Atlas Shrugged Script: Only Slightly More Than Twice as Long as Galt's Speech
David Boaz at the Cato blog sums up some thoughts from Atlas Shrugged screenwriter Randall Wallace on the script, which is complete--at 129 pages.
Here's how Wallace, an Oscar nominee for his Braveheart script, explains the connections:
The assertion that change occurs when heroic individuals are willing to stand up–and further, that people in the herd want to be heroic individuals but aren't encouraged to do so until they find a leader worth following–is very much in Braveheart, and it's something thoroughly ingrained in the American psyche.
I think Mel would make a great Hank Rearden, by the way.
While I live in L.A., I'm not quite a full-on "Hollywood insider." Still, I did subscribe to Variety for a year, and I'll go out on a limb and say a big-deal epic for which no director nor complete cast appear to have been slated is pretty unlikely to be out next summer, no matter what Wallace says.
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It will be quite a challenge to turn Rand's archetypal characters into real people. Casting request: Alan Tudyk as Cuffy Meigs.
I've been told that each page of a script is roughly equal to 1 minute of film, so we'd be looking at a move around 2 hours long.
So, should we expect Cate Blanchett as Dagny Taggart?
Question of the day: Who will be more insufferable, the kids waiting to see Atlas Shrugged or the nerds in line for the latest installment of Harry Potter?
Oh dear god no. The Apocalypse is upon us.
Think of how many teenagers have been turned into insufferable assholes by reading Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead. And now they want to broaden the audience?
I'm going to go hide under a rock for five years or so.
Think of how many teenagers have been turned into insufferable assholes by reading Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead. And now they want to broaden the audience?
They may be assholes, but they're our assholes!
Whoever plays Dagny Taggart will have to have lungs made of iron.
"Whoever plays Dagny Taggart will have to have lungs made of iron."
Huge tracts of land should suffice.
This is very nearly the worst idea since "Springtime For Hitler".
This is very nearly the worst idea since "Springtime For Hitler".
Meaning it will be a HUGE box-office success.
Hm, yes, an explicitly libertarian movie, and all we have are jokes and naysaying. I think anybody who's that negative is the insufferable asshole.
Scripts as a rule of thumb are supposed be between 90-120 pages. One reason for this is that every page equals roughly a minute of screentime.
I don't trust Hollywood. They will take out every bit of political content that doesn't fit the leftist PC line and change the script for "dramatic purposes" and make the whole thing about global warming or American racism or something. If you people think they will put out a movie version that embraces the politics of the book unabashedly, I have a bridge to sell you.
Hm, yes, an explicitly libertarian movie, and all we have are jokes and naysaying. I think anybody who's that negative is the insufferable asshole.
Forgive me if I don't give a crap what the political leanings of my mass-media entertainment are. If Rand had been an outspoken communist, my primary complaint about her work would be the same.
Timothy | May 23, 2007, 11:37am | #
"Who will be more insufferable, the kids waiting to see Atlas Shrugged or the nerds in line for the latest installment of Harry Potter?"
It's you, Timothy, you.
NotThatDavid | May 23, 2007, 11:39am | #
"Oh dear god no....I'm going to go hide under a rock for five years or so."
Please do, but make it 10 years.
I've never claimed otherwise, ed.
Also, like, your mom wears army boots or something equally scathing!
I believe Angelina Jolie is already signed on to play Dagny.
Brad Pitt as John Galt? They've already done the violence-as-foreplay thing on screen...
Hm, yes, an explicitly libertarian movie, and all we have are jokes and naysaying. I think anybody who's that negative is the insufferable asshole.
Yes, but only a libertarian would laugh at Ayn Rand jokes. Anybody else would be like "Huh?"
The jokers may be insufferable assholes, but they're our insufferable assholes.
I'm going to hold out hope that this is going to be a good movie. It would be neat to see it infused with a low level of retro-futurism.
i'm hoping for something between "battlefield earth" and "my left foot."
I don't understand how this project can go forward on the most optimistic libertarian time-line when Angelina Jolie is taking a year off work.
2009?
Randall Wallace? Um, he's about as dishonest to the source material as they come. Heck, it'll be in praise of Marxism by the time he's done with it. I still can't forgive him for the atrocity that was The Man in the Iron Mask. Oooh, let's "improve" on Dumas, shall we?
He also wrote Pearl Harbor.
I hope Michael Bay doesn't direct it. Then Rearden Metal will be used to make Transformers or something. Or maybe they'll use it as a metaphor and make it Rearden Black Metal, and dethklok will be in the movie.
