This is a story I’ve been working on ever since I saw this December 11th email that went out to the Spider-Man 4 special effects crew that day:
Hey there–
We were just notified that our schedule is pushing. We will NOT be starting as planned. I’m terribly sorry for this news, and I hope this email reaches you in time to find other options. We do not know how long we are pushing, and we will not know until mid-January. By mid-January, we will be told how long the push is, whether it be 2 weeks, 2 months, or something else. The studio has every intention of making the movie, but we no longer have a confirmed start date.
Again, I’m terribly sorry, but Sam Raimi has story issues [that] need to be resolved before we are ready to shoot.
Feel free to call me if you have any questions.
VFX Team
At that point, it wasn’t well known that the Spider-Man franchise director who also is helming the 4th installment had huge problems with the script that has run through screenwriters Jamie Vanderbilt, David Lindsay-Abaire, and Gary Ross. I’m even told Sam Raimi had been very vocal inside Sony that he “hated” it. Now Raimi and Sony are anxiously waiting for still another version from screenwriter Alvin Sargent, who wrote Spidey 2 & 3 and is married to Spidey franchise producer Laura Ziskind. “It is unlikely that May 11, 2011, date will be made,” a Sony insider just told me today. “It depends on how quickly the script can get in.” However, agents have told clients in the movie to already expect the film to be pushed back.
My sources say Sony still intends to release that summer, even if the new date is July 2011. But Spider-Man has always owned that coveted early May date. Even as far back as September 2008 when I reported my exclusive that Sony Locks In Sam Raimi & Tobey Maguire in ‘Spider-Man 4’. And now this is a giant opportunity for other studios planning their 2011 schedules to grab this big opening.
Spider-Man 4 was supposed to start filming in February, and star Tobey Maguire echoed that repeatedly in publicity appearances for Brothers. Then it pushed to March. Then late March/early April. And now there’s no date at all, according to my Sony insiders who emailed me: “Some decisions have been made over the holiday about Spider-Man 4. We will be extending the production hiatus on the film. The studio is firmly committed to this franchise but, for us, the script must come first. We intend to notify members of the crew immediately. As you know, Alvin Sargent is currently working on the screenplay. When we have more news, we will keep you posted.”
I do know that Sony Pictures co-chairman Amy Pascal and Columbia Pictures president Matt Tolmach, who have shepherded the Spider-Man franchise from Day One, has been wrestling with this script problem for months. “I’m going to do everything I can to make May,” she has repeatedly told Hollywood types involved with the movie. “But I’m not going to start a movie where the script isn’t right yet. Not unless I want my career to be over.”
Fortunately for Pascal, Sony is not yet “pay or play” on some of the talent negotiations which were still only at the tail end. Raimi is insisting that John Malkovich play the villain, so that won’t change. But I do hear that it’s now unlikely Anne Hathaway will be cast. “I’m not so sure we’re going in that direction,” an insider told me recently. Sony had been hot for her until bigwigs realized she’d cost too much and they probably don’t need “such a big star” for the pic, I’m told. (See my previous, Anne Hathaway Wanted For ‘Spider-Man 4’)
As for those repeated rumors that Spider-Man 4 will and won’t shoot in 3D, I’ve got to figure that’s uppermost on Sony minds given the post-Avatar climate. Back in April, Sony Pictures’ co-chairmen Amy Pascal and Michael Lynton told Forbes magazine they were considering making the 4th Spider-Man in 3D. Here were the quotes: “Could be,” said Pascal. Lynton added: “People are paying a premium to see movies in 3-D and that’s a very big deal. It’s never been done before that someone says you have to pay more to see Spider-Man than a romantic comedy.” More as I get it…
They’re going to shoot it in 3D. They need time. Expect more stories like this. The game has changed.
Actually, 3D is a post process at the moment. It’s contiguous with VFX production and runs on the same schedule. Just throwing the fact out there! :)
Sorry, I forgot to mention, even if it were shot stereoscopically, it would by nature be shot with two cameras simultaneously, so no time would be added to the live action production schedule. But as I said, stereo films are created in post, at the same time as the VFX.
dude, who cares period? everyone has these huge expectations of super hero movies. “oh they’ll follow the story previously written in the comics, and stick to the details.” well in a perfect world. of fanboys. guess what you not beautiful and unique snowflakes, they dont care that peter parker doesnt have organic web shooters, or if the vulture was male of female, or if mary jane was even hot (kirsten dunst bleh). so spiderman 4 (what movie with 4 in the title has been good?) will come out at some point, you will all pay to see it, then complain it sucked, then hope and pray to the fanboy gods that someone in hollywood will get that they should follow original comic story and elements for spiderman 5, then complain when it fails to meet expectations. heres a thought,DONT SEE IT. take your 10 bucks youd spend on a ticket, and go to the freakin comic book store and have all the spiderman adventures you want the way marvel intended.
