More Details On The FANTASTIC FOUR Fallout Back Josh Trank's Claims

We know where the director of Fantastic Four places the blame for the movie's shortcomings, and we also know how the studio feels about the whole situation. Now, some new information about this debacle would seem to come down in Trank's corner.

By MarkCassidy - Aug 08, 2015 11:08 PM EST
Filed Under: Fantastic Four
Plainly speaking, the Fantastic Four reboot is a complete mess. After a promising start it gets gradually worse until the disjointed, haphazard final act is barely recognizable as the engaging sci-fi superhero movie it started out as. Director Josh Trank recently took to Twitter and suggested his original vision for the film was completely different, and the studio was to blame for how it turned out. Of course, Fox maintains it was Trank’s attitude and behaviour on set which caused the problems. Like most things, the truth is probably somewhere in the middle – but the following report from Collider Movie Talk may help to shed some light on things. Here’s what John Campea had to say:

“I’ve got a source, fairly close to the production of this film, who had told me that the movie that Josh Trank and Fox had agreed on making included 3 really big action set pieces. That was all agreed upon, it was part of the flow of the movie. And a movie is like a puzzle, you have all the pieces in place. You start messing with pieces and suddenly the whole puzzle can look out of whack. And they had agreed upon this vision for a film. And days before production began, Fox came in and made him pull 3 main action sequences out of the film. I was also told, the ending of the film was not even Josh Trank’s. At some point they hijacked the editing bay from him. To the point that the editing of the film was done without him.”

Whether all of that is accurate or not, judging by the finished product it definitely makes sense anyway. Listen to Campea’s comments for yourselves at the link below. Have you seen Fantastic Four yet? What did you think?
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l0rdleg0las
l0rdleg0las - 8/8/2015, 11:14 PM
I don't buy all this face saving being done in favor of Trank. Simple reason that I don't buy it, is because of Disney. Disney looked into the goings on with this movie and director before deciding to dump this hack. If they saw that his antics and eventual Craptastic movie was truly due to Fox screwing him over then he would have remained on that project. The truth is he was just a lucky hack who got to control a very small budget indie that exploded, and is not capable of handling anything bigger than that.

Sure Fox tried to control the movie, but when you are working on a film with that kind of budget as a practically 1st time director, some studio interference is to be expected. They were working with the hopes of creating their own shared universe and Trank, torched those plans with his crap.
TheGambitFreak
TheGambitFreak - 8/8/2015, 11:15 PM
I get that. You can pull shit like this on someone like Joss Whedon, who can mock you up a complete scene minutes before shooting, but for an indie director, you need more notice. THAT, is on Fox. But reports of showing up hammered on set and possibly even doing coke and throwing a hissy fit at your cast and crew doesn't help things. THAT, is on Trank. Man up.
jerryblake
jerryblake - 8/8/2015, 11:15 PM
i saw the report from Collider Movie Talk yesterday thanks to the courtesy of one of the CBM users. You should throw a link fo the report Ror. That home designer reference is pretty great.
AgentZero
AgentZero - 8/8/2015, 11:20 PM
Everybody's pointing out that Josh Trank directed Chronicle which was a great movie.

May I remind everybody that he didn't come up with the idea and didn't write the script. It was from MAX LANDIS !!! Often times the director gets sole credit for a good movie and the screenwriters don't even get acknowledged.

So to me Josh Trank has never proven himself by doing a good movie on his own
jerryblake
jerryblake - 8/8/2015, 11:24 PM
@AgentZero
dude. He "directed it". If you think it was great then it's not probably only because of the script.
Mrsinister
Mrsinister - 8/8/2015, 11:26 PM
hmmmmm. Fox should release a statement next week when final numbers comeout. They'll prob wait untill everything is said and done.
ALegendaryPanda
ALegendaryPanda - 8/8/2015, 11:28 PM
Fox should release an apology for letting this movie hit screens.
jerryblake
jerryblake - 8/8/2015, 11:30 PM
anyway ... [frick] the reports. the movie gonna make billions. You wanna know why ?
All of the sudden most of the people wants to see it. Best marketing ever.
Floke
Floke - 8/8/2015, 11:31 PM
But didnt Trank say that he was the one directing all reshoots?

http://screenrant.com/fantastic-four-matthew-vaughn-josh-trank-reshoot-rumors/
jerryblake
jerryblake - 8/8/2015, 11:33 PM
btw. no wonder that at the beginning marketing for this movie sucks. Fox was busy editing the movie. I'm not sure they even send the marketing crew something to work with.
jerryblake
jerryblake - 8/8/2015, 11:41 PM
SuperiorMrGod
SuperiorMrGod - 8/8/2015, 11:50 PM
@l0rdleg0las

