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screenwriter David Peoples discusses Leviathan

posted 10 years ago by dooovall
5 replies | jump to latest

Check out the interview at the following link. In it, David Webb Peoples (one of the credited screenwriters on Leviathan) describes the project: "It’s not something I’m too proud of. I mean, I worked hard, but the assignment from the studio was to simply write Alien, but underwater."

http://dorkshelf.com/2014/04/02/interview-david-webb-peoples/

[–] TVholic 10 years ago

the assignment from the studio was to simply write Alien, but underwater.

I don't think it came out badly. Was it a masterpiece? No. But I'm willing to watch it every few years. It's a guilty pleasure. On the other hand, I'm one of those weird people who didn't really care for Alien, although I did like Aliens. I actually prefer this movie to Alien, so he can take some solace from that.

[–] RumourdProd 10 years ago

You don't care for Alien?

Once again, there's no accounting for taste.

[–] 10 years ago

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[–] snowleopard 8 years ago

I think he really nailed it with some comments:

(Watching it recently) all I saw were the things that I screwed up and the things that other people had screwed up.

When it gets rewritten...it’s not necessarily another writer that’s rewriting you, but it’s the director.

When Cosmatos came on, he wanted a whole new set of changes that I was really just uncomfortable with, so I left the project entirely. I had imagined the project as something very dark...

This film was loaded with a lot of extremely talented people. He, Stuart, Alex Thompson, Jerry Goldsmith, Stan Winston, more. Even Cosmatos has much better directing credits. And some of these did a very good job here at times, but some of them, and I imagine many others at other times not. His comments that "he, and other people screwed up" really rings true. The sum was definitely inferior to it's individual parts.

I'd love to read his last draft. I also have to wonder what the film had been like if it had been directed in such a dark manner as he envisioned.