"Scripts as a rule of thumb are supposed be between 90-120 pages. One reason for this is that every page equals roughly a minute of screentime."
Actually a "spec script" like this should be much longer than 90-120 pages. Once a director whittles it down to a "shooting script", it will still likely be 160-180 pages, leaving the rest to be edited in post-production.
See, Dad! Film school *was* worth it!
John,
To be fair, it would be incredibly easy to make Atlas Shrugged into a leftie propaganda piece. It's not too much of a stretch to say that the captains of industry went on strike because they're a bunch of whiners who made huge, huge profits but then whined and went home when they couldn't buy a gold-plated Cadillac. All the filmmakers have to do is piece together a string of Rand's "moocher" rants while showing abject poverty on the streets. It would be a cheap shot, but easy to do.
oh, and as Randolph noted, it's Rearden with an "e". I hereby revoke Doherty's libertarian-nerd cred.
Lamar,
That makes sense. It would be very easy to take Rand's meritocricy and twist it into an indictment of the rich. Do the whole leftist, "all capitalists are rich because of lying, gambling and speculating at the expense of everyone else" line.
URKOBOLD'S MINIONS "MASHED UP" SANFORD AND SON AND DUNE TODAY. URKOBOLD SEES SIMILAR POTENTIAL WITH THAT WOMAN WITH STRANGE SEX HABITS' 10,000 PAGE BOOK (URKOBOLD ONLY READS THE SPEECHES) AND MR. SANFORD'S SHOW.
URKOBOLD IS COMING TO YOU, ELIZABETH! THIS IS THE BIG ONE!
Come on this could be awesome. That quote from Wallace I think indicates that he understands the material to some degree, and will succeed in humanizing it. Making Rand's message more appealing to everyone instead of just the soulless robots.
I want to keep my money
And give away absolutely nothing
To the government who moderates my spending
and obliterates depending on what time of the year
brutality is here
in the form of income tax
I'd rather take a fucking axe
to my face, blow up this place
with you all in it, I'd do it in a minute
if I could write off your murder
I'd save all of my receipts
because I'd rather you be dead
than lose a tiny shred of what I made this fiscal year
I'd rather you be dead than to maul your body in my second home
I'd rather you be dead than consider losing all my evil restaurants
"Randall Wallace? Um, he's about as dishonest to the source material as they come. Heck, it'll be in praise of Marxism by the time he's done with it. I still can't forgive him for the atrocity that was The Man in the Iron Mask. Oooh, let's "improve" on Dumas, shall we?
He also wrote Pearl Harbor."
What happened to the guy who wrote Ray?
Pearl Harbor was a cinematic Cleveland Steamer.
If he just has a script now and not even a director, there's basically no way a major motion picture will be done within one year.
I have a few points to make without reading anything anyone's already said, which is disrespectful and lazy. I apologize.
- Why does the fact that Ayn Rand was a Fundylibertoid mean that ANONE, especially us, should care about her shitty fiction? Really. I can agree with a lot of her basic ideas, and also hold that she was a crap storyteller. Her longer novels in my view dont deserve to be filmed. They're too flat and unuanced. Soap operas with economic subtext.
Anthem, however, would make a decent sci-fi film ... One reason that book succeeds is that she didnt give herself room to pontificate, and just told a PK Dick style parable.
- Also Ayn_Randian's existence = proves NotThatDavids point
I fully belive that it is fair, right, good and proper for any particular camp to mock, malign and abuse the fundies in their midst. Democrats should kick the hippies in the nuts, the GOP should evict the Dobsons, and we, the leftover people, should remind our core-constituency of nerds, sci fi freaks, ferret-owners, transgenderists, etc. that they all have to sit in the back of the bus and shut up so they dont ruin our hepcat image.
See, like Nick. Nick is a great face for Libertoids, because he gives the impression we're a bunch of suave, economically literate...uhh... potheads. 🙂
Ayn Rand - herself and her fan club - tends to reinforce the image of libertoids as nerdy paranoid naysayers with layers of personality problems. Basically, someone you'd never want showing up at your kegger.
It's nice to refer to Rand as a historical pioneer for Libertarianism, but it doesnt mean we have to also be her literary fan club.
Gilmore: Well 'splained.
Hm, yes, an explicitly libertarian movie, and all we have are jokes and naysaying.
Much like I can't understand Bill Buckley's objections to a movie made from an Ann Coulter book. It is conservative, and therefore worthwhile.