Good move on canning the female vulture girl idea. It’s like these studios want to be hated.
Stay with the comics… Go with Kraven and Lizard as villains. Maybe a cameo by The Falcon as a military good guy to help fight the Vulture, because he’s rad.
Try more practical web stuff for effects to spice it up. Get Parker to lose his organic webbing ability (yech, and unlike forty years of comic history) thus forcing Parker to develop a web shooter with Dr Connor’s help. Then Connor dies, thus protecting his identity…There’s a good movie left in this.
If the script doesn’t fit, you must uh…quit?
This production is becoming a debacle. I’m beginning to wonder if Raimi is still the man to helm this motion picture. It may be time for him to step aside and allow the film to proceed in a new direction.
Assuming this is Raimi’s fault and the studio would listen to another director.
>I’m beginning to wonder if Raimi is still the man to helm this >motion picture. It may be time for him to step aside and allow the >film to proceed in a new direction.
Uh, so he should step aside and let them make a Spiderman with an awful script? Why would you want that? Granted 3 wasn’t great but 1 & 2 were pretty stellar. I’m sure he can put 4 back on track. I’m sure if he thinks it sucks, it really sucks.
Raimi is a terrific director. But if he’s not getting the script he wants, the further the delays, the more problematic the production. Besides, Spidey 3 was not Raimi’s finest moment. I just feel he needs a fresh start with a new project or franchise.
Maybe Raimi should let someone else take over… after all, he wasn’t really crazy about including Venom; until Stan Lee told him that Venom was only one of the most popular characters… and that fans would want to see him at some point. Raimi does not really have an instinct for Spiderman… he’s too focused on all the early villians from 1962-1979; not that there is anything wrong with that, but to appeal to a broader audience, you would want to include characters spanning more history. For this, I think Raimi is ignorant… however, he could prove us wrong an redeem himself with #4. Spiderman is to Marvel as Superman is to DC… if you screw this up, then you really do kill the goose that lays the golden egg. Iron Man is cool… but he’s not Spidey!!! And yeah, I think they did screw up with Mary-Jane… it the comics she is one super hot babe… Dunst really doesn’t fit that bill!!!
I believe Brett Ratner could find time in his schedule for this. He’d be more than happy to shoot the script the producers like. I would hope, for Maguire’s sake, that his contract allows him to walk if Raimi does.
Spidey hasn’t always opened the early May date. The 2nd one came out in July.
Did Spider-Man 3 even have a script? Man, that movie was bad. Did more than fine at the box office though. Why do they care this time?
‘Casablanca’ was written by a revolving door of scriptwriters who cranked out pages of the script a day before each scene was shot.
In fact, nobody knew how the film’s storyline would end — not the Director, actors or writers — even as they were shooting it.
Just sayin’!
That was the best comment (and suggestion) I’ve seen.
Just sayin’!
CASABLANCA had several endings but the best was Bogart and Raines walking away with the ‘beautiful friendship’ line. As the story is told it was filmed well after test screenings under the insistence of Jack Warner. Speaking of this classic film in a SPIDERMAN blog is blasphemous. These action scripts are merely templates for the special effects guys and the second unit directors. Who cares about the ‘script.’
I suspect that Raimi’s still burnt over the roasting a lot of fans gave Spider-Man 3, and is a tad scared of it happening again.
I hope that if they do the 3D they will also do the 2D version, like other 3D film makers have done. 3D movies give me head aches, as well as all my kids. Must be something in our DNA. ;)
Actually the idea of merging Black Cat with the Vulture was NOT a terrible idea at all. Aside from calling the character “Vultress” (which is a dreadful name and particularly sexist – a female vulture is called a vulture!) it was actually pretty smart. The Vulture in the comics is not completely devoid of character but you couldn’t really build a film around him. Conversely, the Black Cat is full of character but her powers aren’t exactly anything to shout about. And their costumes aren’t even all that different.
Really I think it’s a shame that some overzealous fans blew their mouths off about this idea, sight unseen, because it’s actually a pretty neat one. So what if it isn’t 100% authentic to the comics – in case you haven’t noticed, neither were the other three movies. I just hope meaningless internet comments aren’t informing producer decisions…
First time I’ve ever seen someone who liked that terrible idea…
also when did a feminine suffix become sexist…someone alert the zillions of languages with genders
It’s sexist in the English language, and Spider-Man 4 is, as far as I understand, to be filmed in English…
There’s no such thing as a terrible idea, just terrible execution. Take it from someone who’s read pretty much every Spider-Man comic ever published – there’s a lot of terrible execution out there…
The idea of turning Felicia Hardy into “The Vultress” is absurd mainly because there’s no reason for it. The male vulture is a classic, established character and one of Spidey’s most implacable foes. He is a male character and there is no need to turn him female.
