The Null Device

The Master and Margarita

German director Thomas Tykwer (of Run Lola Run fame) is apparently working on a film adaptation of The Master and Margarita, Mikhail Bulgakov's magic-realist novel about the Devil visiting Leninist Russia, written at the height of the Stalinist purges. The Devil (aka Mr. Woland) will be played by Johnny Depp, and filming will take place in Prague (where else?). This should be interesting. (via Reenhead)

(Thankfully Hollywood didn't get it; with the way they massacred Lem's Solaris, it's obvious that the Hollywood script-doctor/focus-group/computer-aided-character-development methodology doesn't go well with serious eastern-European literature.)

(There have been other adaptations of this work; there was an Italian version, made in the 1970s, which gutted it and turned it into a fairly average sensual love story, and a Polish TV mini-series made sometime in the 1980s, which was apparently very faithful to the original and quite good. It'll be interesting what Tykwer makes of it.)

There are 4 comments on "The Master and Margarita":

Posted by: Ritchie
http://
Fri Jun 6 17:12:36 2003

I thought you were a bit unfair to Soderbergh's Solaris. I too was a bit disappointed that the 'living ocean' got short shrift, but I was pleased to see it retained Lem's focus on characters rather than staying safely within genre.

If eastern European sf is going to become all the rage, I just wish someone would 'rediscover' Algis Budrys. "Death Machine" would make a great movie.

Posted by: acb
http://dev.null.org
Fri Jun 6 17:35:55 2003

Soderbergh worked within the constraints of the Hollywood financing/marketing system, and as such had to make it into a popcorn flick. Though IMHO he should have probably renamed it, and said it was "inspired by Solaris". If Solaris was about anything, it's the concept of the alien intelligence, not a love story in space.

Posted by: kenny
http://query.nytimes.com/search/full-pageres9D0DEFDE133AF931A1
Fri Jun 6 20:39:51 2003

yeah, SS' solaris was ass.

yes for EE sf comeback :D karl capek's "war with the newts" please me!

Posted by: Graham
http://grudnuk.com/
Sat Jun 7 04:02:50 2003

Absolutely. They have to remake Expedition '84 NOW!

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