That happened to me once when I drank lots of beer and I got stuck in traffic and there was a rain storm and I was on the highway. Im a woman and it was raining and people could probably see my ass on the side of the road but dammit, I got to piss and it was the greatest feeling of my life. I remember the Beatles were playing on the radio, although I cant remember the song but I remember the feeling.
@@misdangered4326 you could have hit the nail on the head and said yellow submarine but ya missed it. See that? Just flew over your head. Sorry. Coulda been a good joke. But I stole it.
Nobody can look like the Judge because he is just a metaphor for the something something of man yatayata, it’s a great book in general but completely almost* completely fictional. *The whole thing about the boy never even taking vengeance against the Judge was very strange as that was quite literally the only thing to do in the Wild West besides sitting on your ass relaxing or working or sleeping or shitting. The Judge by plot is basically invincible although he is just as man as anyone else. I don’t want to be a cunt but there is no trauma back then that disables you from shooting your mortal enemy. I really liked the book though don’t get me wrong.
The glanton gang is supposed to be armed to the teeth, disfigured and surly. Their gear, belts, reigns all fashioned together with human skin. These guys look like Westworld Extras.
To be fair, we don’t have much knowledge of pre-judge Glanton gang, easily they could’ve gone from this to as described in the book within a manner of weeks Especially with the Judge
@@Slickusso I listen to Blood Meridian and the Golden Bough as I sleep, I woke up during that part and was just dumbfounded by McCarthy describing that image.
I thought it was several furs of beasts, not human skin. When I picture what the glanton gang is wearing. I'm thinking a rotted coats that are red in places from the constant blood. I do agree that these guys are too finely dressed
I can see that like a Netflix original limited series it really would have to be on there or HBO cause of how much crazy shit happens in the story and how twisted the judge really is
@@tacobellalugosi2527 Lmfao you think they would keep true to the essence of the work? Really? Nah, better let these types of works stay in their original format.
The book was released in the 80's but I could only imagine an adaptation if Coppola dropped his Heart of Darkness project and went full crazy with Blood Meridian. And of course Marlon Brandon as Judge Holden
Eggers, Coen Brothers, maybe Ari Aster. Ridley Scott was supposed to adapt it in the past as well and I think he could have done a great job. Jan Skarsgard as Judge Holden
It’s weird to think that a bald person would be out in the sun without a cap. The Judge is rarely known to do that in the book. He’ll get sunburned really quickly. The bald look is only for those who know him “intimately”.
@@snowblind9551ive been trying to understand blood meridian more lately. I think maybe when the Judge is getting sunburned, that's the story's events affecting the judge. but at the end when they talking about the judge never sleeping and never dying it's regarding McCarthy's Judge character from our world's perspective? the literary immortality of Blood Meridian's Judge Holden character
@@snowblind9551like to see it as weakness, his inhumane ss and his humanity are two separated things that he cannot control, atleast that’s what I think
My brain just goes back to after Toadvine when he's coming across the desert in other men's clothes with a makeshift parasol. Like a vision of death, the Judge always remains partly enshadowed
I feel like what everyone misses when talking about how hard it would be to film BM is that theres a BIG chunk in the middle where we just don't see the kid. The reader starts putting their own interpretation on what the kid is actually doing for this whole portion, I didn't even realize it was happening when I read it. I don't see how you could do that in a film.
No one misses this. The novel is difficult to adapt which is why every attempt to bring Blood Meridian to the screen ends in limbo. Any adaptation will be significantly different for the sake of narrative.
@@hattorihanzo2275 and for that reason would be a poorer telling of the story. I'm of the opinion that the kid disappearing into the narrative, and his actions being up to our own interpretation, is core to the story
I honestly feel this wouldn’t be that difficult but it would be an interesting directing decision: just don’t have the kid in any of the shots except in the background or sitting at camp in between action. Either that or choose a path. He either participates in the violence or he doesn’t.
We all wonder about potential directors and cast, but honestly you’d also need a phenomenal director of photography to really capture McCarthy’s words. I forget who shot No Country for Old Men, but they did an excellent job from a visual standpoint. Edit: Roger Deakins was DoP, that’s why it was so beautiful. Man’s an artist with decades under his belt.
Vince Gilligan comes to mind as a candidate. The landscape shots in Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul are amazing, the scope of the world those characters inhabit is really captured.
The problem is that what makes BM a great book is the amazing and spectacular language McCarthy uses, the descriptions of the world and without the literature part it's just dark violent story. The book is great and mystical - but just retelling the story without the genius of the books words is useless.