He is an old man seeking to “scavenge” youth from those around him.
That’s really his drive and his whole dynamic. Casting an actor Hathaway’s age as a similar character would rob it of its whole appeal. This is not a character that needs to be “sexed up”.
Now, Hathaway as the Black Cat would be fine. Far from being a character with powers that “are nothing to crow about” the Black Cat debuted with a bad luck power she could turn on her opponents and has recently regained that ability in the comics.
If someone else is cast as Black Cat, that could work out fine too, depending on who it was. The bottom line is that these characters should be brought into the franchise intact, or left out of it. Anything else is disrespectful to the fans and ultimately pointless.
Just get Zallian and be done with it!
Must be really terrible seeing how the Spiderman 3 script was signed off on.
Alvin Sargent is the ultimate pro. They have nothing to worry about, now that he is on the job. Why didn’t they hire him in the first place?
Sargent had an option to write a fourth movie when he signed on to (re)write Spider-Man 3. However, he declined to do it at first because he wanted someone else to do it (or “hand over the torch to someone else”). Either the paycheck was too much to resist or he changed his mind.
I, for one, am glad to see this one get delayed if the script isn’t right. Too many tentpole titles get rushed through because a studio needs to make a date, not because the film is ready to be produced.
Anne was off the table months ago. Her people’s (“people”) demands made her an impossible option, they were asking for way too much and the negotiations got a little nasty. I believe it’s Emily Blunt.
good for Sony and co delaying spider man four for after all no one not sam or the studeio execs want to wind up being the ones that killed the franchise ala batman and robin. proves Sam learned from spider man three and will not have another too many balls in the air means they are waiting till things get done right though the longer they delay sony knows if they do not get a film going the rights to spider man will soon be gone and they will not be able to do a spider man film again. no film rights revert to Dismarvel
They’ve already been developing a script for parts 5 and 6 without Raimi’s involvement. They’ll make more movies, no matter what. The first thing you see after Raimi/Maguire are gone will probably be a 19 year old actor fighting a CG blob called “Carnage.” There will be a new girl, too. There was a new girl in 3. They want a new girl in 4. Never mind the story arc of Spider-Man’s love for and eventually marriage to Mary Jane. They want Bond girls: fuckable, disposable marketing accessories.
If anyone thinks Spider-Man 3 was bad, wait ’till they see what this series will turn into once nobody who actually knows the comics is at the helm anymore. It’s going to be a “Batman & Robin.” They’re going to bury this franchise so deep, burn the audience so badly that Spider-Man will be as passé as Superman. Like Superman, nobody will be able to remember exactly why the property was popular in the first place.
For anyone who doesn’t know, the big “Making of Spider-Man 3” coffee table book details the history of that production and Raimi’s (losing) struggle to create a film that made any kind of sense. This situation sounds like a much more public version of what happened on 3. I’d like to believe that what happened over the holiday was Raimi saving this thing from turning into Spider-Man 3: Part 2, but Sargent’s role last time was to write a Venom script to compete against Raimi’s own Vulture/Sandman story. Why on Earth would we expect the producer’s husband to do anything other than the producers’ bidding?
Is Sony going to have ANY product ready for that release date? Should Paramount go ahead and squat Marvel’s own “Thor” there?
I can’t be interested. I’m a comics fan and to some of us comic fans Spider-man is dead. You’ll never see worse superhero comics than the Spider-man comics Marvel has produced in the last four years. Nothing means anything. Maybe the movies should die with him.
Actually, the stuff that’s been happening in the comics since the Brand New Day storyline has completely reinvigorated Spidey’s fans,
his critical acclaim, and his sales. Nothing ever satisfies everyone and the new status quo has its detractors. But your pessimism comes off as pretty mindless here. The fact that Raimi is fighting for a better script is a good sign, yeah? You should be singing his praises, not preparing your scathing review for a film that’s still in pre-production.
The problem is having a producer’s husband write the script. The script screams of typical Hollywood nepotism.
Here is my suggestion, humbly submitted. Have an open call for scripts, submitted by by number (no names attached) to a series of readers. Winnow the 90% of trash down to the 10% of the good ones. Then have the good ones read and discussed by the producer, director, and studio execs. Agree on the winner, with the name finally revealed.
This cuts out the nepotism, name-pitching, and indeed pitch skills as opposed to writing skills from the process, and produces a script that presumably has a story people will pay money to see, over and over again.
The biggest problem with Hollywood is the writing. Actors, directors, cinematographers have never been better, for the most part. But the stories stink because producers husbands, wives, boyfriends, girlfriends, and the like end up writing them.