"I don't buy all this face saving being done in favor of Trank. Simple reason that I don't buy it, is because of Disney. Disney looked into the goings on with this movie and director before deciding to dump this hack. If they saw that his antics and eventual Craptastic movie was truly due to Fox screwing him over then he would have remained on that project. The truth is he was just a lucky hack who got to control a very small budget indie that exploded, and is not capable of handling anything bigger than that. "


Or they saw the movie was gonna bomb and didn't want a director attached to a movie like the FF attached to theirs, you ignorant idiot.
Kurban
Kurban - 8/8/2015, 11:57 PM
REVERT REVERT REVERT
jerryblake
jerryblake - 8/8/2015, 11:58 PM
REVERT RIGHTS TO FOX !!!!
DemonHunter
DemonHunter - 8/9/2015, 12:08 AM
Accurate depiction of how Fant4stic was made:

jerryblake
jerryblake - 8/9/2015, 12:08 AM
i think at this point Fox should sell FF rights to Sony who would bring Avi Arad back as the executive producer or maybe even as a director. Orci and Kurtzman could write the screenplay. Maybe Zak Penn. Akiva Goldsman ? Goyer if available ... Maybe they could also bring back Garfield as Mr Fantastic and Stone as Sue. After Sony fails they can make a good deal with Marvel to produce another reboot and put FF in The Secret Wars.
Alphadog
Alphadog - 8/9/2015, 12:12 AM
@l0rdleg0las Josh said he quit the movie. If Fox screwed him over then it's totally possible that he just couldn't handle it anymore. Or Fox fabricated all these reports of Trank's atitude and convinced Disney of the same thing.
@AgentZero Actually Josh was the one who had the idea for the movie. Max just wrote the script. Well not just, that's probably the most important part of the movie.
SirEdwardIV
SirEdwardIV - 8/9/2015, 12:19 AM
@AgentZero

Josh Trank is the creator of Chronicle. He shared his whole three act plan for the story with Max Landis, an old high school classmate of his, who (on the spot) fine-tuned some bits and pieces of it. It was because of Landis' ideas, and his talent as a screenwriter, that Trank decided he wanted him to write the script later on when it was becoming a film. Josh gave him sole credit as the screenwriter.
Get your facts straight before you decide to share any other "righteous" causes with us.
TheOverlord
TheOverlord - 8/9/2015, 12:33 AM
@jerryblake - Fox can't sell the rights to anyone else. They don't actually own them - they just have a contract to use them temporarily. That contract is non-transferable. The rights belong to Marvel and will eventually revert back to them when that contract ends. Marcel is the property owner and only Marvel can sell the rights to use the franchise. (Which, you can be sure, they will never do again, as they only did so out of desperation in the first place due to financial trouble.)
themidnightking
themidnightking - 8/9/2015, 12:33 AM
What happened to the middle of the movie? It was completely missing.
jerryblake
jerryblake - 8/9/2015, 12:41 AM
@TheOverlord

joking ... i was JOKING
RamonSuarez
RamonSuarez - 8/9/2015, 12:42 AM
There once was a director named Trank
Whose movie failed to make bank
For with startling precision
Fox gutted his vision
So badly it destined to tank.
jerryblake
jerryblake - 8/9/2015, 12:44 AM
^what a lovely poem ;)
BlackIceJoe
BlackIceJoe - 8/9/2015, 12:49 AM
I feel bad for Trank and I hope he gets another shot at a movie, this way he can redeem himself. If M. Night Shyamalan can keep making movies why not Josh too? That being said I think Josh should try making an indie film next. Another idea would be some kind of tv series. Wayward Pines has done well for Shyamalan, so maybe doing something like that might be better for him.

I think when this is all said and done his career will be over, because you just don't bite the hand that feeds you. One thing is for sure if he gets another shot, I hope he learns from his mistakes and grows from this experience. Because even if the studio made mistakes, he made them too. So you just have to own up to them and move on.
RamonSuarez
RamonSuarez - 8/9/2015, 12:56 AM
"I feel bad for Trank and I hope he gets another shot at a movie, this way he can redeem himself. If M. Night Shyamalan can keep making movies why not Josh too?"


Because M. Night made his studios lots and lots more money than Trank ever has. Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, Signs, and The Village were very commercially successful films.
RamonSuarez
RamonSuarez - 8/9/2015, 12:57 AM

"Really, Trank? Will you base your entire filmography on ripping off one movie?"


Why not? Tarrantino made a movie career doing it.
jerryblake
jerryblake - 8/9/2015, 1:04 AM
i feel bad for the actors. We still don't know if Trank was having breakdown symptoms before Fox decided to change almost everything or after.