You know I laughed at Tom Hardy but I’m a bit of a sucker for his Bane performance, which I think draws some similarities, specifically the look and some of the language.
The only man for the life of me I can see playing a convincing Judge would be Vincent D’Onofrio, AKA the man who played Kingpin in Netflix’s Daredevil. That man has the size and certainly the acting chops to pull it off. I can think of no other.
imho _The Judge's voice_ is one of the key challenges in making the whole thing work most effectively. As suited as he is in terms of skill and physique, I'm still not sure that D'Onofrio's voice is in the ballpark. Wilson Fisk is intimidating, sure - but he compares to Holden / "the demi-urge in human form" about as well as as ant does to Cthulu.
@@shaft9000all it takes is slight voice tuning. i’m assuming you’re expecting a deep, sultry voice, which i am too. d’onfroyo definitely doesn’t have that voice but it’s nothing modern technology couldn’t patch over.
@@shaft9000 His voice in Daredevil is somewhat close to the audio narrator’s voice for Holden in BM. But given a sort of dignified or sophisticated flare by D’Onofrio with help from speech coaches I certainly think he has the potential to nail it. Less growly like Kingpin and more deep and powerful.
@@Jester-6000 no but im white as snow have a deep voice and generic hair that can be easily edited out all thats needed to make me feel tall is for the camera to be level with the kid’s pelvis
The strength and beauty of the book is the narrative voice, not the dialogue or plot. Any effective adaptation would have to include a voice-over narration.
Well, I could critique this until the cows come home, but I don't think that's the point. It's certainly neat to see someone's attempt at filming Blood Meridian, despite its flaws.
For a Blood Meridian movie to work the aesthetic really needs to be on point. I'm thinking more of a neo western aesthetic, something along the the mixes of Mad Max Fury Road, Breaking Bad desert scenes, and No Country For Old Men. Along with this there needs to be a lot of religious almost hellish imagery to pair with it. Cormac has stated that Dante's Inferno and Paradise Lost inspired a lot of Blood Meridian and even the gunpowder volcano scene is a direct copy of a similar scene in Paradise Lost.
I disagree and think they should go as historically accurate to the time of the actual Glanton Gang as possible and they should make it gritty, dusty and bloody. It could be done.
This sounds awful. Reality is surreal and gothic enough without a corny forced aesthetic. The gang wears rotting pelts of beasts and broadcloth rags and belts and bandoliers and trophys made from the skin and flesh of butchered humans.
@@tdubya97 the realistic tone worked for NCFOM but Blood Meridian is more grander and almost fantasy like. The realistic tone would completely kneecap the book and make it feel less. I guess the violence would be more impactful if it were realistic but I just think the movie would be better if it was stylized. Plus if it were, the movie would be made instead of being censored. If it had this style then it could probably get away with majority of the violence and it would look sick as fuck.
@@tsukamotomann Tone is different from production design and wardrobe. Obviously a blood meridian film would need a feverish and nightmare feel, but you can accomplish that while still cleaving close to the material reality of blood and guts in the Mexican borderlands.
The prolific violence in Blood Meridian as written would never pass the movie censors. Not even for an R rating or to be acceptable even on HBO as a miniseries. Too much would need to be cut for any film adaptation to be even remotely faithful to the source material. I am currently reading it again for the fifth time and it is still brutally shocking. There is no need for a watered down film version.
Yeah, I agree with Dan In Reddy - you can do a lot of it offscreen. You film one of the Delawares swinging the babies, but not actually their skulls hitting the rocks. Sometimes the most moving violence is left offscreen.
I've recommended Blood Meridian to dozens of my friends and coworkers and even let many of them borrow my copy just so I would have someone, anyone to talk to about it. All but 1 of them returned it the very next day. One coworker said it was nothing but gore and filth. A few of them won't even speak to me anymore because they believe I tried traumatizing them. The one who did finish it asked me for more recommendations and is now a huge fan of Cormac McCarthy, Lovecraft, Neil Gaiman, Alan Moore, Mike Mignola,Robert E. Howard and Junji Ito.
If they do the book justice in movie form it would leave the audience speechless and traumatized lol but I really want to see it on the big screen it would be amazing
It would be almost impossible to do the book justice. The book is an absolute masterpiece. Any feature length depiction would fail miserably. The only way to do it would be to faithfully capture every moment in exacting detail in a long form miniseries. Capturing the spirit of the book as many adaptations do would take a great screen writer of whom there are precious few still operating.