Gilmore,
While I agree with you that Anthem would be the best choice for a movie, I liked the longer novels too. I just dont read her non-fiction.
Well, Gilmore, I'm not sure I agree completely with your literary evaluation.
Atlas is in fact unnuanced - so much so that Rand invested time and energy in inventing a theory of aesthetics to justify her lack of nuance. But that doesn't necessarily discredit it in literary terms for all time. It's a stylistic throwback without much of a place in the history of 20th century "high" literature, sure.
I think The Fountainhead and We the Living are actually pretty decent literature, and aren't nearly as stilted as Atlas.
I don't think Atlas would make a good film for several reasons:
1. It's too long, and can't really be profitably shortened in my humble opinion without having the implausibility of a "strike of the mind" toppling an industrial society heightened to really obscene levels.
2. It takes place in a magic-realist America that combines the attributes of many different eras, and would therefore have to take place in a sort of "Hudsucker Proxy" world that I don't think filmgoers would take to.
3. Many of the subplots would make little to no sense to a modern audience. The Rearden marriage makes no sense in 2006, Dr. Robert Stadler's conflict would be alien to the audience, etc. But taking out the subplots [the likely solution] just makes the story that much flatter.
I also think the film is a bad idea because too many of the readers of Atlas take it as a political and economic primer instead of as a metaphor for the role of reason in man's existence. The strike idea is, at the end of the day, silly - technological society runs on too broad a base of human expertise to be vulnerable to the disappearance of a small group of people. That's why Rand has to construct the composite environment in #2, above - to create a world where the strike could work. And once we dispose of the literal strike and look at the story as a metaphor, I just think that there HAS TO BE a better way to make a film that makes that metaphorical point than to try to squeeze Atlas into 2 hours.
Fluffy,
2006? The rest of us are living in the future, catch up.
URKOBOLD PLANS TO ATTEND THE GRAND OPENING OF ATLAS SHRUGGED AND YELL, "SPEECH! SPEECH!" DURING THE SCENES WHERE THE SPEECHES ARE EDITED OUT IN THE INTEREST OF TIME.
thoreau may be a geeky Physicist with a cheeseball sense of humor, but he's our geeky Physicist with a cheeseball sense of humor.
Is it just me, or does the Urkobold seem to have multiple personalities today?
Though I do think that the war with thoreau ended last week. Urkobold is now at war with Jennifer. Or is that Eurasia?
But will it be as good as Shrek 3?
I think that Burt Reynolds would make a great Dagney and Dom DeLuise as her sidekick Eddie Willers. ( Are Burt and Dom still living? )
In any case, when it comes out I'll be the first in line at the movie theater.
IDL
Ayn Randian,
When did Ayn Rand become a libertarian again?
ProGLib,
Uranus.
I liked Atlas Shrugged.
Urkobold is now at war with Jennifer. Or is that Eurasia?
That would be me. And I am totally kicking his ass.
PATHETIC FOOL! WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO, SHAKE YOUR TITS AT URKOBOLD? YOU CANNOT WIN.
LAST URKOBOLD SAW, YOU WERE FAILING TO MASTER YOUR OWN DOMAIN.
At least I know how to master proper use of the "Caps Lock" button.
what the shit is this urkobold. it's not funny, and pretty much kills any thread it posts in.
How is 'Dagny' pronounced, please?
Urkobold is the primal troll before whom all lesser trolls tremble.
I, however, am a greater troll, so I do not tremble. I bounce.
BOUNCY, BOUNCY.
Urkobold is a necessary response to all of the trolls that we've been encountering lately.
DEMAND KURVE!
*opens mouth. looks up. sigh. walks off*
thoreau, sort of a troll consolidator, if you will.
I don't think I'd call the Urkobold funny. More in the grating/abusive/bad for kids vein, I'm thinking.
Maybe it's just me, but I'm starting to think there's something going on between Jennifer and the Urkobold. She springing to His defense? He constantly talking about her ampleness? Yeah, they call it a war, but I'm thinking Sam and Diane.
Urkobold...pretty much kills any thread it posts in.
stephen the goldberger GETS A COOKIE.
URKOBOLD: SLAYER OF THREADS, BESTOWER OF COOKIES!
*pecks ProGLib's suggestion on taint*
I see. Um, what gender is the Thunderchicken, anyway?
Do you have a gizzard, gullet, and comb? No? Well then - you couldn't possibly pronounce it.
*pecks cookie on the taint*
Checked out:
That's always been a mystery to me, too.
I always assumed it was "DAG - nee."
