of Thrones averaged $6 million US per episode (some episodes cost more than others).
Given that a Silmarillion title might not even start production for another decade (in our imaginary alternate universe where this happens), I'd suggest a tripling of Game of Thrones's budget. Some things will go down in price, like the film equipment itself, while other things will go up. And of course we will give into the temptation to scale it up in terms of pure awesomeness of what can be achieved on screen.
That said, $18 million per episode is a lot, but it's not infinity, and there will still have to be choices to make, and occasional compromises. Even for Game of Thrones, there were sometimes scenes that were too large and epic to do with the show's budget. And it adds up over time; if you do ten episodes per season for ten years, that could be $1.8 billion, with a B, all told.