The Revenant seemed very Blood Meridian inspired, and good, but still hope they never adapt it for screen. The prose are so lyrical, the Richard Poe narrated audiobook is far better than any theatrical version I could imagine.
A brave attempt to film an unfilmable book. The dialogue is straight from the novel, though Judge Holden should be more imposing (nearly 7 feet tall in the book). For movies, I understand the characters have to be somewhat presentable. But these filibusters look too healthy and well-fed. A description of Glanton's gang from the novel: 'Haggard and haunted and blackened from the sun. The lines and pores of their skin deeply grimed with gunblack where they'd washed the bores of their weapons. Even the horses looked alien... decked as they were in human hair and teeth and skin. Save for their guns and buckles and a few pieces of metal in the harness of the animals there was nothing about these arrivals to suggest even the discovery of the wheel.'
Maybe Cormac is a secret genius. He might've written the book in a certain way where it would be nearly impossible to adapt into film to make sense coherently. Reminds me of Alan Moore. He wrote those stories specifically for the comic book medium. He wrote pages of notes for the artists, colourists and editors to get points across that you can't do with film/television.
Thanks so much for uploading this! I thought this might remain a piece of lost media forever. This honestly isn’t as bad as I thought it would be. I would have picked different actors, at least for the Judge, and a better setting, but some of the pieces are here.
The setting is perfect. A real DP on photography, and it would be more than perfect. The acting, especially the dialogue by The Kid, is a little flat, but it's test footage. What would you have chosen- Arnold, Sly and the bloated loon Deniro on the Mersey? Lena Dunham and Lady Gaga as the baddest of the bad gang members who turn into love interests once they get to the ferry? Anyone who attempts a film adaptation of Blood Meridian gets a chance to fail, or make a masterpiece, and I'll stand back and eagerly await the result.
When you read the book, the landscape, the smells, the sounds, the silence, the voices all of Blood Meridian is in your mind's eye, ear, nose, tongue, skin all of your senses, organs and gut. Who can capture that in two dimensions. It's the beautiful prose that makes Blood Meridian what it is. Without the prose it's just another, be it X-rated, western. A commercial meat packing plant that you can tour.
Sorry, sent too soon. Sum it up by saying no dif than touring a meat packing business. The book is the thing the way Cormac McCarthy created it or it's ... bloody junk.
There are still passages out of that book that I think of in my head randomly after over a decade from the last time I read it. The only other novel that stuck to me in such a potent way was Naked Lunch.
It’s one hell of a journey. I don’t want to see (on screen) the baby tree, or scouts hanging by the ankle tendons, brains boiled out, or the old woman with Glanton’s pistol firing into her skull. And that’s only a start! Cheers!
I lent this book to a coworker after lending him The Road and I warned him that it was very disturbing at times. "What could possibly be worse than a headless newborn roasting on a spit?" Ummm...... Yeah he didn't talk to me for like a month after this one.
Absolutely well said. I loved reading your comment. Story in great lit is progenitive and moves from mind to mind, and the process of depiction destroys the process. To "work" on film it has to be redone. And when the finished product is accepted by the viewer it is like but other than what's written. IMHO Blood Meridian should in reverence be left alone.
The Judge's height is literally the last thing that should be considered when casting. The ability to pull off the sweeping monologues, to come across as both imposing and charismatic, and the ability to believably pull off fluency in multiple languages and areas of study are all WAY more important
I don’t really believe he has a southern or even English accent, just plain American, he’s just plain evil as is. He is not involved with anything or anybody. He’s just Evil itself. He will never die, and he’s still well with us.
@@thebigshep All characteristics of each of these characters should be considered equally when casting for a work like this. Your attitude is why great works get shitty adaptations.
This is test footage. In The Lord of The Rings, none of the hobits were actually 3 feet tall. They used clever editing and camera tricks to make others appear taller than them. I'd imagine if this pasted testing phase, they would've done the same.
Mark Pellegrino is the actor playing the Judge. He played Lucifer in Supernatural, among other roles. He's a great actor and can be truly haunting in his performance. I'm sure he could pull the Judge off if he worked on the voice and his physicality.
To be honest i can't imagine it as live action, with the right art style i could see it more as a series of graphic novels, but even then its the thought of someone having to be all in on portraying the many violent acts within the book and capturing that atmosphere
He really would have been the right man. With all his boldness, he would have turned the whole thing on its head and created true art beyond all conventions. No Hollywood director today has the courage or freedom to do that. That's why you can forget about the adaptation.