Personally, I prefer Trooper Roman to Urkobold.
Trooper Roman? Isn't that a font?
Maybe it's just me, but I'm starting to think there's something going on between Jennifer and the Urkobold.
For fuck's sake, PL. This is a thread about Ayn Rand novels, and the thought of a creepy abusive masochistic love/hate sex vibe catches you by surprise?
Turn in your decoder ring at once, lightweight.
I like Atlas Shrugged (though I certainly wouldn't call it good; bizarre would be more accurate). The prospect of an Atlas movie is exciting, no matter how ridiculous it winds up being.
Fluffy,
I just never thought Dag-nee sounded cool, so have wondered if it's supposed to be like the 'g-n' in champagne, and pronounced Danny or Dainy. Oh, well, thanks for your thoughts.
Trooper Roman - a type of pre-packaged, boil-and-eat noodle?
I'm pretty sure it's pronounced "Bill".
Jennifer,
Alrighty then. I recast my analogy then to the romantic tones of The Fountainhead.
Trooper Roman? Isn't that a font?
You are essentially correct, Sir. It's a joke for graphic-design nerds. "Urkobold" sounds like a typeface, you see.
AND JP SOUNDS LIKE A "JUNIOR PENIS."
ON SECOND THOUGHT, URKOBOLD SHOULD HAVE HIS OWN FONT. URKOBOLD AWAITS SUBMISSIONS THEREOF, MINIONS AND UNTERKOBOLDIANS. SOMETHING TROLLISH, WITH LOTS OF NICE GROTESKS. . .SERIFS FOR YOU FRENCHIFIED FOOLS.
stephen the goldberger | May 23, 2007, 2:10pm | #
what the shit is this urkobold. it's not funny, and pretty much kills any thread it posts in.
First off, I commend your creative use of "what the shit"
Second, I think the Urkobold is inevitable and necessary in open forumns
The best defense against stupidity is often to appropriate that particular mode of stupidity, and pre-empt it with some rhetorical flourish. It sometimes acts as 'asshole repellant', since it takes away the air of seriousness that stupid people sometimes need to express their particularly stupid views
my occasional use of "MORE AMERICAN THAN YOU"-man is similar. He knows that all of you are Athiest America-hating decadent druggie half-breed fag-enabling masturbators, and knows that you dont understand anything unless he types in IN ALL CAPS AND WITHOUT COMMAS BECAUSE A REAL AMERICAN DOESNT NEED COMMAS COMMAS IS PROBABLY COMMIE TOO
Fake personas are always fun too.
I don't like the direction that this is taking. Some sociology PhD is thinking about writing his thesis on the Urkobold as we type. That disturbs me for some reason.
Lord Urkobold,
Runic fonts for your missives
http://www.acondia.com/fonts/runenglish/index.html
That's alright, Pro Liberate, you'll be noted as one of the cool kids.
😉
Right, ProGLib.
Do not look behind the curtain. Nothing to see here. Move along. Move along quietly, folks. Everything's fine. Nothing to see.
The producer had talked about doing Atlas Shrugged as "two or thre movies, or one fairly long one" to fully capture Rand's vison or something. This script sounds pretty compact.
Summer release date? I would have expected this to be a December release with heavy Oscar campaigning.
I've never read the book, but I have no doubt that this movie will suck.
Better than than Jack and Diane.
Better THAT than...
Bah.
Aristotle believed that even a spec script should be 90-120 pages. I suggest you read Aristotle's Filmics before you embarrass yourself further.
It has become necessary to troll the threads in order to save them.
I believe it's pronounced "Taggum."
One other pronounciation possibility I've heard is that it's pronounced like "Daphne".
I tend to not agree with that pronounciation, though.
I liked Atlas Shrugged.
And I predict that the movie will be such a popular blockbuster that it will spawn a weekly TV series.
Jerry Stiller will play John Galt's wacky neighbor.
I dont mean to slag off all rands longer books, and think they are great for young adults who want a Dune-type immersive read that also gives them some 'big ideas' to chew on... (I read all her stuff in a rush in 8th-9th grade, and can credit her for starting me down the glorious path of enlightenment that lead to.... uhh, me hanging around the reason threads?)...but it's just that i think they're not the kinds of things that make good film material. Like, say, The Magus. Or, a better example, most of Vonnegut's stuff... which is light-years better writing than Rand, but has something about it that makes it hard to translate onto screen. I love vonnegut's books, but most of the films made of his stuff are garbage (Shlaucthous Finf being the exception)...
anyway, Rand as a thinker lost a lot of credibility to me the more of her stuff I read. She had the headlines right, but really didnt understand a lot of the shit she tossed around. and, she was nuts. And, the big fans of her stuff (see above) are often...whats the expression? Insufferable something-or-others?
