Fruits Basket live action - it just keeps getting worse
A little while ago I posted an entry expressing my horror at the news of a Fruits Basket live action movie, being directed by a guy called Joshua Long. Keen to find other people who shared my horror I also started a post about this on mangafox (link: http://forums.mangafox.com/showthread.php?t=215851).
I had previously hoped that this movie could not get any worse, because - frankly - the idea of a 'live-action version of Fruits basket' is so ridiculous in the first place that it would be hard to make it any worse. But no. Turns out it can.
The first massive blow came with this update (which originally came from Joshua's twitter posts): 'This movie is going to be more 'realistic' than the manga or anime version. Therefore, scenes like Tohru living in a tent at the start will not happen.'
WHAT.THE.HELL?!!
Make it more 'realistic'?! The characters turn in to bloody animals for Christ's sake!! And what makes Tohru living in a tent at the start unrealistic anyway?!
And how is she going to end up living with Shigure and the others if they're cutting that scenario then?! Is she going to answer a job add in the paper? Is Shigure going to be some kind foster parent who gets her from the adoption agency? Is she going to blub at school about having no home and Yuki just says 'Hey, come live with me!'? How?! It's so stupid!! And what other 'unrealistic' things are they going to cut out of the story?
To make things even worse, according to people who listened to the interveiw with the director, it sounds like the guy intends to condense all 23 volumes worth of plot in to this movie. That is just impossible. It will be so rushed and confusing, it will end up like the movie adaptation of 'A Series of Unfortunate Events'.
And here is the icing on the cake. Sorasan0000 commented on my last post that our one shred of hope was that, judging by the number of manga adaptations he is doing, this Joshua is a manga fan, who will atleast respect the series when adapting it. Well get a load of this. While talking about the movie during the interview on the ANN, Joshua said that 'Fruits Basket, in it's heart, is basically a silly love story'.
I.WANT.TO.KILL.HIM.
I originally planned to hold back my murderous rage in this post, in case of the very small chance of Joshua ever reading this post, but now I really can't think of enough bad names to call this guy.
Fruits Basket is not 'a silly love story'. The romance aspect is only a small part of the scale of the series. Fruits Basket is in many ways an in depth psychological look at all apects of human emotions, behaviour, and relationships. There is a realism to the series that makes it so poignant and moving. Through reading the series we confront a lot of our own feelings and experiances; almost every reader will at some point come across a scenario where they think 'you know what, that happened to me', and they can relate to it and the feelings of the character involved, whether it be bereavment, bullying or guilt. It is that that makes Fruits Basket so powerful. This Joshua guy claims he is a fan, but that must be bullcrap, because if he was a fan he would know that.
Oh well Sorasan, there goes our last shred of hope for a halfway decent and respectful adaptation of Fruits Basket. OhmysweetloveX said they could see Fruits Basket becoming a romantic comedy - looks like you could be right!
The picture of the upcoming Fruits basket movie is becoming an ever more gruesome image in my head. I just hope it won't get any worse than this. I have a feeling I will be proved wrong again, though.