Interesting find, but wow did they ever miss the mark when it came to casting Judge Holden. The traits that are supposed to immediately typify the Judge are completely absent. His size, complexion, clothes, etc. are almost completely opposite to how he's described in the book, apart from the fact that he's completely bald- including eyebrows, etc. Additionally weird casting choice since he barely speaks. All they really needed was a tall, fat, bald dude who has some modicum of acting experience and was willing to shave his eyebrows.
In film you'd have to make the Judge completely alien to his encounterers. A monk-like poet-warrior-scientist fits the bill. He is imposing in this test film in his own way. He is imposing in the way all these "hard men" follow him willingly.
I like the way that this video is filmed like a snuff film, with no real center point within the different scenes and no emphasis put on one specific thing, regardless of how important said thing is. It's very similar to the way that the book was written.
I don’t think Blood Meridian can possibly be made into a movie, even as a 3.5 hour epic you couldn’t possibly capture everything in the book. I feel like it could only work as a mini series with 8 or so episodes. Not only does a movie limit the amount of content, but the slow-burn, atmospheric sort of storytelling would be lost in a rushed format.
A 3 hour epic could work, Daniel day lewis or Russell Crowe(think Russell in 3:10 to Yuma) could pull off the judge. The cinematography would have to be amazing to capture the land and colors of the sky which is a huge part of the book, get the Coen bros, Paul Thomas Anderson or Quentin Tarantino and it could be done
Oh goodness the portrayal of the Judge here is not at all what I would have imagined lol. Not seven feet tall, not pale white, no booming voice like I'd imagine. This guy does not embody the judge by any means.
Sending Franco out to do this movie is like letting the Idiot out of his cage to pilot an airplane. It's so crazy it might just work--but everyone knows it won't. Also, hand-held cameras aren't gonna cut it with a tale this riveting.
Good to see this again. I thought maybe the Judge had written it in his book and then destroyed it. I'm pretty sure Franco made it as a test reel to attract investors so its not a perfect rendition. Good scene to use, exciting like a conventional western. Maybe he was hoping to get the money and start production before they looked too close at the source material.
I can forgive the bad sound editing and cheap effects. I can forgive the fact that the gang just looks waaaaay too clean and healthy and pampered and I'll even look past Dylan from 90210 leading the Glanton gang, a gang of ruffians and scalp hunters mind you. But one of literatures greatest villains, an albino beast of a man/literally the charismatic silver tongued devil being a silent average human who cant even match the screen presence of Scott Glenn is why I despise this so much and why the 32:33 felt like a 3 hr runtime
Man, a film adaptation of the book would be great in the right hands and circumstances.. But this sure as hell wouldn't have been it. "PISS FOR THE LOVE OF CHRIST, PISS!"
Even *if* there was a director or showrunner out there that could get close to it, no network in existence would get anywhere near the essence of the original work. They would leave out some part of the poeticism, violence, language of the time, you name it. And if you leave any part of this work out, it would lose that essence. If you want to experience it, read the book and imagine it in your mind's eye. Good God Almighty.
Michael Mann and HEAT be vanquished! Behold, the Blood Meridian shootout. Legend has it they used the sound of actual popcorn machines discharging in a men's restroom for the gunfire.
John Hillcoat could do the book justice. He already did a great job with McCarthys the Road and the proposition is basically blood Meridian in Australia
That piss scene went exactly how i saw it in my mind's eye while reading it, amazing. I thought it was just going to be referenced briefly but they did a great job
He’s a good actor but he’s not the judge. He’s like 5’9 lol Edit: btw luke Perry actually makes a pretty convincing glanton I expected someone like Josh brolin but Perry definitely has the look
If its going to be shot like your average western, dudes on horses, campfires and dust..then it will completely miss the psychedelic otherworldly state this story truly exists within.
might not be perfect, but its all we have of a film adaptation for now! and I’m glad it exists. everybody claims its unfilmable but film is young and the greatest works are yet to be made; HBO can do almost anything and have reset the standard for TV at least three times in the past two decades.
Stop cucking for this peice of crap,soap opera quality pucelige. " honey! I forgot to get food for dinner but theres a can of beef and salmon dog food, is that okay?" aaaa, yes ...dear. are their chips?
If this film ever gets made I would love to see John Goodman in the role of The Judge...this portrayal of him didn't cut it for me, the actor was too young for one thing.