3-D is not going to fix a bad story, you only get one Avatar made first. The next three D movie is going to bore the hell out of people unless it has an actual story.
have to agree that screenwriting has never been worse (and you know based on what is being done in television that it’s not for lack of great writers/storytellers)
Of course they are having story problems. They ONLY got Alvin Sargent who not only destroyed the franchise along with his wife and Sony with their greed for the third installment , but also stole and claimed full credit for something that was clearly crafted and written by Gough and Millar in the second one (the only enjoyable and one of the best comic book movies of all time) . Talk about overpaid nepotism. Sadly, the formula seems to keep working and will likely end in another billion-profit thud.
Are Sony’s claims of having the screen rights to Spidey “in perpetuity” endangered by this development? Could Marvel now reclaim the property on the grounds that Sony couldn’t get it made and set it up at Disney instead?
The best “Spiderman” was Spiderman 2, written by Alvin Sargent. The last, “Spiderman 3”, was written by a committee, which included Sam’s brother. It wasn’t nearly as good as “2”. There is a reason Alvin Sargent has Academy Awards. You get what you pay for…
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What, did you figure that out by reading the credits? Actually, Raimi’s brother received a credit for no other reason than Laura Ziskin and her husband allowed the Raimi’s to put Sandman there after otherwise nixing their script pitch.
Spider-Man 3 sucked because Ziskin and Sargent pit themselves against the director, won (naturally, she’s the boss) and then forced him to do Venom. After realizing Venom needed at least two movies to breath properly as a character, they nixed that idea too.
All you ended up with was a screenplay, by Ziskin, Arad and Sargent (read the making of book, they were so sure the movie would be great the book bragged about overruling Raimi) forced on only the people who actually cared about the source material.
They’re obviously fighting over the Vulture, which was is the same element Sony and producers fought over the last time… except Raimi gave in and his career took a huge hit for going along with other people’s ideas. Now Sargent is back on the project, and by whose request? I bet you it ain’t Raimi…
It’s Spider-Man 3 all over again, and I just hope the cast and crew have the guts to just walk. Let all the morons who think Raimi is the problem watch as Spider-Man 4 turns into The Quest for Peace. Have fun!
Can somebody please tell executives at Sony Pictures to just let Sam Raimi do whatever the f*ck he wants with that franchise?
I have great respect for Raimi and I think he’s trying to make Spider-Man 4 as best as it can be. I’m worried, though, because I think he also TRIED to make Spider-Man 3 the best it can be. And I don’t even think Spider-Man 3 is as bad as others make it out to be, except for the emo-goth hair they gave Peter Parker when he became “dark”. But knowing Raimi’s often over the top style, it wouldn’t surprise me if that emo-goth hair was his idea. So maybe he shouldn’t quite be able to do ANYTHING he wants…
Sony, give the rights back to Marvel and have James Cameron come in to do his version of Spider-Man.
The people at Sony and the writers have obviously not read a comic book in their life. Lets give James Cameron a shot, who said Spider-Man was his fav character at age 14.
I would rather see a well done film than Sony dragging this franchise on any further. Delay after delay, Vultress… they don’t know what they’re doing… James F’ing, Cameron!!!
Why would you want to willingly fuck up a great thing?
SM3 was like a bad dream you can’t wake up from, I remember seeing it on opening night and feeling my smile (& watching everybody else’s) slipping off as the movie progressed.
Sony seems determined to match Fox’s X-Men rep, which is sad and inexplicable.
Or maybe not, at least this time they’re listening to what Raimi has to say…
“…feeling my smile (and watching everybody else’s) slipping off as the movie progressed”.
It sounds like you were watching other people’s reactions to the movie INSTEAD of watching the movie. I’m not gonna say Spidey 3 was as amazing as the character deserves, but some of the knocks against it are undeserved. For one thing, Thomas Haden Church as Sandman was an inspired choice, and the scene where he’s in sand form trying to pick up the locket his daughter gave him is pretty heart-rending.
For another, everyone says there’s too much crying in Spidey 3, but c’mon, when your best friend is dying, you usually cry. And they cried in the first two as well. And there are far fewer endless monologues of undying love between Pete and MJ in the third installment than there are in the first two. Just sayin, it earned some of its negative reviews, but it wasn’t quite a “Batman and Robin”. There was SOME stuff there to like.
Sam Raimi needs to just wash his hands of this entire series and go start on “World of Warcraft”. That movie could be HUGE.
Yeah a World of Warcraft movie COULD be huge…if only those sad game addicted fools could roll away from their computers and see the film. Raimi did the right thing, crap scripts are ruining so many movies, and I’m glad he’s at least TRYING. And vultress was a terrible idea, i hope its out of whatever script they end up using.
World of Warcraft, seriously?
Good for Sam Raimi for not settling for a crap script. Spidey 3 was a piece of crap that was a direct result of bowing to studio pressure and just cranking out a payday.
Ok…are you even at the right site? And aren’t you needed back in the Nerdcave?