h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: Alan Smithee: Director... Sort of - A1007759
Author: Count Zero (MosquitoFinder Persuivant and Straitener of phone cords) - U69725

Hope you like it. I would especially like to hear any suggestions for links to other Guide articles.

Like it.

Fascinating!

This is very interesting! It's good to come about an interesting entry in the midst of purely informative ones.

I'm having a lot of fun trying to find a DVD copy of AASFBHB. Here's the conversation when I go to the store. "Yes, I'm looking for a particular particularly bad movie... you probably don't have it...."

Marvellous article, brilliantly written. I always wondered how AS kept on getting more work considering how he invariably turned out such crap films
Just as a matter of interest, Stephen King petitioned to have his name taken off the credits of Lawnmower Man (now the're one which should never have got out of the garden shed). So what name do they use in the case of a disaffected scriptwriter/author?

fm

PS: have you seen Blake Edwards' 'S.O.B.'? That has a very similar plot to An Alan Smithee Film etc.

excellent entry

Sprout

Director Tony Kaye attempted to get his name removed from American History X after he'd been refused final cut of the movie (or, more accurately, after he'd spent 18 months supposedly editing the footage together and still hadn't delivered a final cut). The film was taken off him and (according to many sources) re-edited by the star of the film, Edward Norton. Outraged at this situation, Kaye took out an advert in industry mag Variety moaning about how he'd been treated, and then approached the Directors' Guild of America to have his name taken off the picture. Unfortunately for him, there's a Director's Guild rule that states that directors who want to use pseudonyms (such as 'Alan Smithee') must not talk about why they've had their name removed.

Kaye's later demands to have the film attributed to 'Humpty Dumpty' were also dismissed.

Cracking entry, by the way. Take a look at your American spellings though - British-English spellings are preferred.

I can just see all the Scouts circling for their upcoming feeding frenzy. Pity I've had my three picks

I've been ill a few days so to respond in order...

Felonious Monk, I didn't know that about Lawnmower Man, but it doesn't surprise me. I think he was somewhat successful at removing his name from The Running Man, not that it mattered for either since everyone knew he wrote the stories, (well the stories the movies were VERY loosely based on.) As far as writing credits, I don't know that there is a standard nom de plume. The only other standard I found was "George Spelvin" for actors in the theatre.
As far as S.O.B. goes... I love that movie. I once loaned a copy to a friend and he returned it after only seeing about 5 minutes... you know the pollywollydoodle dance number. He said it was the worst movie he'd ever seen. Can you imagine my smirk when I handed it back and told him he had to try it again with some patience? Of course it was bad... that was the point.


Jimster, I didn't know about American History X's (great flick BTW) bid for smitheeness. During my research I did find a couple of other movies that directors bid to be smithee'd. For instance Michael Mann wanted the TV edit of Heat to remove his name. As far as the non publicity clause, they seem to apply it on a case by case basis. Taking out a full page add definitely crosses the lines, but I know that David Lynch wasn't exactly quiet in his bid. I don't know if Hiller actually WENT to the press, but there was more press about his bid for removal than any other movie I know of. Of course that was surely because the irony was too obvious for the Hollywood press to ignore.
Oh, and I apollyologise for the American spellings. I try, but it's hard to change after 30 plus years. If anyone would be so kind as to just give me a list of the British spellings of misspelled words, I'll make the changes.

Thanks All

make the changes quickly! I've got my eye on this one

I've made some spelling and grammatical changes but I'm going to need some help with UK spellings. I've even tried to spellcheck it through Word, but my version only has English(US). It lets me change to English(UK) but doesn't actually use it to spellcheck. (I hate gates.)

leave it up to the sub-eds if you can't sort out yourself. Believe me, the spelin is the wurst thing abowt this fain artikkl.

kewl

Oh, that's so 20th century!

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WOOHOO

it deserved it.

Good work! You'll excuse me not mentioning the name of the person who wrote this, I just got home...

Okay, CountZero, good job.