Funnily enough, for as densely literary as Blood Meridian is, I believe a film adaptation made in the spirit of silent cinema would be best suited for it. It could have the scope and grandiosity of Griffith or Stroheim. McCarthy's otherworldy prose could allow for a more surreal, exaggerated depiction of its settings in the vein of, say, German expressionism. The Judge could modeled on horror icons like Conrad Veidt from The Man Who Laughs.
I think the true inspiration for this was the incredibly violent narco-wars that were going on in the 80's around this area, rather than the supposed violence of the old Wast.
I find it interesting that they are adapting the scene from the book that alludes to or copies Paradise Lost, and the actor they cast as the Judge portrayed Lucifer himself in Supernatural. I’m not sure what the quality of the final film would have been but I truly respect this attempt bearing in mind it’s test footage. I care not for Franco’s controversies, I care about analyzing art independent of its creator. And so far he and his crew are the only ones with the balls to attempt adapting even a single scene from this book and it’s a shame it was scrubbed off the internet as lost media.
Well, this doesn't prove that 'Blood Meridian' can't be filmed; only that the search for the right screenwriter, director, & cast still needs to go on.
Coen Bros. or Hillcoat. Looks like Hillcoat is gonna make it. The Road was pretty darn good. Funny thing is, Hillcoat looks just about how I picture the Judge.
PISS FOR YOUR LIVES.
Lmao, piss man piss
Cant you see the redskins yonder?
That happened to me once when I drank lots of beer and I got stuck in traffic and there was a rain storm and I was on the highway. Im a woman and it was raining and people could probably see my ass on the side of the road but dammit, I got to piss and it was the greatest feeling of my life. I remember the Beatles were playing on the radio, although I cant remember the song but I remember the feeling.
@@abandonedmuseAre you sure it wasn’t ‘Yellow River’ by Urethra Franklin?
@@misdangered4326 you could have hit the nail on the head and said yellow submarine but ya missed it. See that? Just flew over your head. Sorry. Coulda been a good joke. But I stole it.
@@abandonedmuse Ah, you won. At least I didn’t take the piss though 🙂
A Blood Meridian movie that exists without my knowledge exists without my consent.
Judge,is that you?
HOLY SHIT JUDGE HOLDEN
7:52 So in James Franco’s mind, the Judge is season 5 Eric Andre.
BAHAHAHHAHAHA😭😭
He didn't do too bad portraying the judge but he definitely doesn't fit the part
Ohhh my f**king god I almost died laughing 😂😂😂😂
Nobody can look like the Judge because he is just a metaphor for the something something of man yatayata, it’s a great book in general but completely almost* completely fictional. *The whole thing about the boy never even taking vengeance against the Judge was very strange as that was quite literally the only thing to do in the Wild West besides sitting on your ass relaxing or working or sleeping or shitting. The Judge by plot is basically invincible although he is just as man as anyone else. I don’t want to be a cunt but there is no trauma back then that disables you from shooting your mortal enemy. I really liked the book though don’t get me wrong.
@@JamalTheCreamMachineinteresting
The glanton gang is supposed to be armed to the teeth, disfigured and surly. Their gear, belts, reigns all fashioned together with human skin. These guys look like Westworld Extras.
To be fair, we don’t have much knowledge of pre-judge Glanton gang, easily they could’ve gone from this to as described in the book within a manner of weeks
Especially with the Judge
And that one guy with old ass Spaniard armor.
@@KenobiStark1That was one of the Comanches that attacked the US army in the beginning not a member of the glanton gang
@@Slickusso I listen to Blood Meridian and the Golden Bough as I sleep, I woke up during that part and was just dumbfounded by McCarthy describing that image.
I thought it was several furs of beasts, not human skin. When I picture what the glanton gang is wearing. I'm thinking a rotted coats that are red in places from the constant blood. I do agree that these guys are too finely dressed
I think this would do a lot better as like a 10-12 episode series with like hour + runtimes to truly capture the story start to finish
I can see that like a Netflix original limited series it really would have to be on there or HBO cause of how much crazy shit happens in the story and how twisted the judge really is
@@tacobellalugosi2527 Lmfao you think they would keep true to the essence of the work? Really? Nah, better let these types of works stay in their original format.
That show would not last if it was even remotely faithful
Yeah Netflix can’t adapt anything. They’ve ruined the Witcher, cowboy bebop, death note etc.
After wendigoon just spent 5 hours explaining it to me, it definitely needs an episodic approach. A movie wouldn't be able to fit it all in well.
