The Colour of Magic Movie

Welcome to the Sir Terry Pratchett Forums
Register here for the Sir Terry Pratchett forum and message boards.
Sign up
Aug 2, 2008
2
1,650
MARYLAND, USA
#1
Hello, I am in the US and just discovered the movie, "The Colour of Magic" was shown in GB last Easter. Does anyone know if it will be available on DVD here; or if it will come across the Atlantic to be shown in movie theatres here? :rolleyes:
 

Tonyblack

Super Moderator
City Watch
Jul 25, 2008
30,841
3,650
Cardiff, Wales
#2
Hi kfishdive4choc! :)

The movie along with The Light Fantastic was made for SKY television and shown in two parts.

It is coming out as a DVD at least here, but we don't know when yet.

The Hogfather, which was shown over here at Christmas 2006 has been released in the US and that was by the same people, so Colour of Magic should surely be released as well.

:)
 
Aug 2, 2008
2
1,650
MARYLAND, USA
#3
:laugh: Thanks so much for replying so quickly. "The Hogfather" was released here in March of 2008; so I suppose the other two will follow. I loved "Hogfather" -- the film stayed mostly true to the book. Unfortunately the film has done OK here on DVD. Not enough intelligent people here with a good sense of humor as well...
 

Tonyblack

Super Moderator
City Watch
Jul 25, 2008
30,841
3,650
Cardiff, Wales
#4
No worries - I just hope they don't make you wait too long. I thought the Colour of Magic/Light Fantastic was a pretty good adaptation. The next one that is planned is Going Postal. ;)
 

Witch from Lancre

Lance-Constable
Aug 4, 2008
27
2,150
West Yorkshire
#6
I registered to be notified by email when The Colour of Magic is available for pre-ordering on Play.com. The rest of the family can wait for their copies until Christmas.

I think that you will need to appreciate that the two books together have had to be severely adapted to make one film. See trailer http://www.skyoneonline.co.uk/tcom/index.html

Jason and I had a friendly argument about the casting of Sir David Jason as Rincewind and Sean Astin as Twoflower before the film was on Sky. Let us say that neither fitted the descriptions of the characters in the books and, despite what Jason says, Twoflower is definitely Chinese and not American :p

I decided to forget the books and watch the films as a slightly different stories. Gareth really missed parts of the books he enjoys but so many cuts had to be made to shorten the stories.

Of course Jason and others were extras in the film and I had great fun spotting those I knew or had seen photos of at events.

I prefer watching the DVD as there are no commercial breaks. I had recorded The Hogfather on my Sky+ box and had to fast forward the adverts. If I'd only checked the Anytime section I could have watched or recorded without watching it in two sections without adverts as I did The Colour of Magic.
 

Metsecman

New Member
Jul 26, 2008
4
2,150
New Zealand
#7
Oh deep joy upon deep joy!
Prime TV in New Zealand are going to show The Color of Magic!
Im on tenterhooks they are just saying "Coming soon on Prime TV etc etc" I cant wait! Why can't they tell me when? I might miss it! :(
To my knowledge they haven't even shown Hogswatch yet}
(i think i've broken the exclamation mark key)
 
Aug 29, 2008
559
2,425
Bridgwater Somerset
#9
Spoilers...........you have been warned......... :eek:


I watched it on Sky and there are a lot of changes to the tale, not such a good adaptation as The Hogfater. Why was Vetinari in the story and what happened to Bel-Shamharoth part of the book, the Ginger Bread cottage and the part at the Wyrmberg was seriously cut............. For Examples.

Entertaining but not what I was expecting.YES and TwoFlower was defiantly Asian, I suspect He was Americanised to appeal to the US market when the show is aired over there. There are numerous other small changes to from the book too. I would rate The Hogfather as an 8/10 :) and the Colour of Magic as an 6.5/10 o_O
 

Tonyblack

Super Moderator
City Watch
Jul 25, 2008
30,841
3,650
Cardiff, Wales
#10
With an adaptation of (in this case two books) to a movie you are always going to have to lose stuff. If you put everything in then it would be too long.

The best you can hope for is that the feel of the book is kept and in this case I think that's been achieved. Frankly I don't want to see everything that was in both books - I'll read the book if I do.

The Patrician IS mentioned in the books. He's not named and the description is different from Vetinari - but this was Terry's first Discworld book and Vetinari isn't developed until quite a bit later. Terry has gone on record to say that it is Vetinari in Colour of Magic.

As to Twoflower - there is an assumption that he should be Oriental. Why? This is the Discworld not the Earth. In both Colour of Magic and Light Fantastic there is no physical description of Twoflower that suggests he's Oriental looking.

It's not until we get to Interesting Times that we see a country that sounds like China/Japan on our world but again there are no physical descriptions of the people - Terry rarely describes phyical features.