These reviews are probably for them like:


TheSuperguy
TheSuperguy - 8/9/2015, 1:06 AM
This movie is going to become the modern day Superman Lives. The whole movie was really one of most unique and well put together pitches ever. Miles Teller, Kate Mara, Michael B. Jordan, Jamie Bell, and Toby Kebell, from the director of Chronicle, and one of the writers/producers of X-Men: Days of Future Past? Sign me up!

Ultimately, the movie fails because the studio, or the producers, or WHOEVER, did not have faith in the vision they were pitched. I loved the first half of the film. It was going for this smaller scale, personal character drama that deals with the wonders of science, and what we have yet discovered. The whole Negative Zone (or as they call it, Earth Zero, insert disgusted sigh here) experiment felt like a modern day Apollo 11.

Then we hit the "1 year later" title card, and the film falls apart. We're watching obvious reshoots that are thrown together and written by what seems to be an intern. The tone, the character development, everything is thrown out the window in favor of, well, nothing. I've read fan fiction that was more well written than that dialogue.

If Fox had just stuck with Trank's original vision, for better or worse, people would have been kinder to this movie. Even if it sucked, it would have at least been an interesting experiment. Instead what we got was the modern day Corman version. A hastily slapped together turd meant to only keep the rights. But hey, at least we might be getting a Deadpool sequel earlier than expected. At least SOMETHING good came out of this...
jerryblake
jerryblake - 8/9/2015, 1:09 AM
@TheSuperguy

fast tracking the Deadpool sequel might not be a good move. They can really [frick] the sequel up.
RamonSuarez
RamonSuarez - 8/9/2015, 1:21 AM
I don't think people are recognizing the level of sheer asshat buffoonery Fox perpetrated upon Trank and the American viewing public with this film.

For almost a decade the FF property had languished in a dark deep hole controlled by a studio that, at best, was ambivalent towards its commercial and creative potential. Upon Fox almost relinquishing FF's movie rights though sheer indifference, Trank steps in and convinces its studio execs of the properties potential with a very particular off-beat vision for what a reboot could look like.

A 'final script' was hammered out, principal actors were cast, and a budget was set with Trank signing on to helm a project which only he believed in to begin with.

So what does Fox do? Well, with only a few days until principal photography begins some great genius within their braintrust decides that Trank's vision wasn't what they were looking for and cuts out three major action sequences in a script they already approved for production. In the middle of this indecision the budget was slashed, supporting casting was delayed, the special effects supervisor was fired all during production behind Trank's back. This is not even to mention the complete re-editing and re-shooting of important scenes.

Can anyone imagine making a film work in the midst of this chaos? I can't.
BatmanHeisenberg
BatmanHeisenberg - 8/9/2015, 1:31 AM
I blame the structure of the film and the editing, based on rumors, on Fox. The films was very poor in pacing and the action was laughable.

Fox FOXED this movie up, big time. But it's not all their fault.

When you look at each individual scene, and ignore the bad editing, you're left with a movie that has HORRIBLE acting, no chemistry, and just SAD dialogue. The individual story ideas were all just bad. Everything felt cliched, or just downright insulting.

I love the cast too, despite may or may not fitting the role. But they can still do well with a good script and good direction. This film had neither.

The whole idea to bring them to the Negative Zone by being drunk is INSULTING, and I am SURE that was Trank and Kinbergs idea.

Trank has equal blame in this, in my eyes. The direction taken by him is nothing short of empty, sad and weird. I was horrified.

What a shit movie.
HavocPrime
HavocPrime - 8/9/2015, 1:41 AM
Damage control to the extreme as no one wants to accept the fact that they both [frick]ed up.
TheOverlord
TheOverlord - 8/9/2015, 1:49 AM
@jerryblake - don't do that, man -- it's 4am! ;)
AbhiShake
AbhiShake - 8/9/2015, 1:59 AM
We will never know what Josh Trank's original vision was, as he tweeted, but he should've parted ways if FOX intervened so early and heavily in the development of the movie.
Mercwitham0uth
Mercwitham0uth - 8/9/2015, 2:42 AM
I saw it but I didn't pay for it. I downloaded it. Was a waste of time. What a horrible film. Such a boring 1 hour. Some things didn't make sense. Like where the hell did Doom get his cloak from? Did he sew his pubes together over the year to make it? What a shitty climax and the dialogue during it was cringe worthy as [frick].

Also lol @TheAmericanPatriot for using that image I created in meme generator. Good on you.
BlackPhillip
BlackPhillip - 8/9/2015, 2:48 AM
@SuperiorMrGod

If only Disney fired the writers of Spider-Man after seeing how awful Vacation was, critically and financially.
BodieBroadus
BodieBroadus - 8/9/2015, 4:12 AM
This article doesn't include another quote from the same video, where he says another source pretty much confirmed everything he heard from the first source.
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