The book was released in the 80's but I could only imagine an adaptation if Coppola dropped his Heart of Darkness project and went full crazy with Blood Meridian. And of course Marlon Brandon as Judge Holden
weirdly enough i always imagined judge holden to look like brando as well
Cormac actually said that the Judge was based on Satan from Paradise Lost and Kurtz from the Heart of Darkness
Marlon Brando as the Judge? You can’t be serious.
I played with the idea to have the judge being portrayed by John Goodman, but he´s now a little to old for that, I guess. Now come lynch me :)
@@thesun564 why not?
The one filmmaker I feel could adapt "Blood Meridian" is Robert Eggers. I would love to see that happen
I can see that… I’ve always said Alejandro Gonzales Innaritu… but Eggers has got the chops to pull it off.
@COOL STORY BRO I think he would understand the Judge and pull off his unsettling nature better than anyone.
Eggers or the Coens would be my pick.
@@nickasaro8789 I think the Coens would be a safer bet, but I think Eggers would be able to capture the horror of the Judge better than they could.
Eggers, Coen Brothers, maybe Ari Aster. Ridley Scott was supposed to adapt it in the past as well and I think he could have done a great job.
Jan Skarsgard as Judge Holden
It’s weird to think that a bald person would be out in the sun without a cap.
The Judge is rarely known to do that in the book. He’ll get sunburned really quickly.
The bald look is only for those who know him “intimately”.
An albino Bald person at that
I always thought it was weird how the Judge is human enough to get sunburned, but inhuman enough to never sleep, eat, or age.
@@snowblind9551ive been trying to understand blood meridian more lately. I think maybe when the Judge is getting sunburned, that's the story's events affecting the judge. but at the end when they talking about the judge never sleeping and never dying it's regarding McCarthy's Judge character from our world's perspective? the literary immortality of Blood Meridian's Judge Holden character
@@snowblind9551like to see it as weakness, his inhumane ss and his humanity are two separated things that he cannot control, atleast that’s what I think
My brain just goes back to after Toadvine when he's coming across the desert in other men's clothes with a makeshift parasol. Like a vision of death, the Judge always remains partly enshadowed
if Blood Meridian were a corporate training film...
I feel like what everyone misses when talking about how hard it would be to film BM is that theres a BIG chunk in the middle where we just don't see the kid. The reader starts putting their own interpretation on what the kid is actually doing for this whole portion, I didn't even realize it was happening when I read it. I don't see how you could do that in a film.
Blood Meridian is not about the Kid it’s about Manifest Destiny aka the Judge. 🤭😎
And the kid is the lens through which we see that
No one misses this. The novel is difficult to adapt which is why every attempt to bring Blood Meridian to the screen ends in limbo. Any adaptation will be significantly different for the sake of narrative.
@@hattorihanzo2275 and for that reason would be a poorer telling of the story. I'm of the opinion that the kid disappearing into the narrative, and his actions being up to our own interpretation, is core to the story
I honestly feel this wouldn’t be that difficult but it would be an interesting directing decision: just don’t have the kid in any of the shots except in the background or sitting at camp in between action. Either that or choose a path. He either participates in the violence or he doesn’t.
We all wonder about potential directors and cast, but honestly you’d also need a phenomenal director of photography to really capture McCarthy’s words. I forget who shot No Country for Old Men, but they did an excellent job from a visual standpoint.
Edit: Roger Deakins was DoP, that’s why it was so beautiful. Man’s an artist with decades under his belt.
The movie has another make in the works rn. They picked a director who knew Mccarthy
Vince Gilligan comes to mind as a candidate. The landscape shots in Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul are amazing, the scope of the world those characters inhabit is really captured.
Roger motherf@#$ing Deakins... That is his real name.
Starring Johnny Sins as The Judge
i think he would actually do a decent job
Terrifying
rape scenes stunt double
Gérard Depardieu
Johnny is too wholesome
The problem is that what makes BM a great book is the amazing and spectacular language McCarthy uses, the descriptions of the world and without the literature part it's just dark violent story. The book is great and mystical - but just retelling the story without the genius of the books words is useless.
Exactly! And that's why it's unfilmable.
Everyone’s commenting about the casting like this wasn’t test footage. Franco has said he wanted to get Tom Hardy or Joel Egerton for the role
But seriously, what's test footages even for?
This guy playing Holden is literally Satan from Supernatural lol
You know I laughed at Tom Hardy but I’m a bit of a sucker for his Bane performance, which I think draws some similarities, specifically the look and some of the language.