Actually, the Krullians are described as having black skin and white hair - now that IS something the movie missed out on. ;)

Again, I think the movie kept the feel of the books and they did a good job of the adaptation. It looked and felt like I imagined A-M to be and if anything I think it looked a bit more professional than Hogfather. :)
 
Aug 29, 2008
559
2,425
Bridgwater Somerset
#11
Ya it was not a bad effort but I think they should have split the TV Movie into the Two books and not lumped them into one..........it felt like they had to cut corners to fit it all in. I would have been happier with a more true to the book myself. But I can an be a bit picky at times!! :)

No way was Vetinari in the first book though, if I recall the patrician from the first book was a short plump man with chubby be ringed fingers and a taste for Sea food, not the tall lean man of the later books who Dined on Bread and water.
 

Jason

Special Constable
Jul 10, 2008
727
2,650
52
Pontarddulais - Wales
discworldmonthly.co.uk
#12
I was talking to Terry about the patrician in The Colour of Magic when I went on a day-trip to Pinewood with him and Rob his assistant.

Terry was most definite that the patrician in TCOM is Vetinari, he just hadn't fleshed out the character at that point. If Terry says is was Vetinari then so be it. I don't think we are entitled to argue, and even if we do we will be wrong!
 
Aug 29, 2008
559
2,425
Bridgwater Somerset
#13
Well if that was Him he must have had a body and personality transplant, but I can see this is possible. A number of characters have changes from novel to novel - Death being a good example.

In the early books Death is more self centred............. harvesting lives wily nilly was the whim takes Him and in the latter Books shows Him as a more Humane character with an interest in Life only Harvesting as and when the job required! :)

Well if Terry said its so then who am I to argue............... but I had the impression that the Patrician in the first book may have been Snapcase or Homicidal Lord Winder or one of the earlier mad ones. :eek:
 

Tonyblack

Super Moderator
City Watch
Jul 25, 2008
30,841
3,650
Cardiff, Wales
#14
I think I've said this elsewhere here somewhere - Granny is very differnt in Equal Rites than she is in the later books. And Vimes is not the same person in Guards! Guards! that he is in later books. Sometimes a character takes over and demands to be fleshed out and developed. ;)
 

Dotsie

Sergeant-at-Arms
Jul 28, 2008
9,068
2,850
#15
mspanners said:
In the early books Death is more self centred............. harvesting lives wily nilly was the whim takes Him and in the latter Books shows Him as a more Humane character with an interest in Life only Harvesting as and when the job required! :)
And he killed a cat in a fit of pique. So as far as I'm concerned, it's a different Death in COM as well.
 

Casaninbetween

Lance-Constable
Sep 7, 2008
37
2,150
Sweden
#16
I think the makers of the Colour of Magic movie were afraid to be dubbed racist had they included a silly oriental character like Twoflower. The same thing happened when an American version of Red Dwarf was made; Lister, who's hispanic in the UK version, was a caucasian American in the US version.

Personally, I don't like the fact they've made Twoflower American, since it doesn't fit with Interesting Times. Now, if they ever make a movie of Interesting Times, they have to either change the characters from the Color of Magic movie, make Twoflower a tourist on the Counterweight Continent as well, or make a parody of China and Japan with caucasian Americans playing all the Chinese and Japanese.
 

lawrenson

Lance-Constable
Jul 30, 2008
27
1,650
#17
Hi,

I'm sorry, but Craig Charles is no more hispanic than he is Chinese. And Lister is just Craig Charles.

His father was black, his mother white Irish, and he was born and raised in Liverpool!

Smmmmmeeeeeeggggg....... :laugh:

Cheers,
Karen
 

Jason

Special Constable
Jul 10, 2008
727
2,650
52
Pontarddulais - Wales
discworldmonthly.co.uk
#18
I'm in danger of repeating myself again - but when has that ever stopped me.

In The Colour of Magic and The Light Fantastic Twoflower acts and dresses more like an American tourist that an oriental one. We later find out in Interesting Times that Twoflower comes from a society that appears to be similar to Imperial China. BUT and this is the important bit nowhere in the series does Terry describe what Twoflower physically looks like. He describes his clothes and his glasses but that's about it. Also if Rincewind and The Silver Hoard can roam about the counterweight continent without looking out of place maybe the physiology of Ankh-Morpork citizens isn't that different from the counterweight continent.
 

Tonyblack

Super Moderator
City Watch
Jul 25, 2008
30,841
3,650
Cardiff, Wales
#20
Jason said:
I'm in danger of repeating myself again - but when has that ever stopped me.

In The Colour of Magic and The Light Fantastic Twoflower acts and dresses more like an American tourist that an oriental one. We later find out in Interesting Times that Twoflower comes from a society that appears to be similar to Imperial China. BUT and this is the important bit nowhere in the series does Terry describe what Twoflower physically looks like. He describes his clothes and his glasses but that's about it. Also if Rincewind and The Silver Hoard can roam about the counterweight continent without looking out of place maybe the physiology of Ankh-Morpork citizens isn't that different from the counterweight continent.
What he said! :laugh:

There's a real danger when reading Discworld books, of falling into the trap of thinking that Terry is writing about a certain type of person from this world. Discworld is NOT this world, even if a lot of things may seem familiar.

And I agree that Craig Charles is most definitely not Hispanic. ;)
 

User Menu

Newsletter