How is 'Dagny' pronounced, please?
Just like "Danny," but with a strangling noise in the middle.
That's what I like about you, highnumber. I don't have to explain my cryptic, runish-fonted remarks to you.
Stevo,
I see it as a wacky farce, with Galt being an inventor who is constantly quitting regular jobs.
One other pronounciation possibility I've heard is that it's pronounced like "Daphne".
You mean Dagny was African-American?
The proper pronunciation of "Dagny" is "chumley."
John Galt was an asshole. I liked Francisco much better. Oh, and Dagny was a total slut, jumping from guy to guy. She dumps Galt for Owen Kellogg later in the sequel, Atlas Dropped the Ball. I think the movie should reflect my view.
"Chumley" as in Tennessee Tuxedo? Heh, heh.
I see no evidence that the continent of Africa exists in the Atlas Shrugged world, nor any evidence that there are any Americans of African descent. Thus, I conclude that Daphne-Dagny was not, in fact, African-American.
Just to clarify things for everyone regarding my OWN name - I actually use the German pronounciation, which is, of course, Floify. Please make a note of it.
No, PL, "Chumley" as in "Cholmondeley."
It's to be called Atlas Shagged, Baby! And I'm going to be the star! Isn't that just groovy?
Oh, like Featherstonehaugh is pronounced Fanshaw. Or that Worcestershire word.
I'd pay twice to watch Atlas Shagged.
I'd pay twice to watch Atlas Shagged.
That would be the most boring porn movie ever. Considering how completely oblivious John Galt was to being tortured in the original version, just imagine how calm and efficient the sex scenes would be.
Throatwabbler Mangrove.
Well, like I said, John Galt was a jackass. How about we edit him out altogether? Hank Rearden was the protagonist, anyhow. Or maybe Chumley. Either way, not Galt.
Now that I think about it, an Atlas Shrugged parody does just about write itself.
VM,
Spelt Raymond Luxury-Yacht, right? ?
And you know how it's pronounced. Now how about that nose job?
**
"My Hovercraft is full of eels"
Okay, this is really funny. I went and looked at the "Hungarian Phrasebook Sketch" that VM is quoting from and saw this line:
"Ya! Ya! Ya! Ya! Do you waaaaant. . .do you waaaaaant. . .to come back to my place, bouncy bouncy?"
Yes, "bouncy bouncy". Jennifer, you and Urkobold are apparently one with Monty Python or are speaking Hungarian. Either way, pretty cool.
The next great line in the sketch, incidentally, is, "If I said you had a beautiful body, would you hold it against me? I. . .I am no longer infected."
For those that don't know, all these statements are from a Hungarian using an evilly written Hungarian-English phrasebook to attempt to purchase some cigarettes.
The Flat at 2b...
errr.
To be honest, it was the URKOBOLD's "Bouncy bouncy" that inspired my request for matches!
Oh.
I thought it was kismet. Or, at the very least, synchronicity.
I'm going to hold out hope that this is going to be a good movie. It would be neat to see it infused with a low level of retro-futurism.
Good call mediageek. Another Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow would be perfect. A super styled piece with a message. Critically aclaimed and enough promotion and fan base to make it profitable once it hits netflix. Yet only barely so. So in a years time it will be forgotten by all but the faithful and won't be a shit target for every statist with an ax to grind.
PL
I cant believe you've made it this far through life without having memorized every single mont python sketch ever produced. i thought that was like, part of college or something.
"My Hovercraft...is full of eels..."
ProGLib:
A connecting principle?
aaaarrrg. Someone beat me to it.
Another Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow would be perfect.
I've got it: it should be animated. Brad and Angelina can voice Galt and Dagny, and Randy Newman can write some songs for it.
I\'d pay twice to watch Atlas Shagged.
That would be the most boring porn movie ever.
Speaking of porn movies, I submit Vibrator Shrugged.
oh noeths i have italitshized in zthe entirety. I shall cut myself now.
Really, for a title, you can't beat The Fountainhead.
Which reminds me, "Dagny" is pronounced "Danni," as in "Danni Ashe" (who should be given the role, BTW).
(indignantly) "My nipples explode with delight!" I don't have Python fully memorized, but I usually know it when I hear/read/see it. I learned juggling in college, for the record.