@@aqueminiaturehardy can play psychopathic roles too, watch him in bronson or legend
The only man for the life of me I can see playing a convincing Judge would be Vincent D’Onofrio, AKA the man who played Kingpin in Netflix’s Daredevil. That man has the size and certainly the acting chops to pull it off. I can think of no other.
Excellent observation and idea!
imho _The Judge's voice_ is one of the key challenges in making the whole thing work most effectively.
As suited as he is in terms of skill and physique, I'm still not sure that D'Onofrio's voice is in the ballpark.
Wilson Fisk is intimidating, sure - but he compares to Holden / "the demi-urge in human form" about as well as as ant does to Cthulu.
@@shaft9000all it takes is slight voice tuning. i’m assuming you’re expecting a deep, sultry voice, which i am too. d’onfroyo definitely doesn’t have that voice but it’s nothing modern technology couldn’t patch over.
@@shaft9000 His voice in Daredevil is somewhat close to the audio narrator’s voice for Holden in BM. But given a sort of dignified or sophisticated flare by D’Onofrio with help from speech coaches I certainly think he has the potential to nail it. Less growly like Kingpin and more deep and powerful.
He’s a good choice. Tbh Javier bardem would be good too lol
This would have to be super gritty, with unknown actors and sparce dialogue.....don't let Franco anywhere near it
@@HellwatervaAre you big, albino and hairless?
@@Hellwatervawho tf r you
@@Jester-6000 no but im white as snow have a deep voice and generic hair that can be easily edited out all thats needed to make me feel tall is for the camera to be level with the kid’s pelvis
Lmao my thoughts exactly Franco couldn’t make a coherent film unless it was about stoners and teenage 🐱
@@Hellwatervado it and post it to TH-cam
The strength and beauty of the book is the narrative voice, not the dialogue or plot. Any effective adaptation would have to include a voice-over narration.
Agreed. Like Willard’s narration in Apocalypse Now.
Well, I could critique this until the cows come home, but I don't think that's the point. It's certainly neat to see someone's attempt at filming Blood Meridian, despite its flaws.
For a Blood Meridian movie to work the aesthetic really needs to be on point. I'm thinking more of a neo western aesthetic, something along the the mixes of Mad Max Fury Road, Breaking Bad desert scenes, and No Country For Old Men. Along with this there needs to be a lot of religious almost hellish imagery to pair with it. Cormac has stated that Dante's Inferno and Paradise Lost inspired a lot of Blood Meridian and even the gunpowder volcano scene is a direct copy of a similar scene in Paradise Lost.
I feel like a natural born killers vibe would work in some scenes/aspects aswell
I disagree and think they should go as historically accurate to the time of the actual Glanton Gang as possible and they should make it gritty, dusty and bloody. It could be done.
This sounds awful. Reality is surreal and gothic enough without a corny forced aesthetic. The gang wears rotting pelts of beasts and broadcloth rags and belts and bandoliers and trophys made from the skin and flesh of butchered humans.
@@tdubya97 the realistic tone worked for NCFOM but Blood Meridian is more grander and almost fantasy like. The realistic tone would completely kneecap the book and make it feel less. I guess the violence would be more impactful if it were realistic but I just think the movie would be better if it was stylized. Plus if it were, the movie would be made instead of being censored. If it had this style then it could probably get away with majority of the violence and it would look sick as fuck.
@@tsukamotomann Tone is different from production design and wardrobe. Obviously a blood meridian film would need a feverish and nightmare feel, but you can accomplish that while still cleaving close to the material reality of blood and guts in the Mexican borderlands.
When you get the most important character messed up you mess up the whole thing
im really happy that james franco wasn't greenlit to make this.
The judge? The best judge would be Brando out of Apocolypse now. Thats how I saw him.
This is the way. But with less mumbling.
I think for a modern actor after watching the recent Dune Stellan Skarsgard would be pretty good.
EXACTLY MY THOUGHTS@@valenmahoney2014
@@valenmahoney2014I can see that
Vincent D'Onofrio could do an amazing job too.@@valenmahoney2014
This was pretty terrible. I’m glad they didn’t move forward with it. Blood meridian should be a long series on hbo.
My thoughts exactly!
Series are cringe. And certainly you don't need to make it a long one. A dense 3-4hr epic would be the best scenerio. But I do agree this sucks ass.
I loved the part where he's screaming about the piss.
Really though I was glad they included those last lines. Those were great in the book.