As for connecting principles, I certainly know many men who would state that "bouncy bouncy" is the force that holds and binds all the universe together. An ur-stuff if you will.
Hmmm. It appears that the Urkobold has unlocked Formerly Known as jp's primal force.
It appears that the Urkobold has unlocked Formerly Known as jp's primal force.
I attribute it to bouncy bouncy, the ur-stuff, even more ur than ur-kobold.
Really, for a title, you can\'t beat The Fountainhead.
No, no, no. That would be Fountain Head.
Hmph.Amateurs...
Junior P----,
I believe that it was Thales of Miletus that posited the theory that all existence could be reduced to "bouncy bouncy".
"Lamar | May 23, 2007, 11:29am | #
It will be quite a challenge to turn Rand's archetypal characters into real people."
Casting the politicians will be easy. Just hire actual politicians. That would be the first real job for some of them.
"Jennifer | May 23, 2007, 2:58pm | #
Maybe it's just me, but I'm starting to think there's something going on between Jennifer and the Urkobold.
For fuck's sake, PL. This is a thread about Ayn Rand novels, and the thought of a creepy abusive masochistic love/hate sex vibe catches you by surprise?
Turn in your decoder ring at once, lightweight."
Nice going, Jennifer. Made me choke on a cinnamon roll, I was laughing so hard at your post. Trying to kill me, you sadist?
"my occasional use of "MORE AMERICAN THAN YOU"-man is similar. He knows that all of you are Athiest America-hating decadent druggie half-breed fag-enabling masturbators, and knows that you dont understand anything unless he types in IN ALL CAPS AND WITHOUT COMMAS BECAUSE A REAL AMERICAN DOESNT NEED COMMAS COMMAS IS PROBABLY COMMIE TOO"
I resent being called an atheist. And you left out "greedy anarchist capitalist-exploiter swine".
uhh in any case im excited that this movie is a possibility. I hope they keep in tact the highly eroticized bridge design scene. I also hope they edit John Galt's speech from one hour 25 minutes to a 4 word catch phrase like: "man, y'all fucking crazy"
# Fluffy | May 23, 2007, 1:22pm | #
# I don't think Atlas would make
# a good film for several reasons:
# 2. It takes place in a magic-realist
# America that combines the attributes
# of many different eras, and would
# therefore have to take place in a
# sort of "Hudsucker Proxy" world that
# I don't think filmgoers would take to.
I disagree with you there. Don't think "fantasy 1940s that never were..." Think "sf 2040s that might yet be..." There are a lot of rail fans out there, and many economic and technological reasons why we might see a revitalized rail system in the near future. The person or persons who make that happen could forge a new modern era of transportation, and be among the class of magnates to which Rand alludes in AS.
Furthermore, politics and economic trends seem cyclical. After a booming entrepreneurial, laissez faire period of several post-millennial decades, in which South America (notably Chile and Argentina) could once again ascend, we could fall back into a statist-socialist global pattern, which would pave the way for the Cuffy Meigses and James Taggarts of the world.
It just seems to me that setting the AS movie in a possible FUTURE, as opposed to an imaginary, parallel universe PAST, would be the better call.
And here's another vote for Mel Gibson as Rearden. I thought he could do Eddie Willers, too, but I think I'd rather see him as Hank.
Antonio Banderas as Francisco!
I used to like Jodie Foster as Dagny. I don't think Angelina is right. What about Jessica Simpson? Yes, I'm serious!
Laura Linney as Lillian Rearden!
Paul Gross as John Galt. Or, if you need someone younger, Christian Bale. Either of them could credibly play Galt as both the janitor and the guru-leader of the "strike." Both can speak Galt's words with conviction and intelligence.
Dagny is pronounced Qwghlm.
Actually, Dagny is properly rendered in speech as "natures".
Jack Elam as Henry Rearden.
The perfect future double bill...
"A first draft of "Karl Marx" is due to be ready for the Festival de Cannes."
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/film/news/e3i8d63c07e815ca7e34c7b7357a1bae56e
Mel Gibson as Hank Rearden
Tom Hanks as Eddie Willers
Ray Liotta as James Taggart
Brad Pitt as John Galt (a one dimensional actor to play a one dimensional role.
Angelina Jolie as Dagny
Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends as...
Shrugged should be a 26-part TV miniseries. Any hour-long or longer scenes of speechifying can be excerpted in the first release, with the full versions available as on demand video through the `net or one's cable or satellite provider. Those will be extras on the DVD release, of course.
The Italians made a decent version of We, The Living.
Kevin