Woke HBO...the kid is transgender and him and the judge have a romantic relationship.
@@js9550 Not that far off the source material tbh
The prolific violence in Blood Meridian as written would never pass the movie censors. Not even for an R rating or to be acceptable even on HBO as a miniseries. Too much would need to be cut for any film adaptation to be even remotely faithful to the source material. I am currently reading it again for the fifth time and it is still brutally shocking. There is no need for a watered down film version.
I think you could make a film adaption 'psychologically dangerous'... You can imply...
Bone Tomahawk is the only film I've seen that's even remotely in the same vein as Blood Meridian.
Good flick, nothing close though.
Yeah, I agree with Dan In Reddy - you can do a lot of it offscreen. You film one of the Delawares swinging the babies, but not actually their skulls hitting the rocks. Sometimes the most moving violence is left offscreen.
I've recommended Blood Meridian to dozens of my friends and coworkers and even let many of them borrow my copy just so I would have someone, anyone to talk to about it. All but 1 of them returned it the very next day. One coworker said it was nothing but gore and filth. A few of them won't even speak to me anymore because they believe I tried traumatizing them. The one who did finish it asked me for more recommendations and is now a huge fan of Cormac McCarthy, Lovecraft, Neil Gaiman, Alan Moore, Mike Mignola,Robert E. Howard and Junji Ito.
@@ProudGirlDadX2 All I can say is for most people, it's a lot. And that's putting it mildly. But they don't get McCarthy. Too bad for them, IMO.
If they do the book justice in movie form it would leave the audience speechless and traumatized lol but I really want to see it on the big screen it would be amazing
It would be almost impossible to do the book justice. The book is an absolute masterpiece. Any feature length depiction would fail miserably. The only way to do it would be to faithfully capture every moment in exacting detail in a long form miniseries. Capturing the spirit of the book as many adaptations do would take a great screen writer of whom there are precious few still operating.
The only thing that's impossible is for James Franco to make a good movie.
Stop assuming that because most movie making now is brain dead that blood meridian is inherently averse to being adapted.
The Revenant seemed very Blood Meridian inspired, and good, but still hope they never adapt it for screen. The prose are so lyrical, the Richard Poe narrated audiobook is far better than any theatrical version I could imagine.
@@mmurmurjohnson2368 cope
It's completely impossible. You could never even cast the Judge. So much would have to be altered to the point that it barely resembles the book.
A brave attempt to film an unfilmable book. The dialogue is straight from the novel, though Judge Holden should be more imposing (nearly 7 feet tall in the book).
For movies, I understand the characters have to be somewhat presentable. But these filibusters look too healthy and well-fed. A description of Glanton's gang from the novel:
'Haggard and haunted and blackened from the sun. The lines and pores of their skin deeply grimed with gunblack where they'd washed the bores of their weapons. Even the horses looked alien... decked as they were in human hair and teeth and skin. Save for their guns and buckles and a few pieces of metal in the harness of the animals there was nothing about these arrivals to suggest even the discovery of the wheel.'
Lol. Every paragraph in that book is worded impossibly well. It's just unbelievable. Can't believe a human being actually wrote it.
Maybe Cormac is a secret genius. He might've written the book in a certain way where it would be nearly impossible to adapt into film to make sense coherently. Reminds me of Alan Moore. He wrote those stories specifically for the comic book medium. He wrote pages of notes for the artists, colourists and editors to get points across that you can't do with film/television.
his genius is no secret
he literally won the genius grant... not the secret genius grant
@@Brandon-tk2rw Oh lol
"Genius is as common as dirt." - John Taylor Gatto
Imagine if it was adapted like Vinland Saga...
It may be bad, but he tried. Much more then us couch potatoes could do. Maybe this made him a better director/actor.
This must be the most incongruent ill-fitted misconceived concept of Judge Holden there could ever be. Disney would make a better version.
tbf its just a very very early test screening, actors get replaced all the time in those
I have been looking for this footage for ages thank you for uploading
This is horrific, and not in the way it's meant to be
Thanks so much for uploading this! I thought this might remain a piece of lost media forever. This honestly isn’t as bad as I thought it would be. I would have picked different actors, at least for the Judge, and a better setting, but some of the pieces are here.
its horrible, like a made for tv episode of a docu-drama.
Mark Pellegrino is very capable at playing menacing and sometimes horrifying villains. I think if this pasted testing phase, he would've killed it.
@@blakerackley8874it’s literally just test footage
It should have stayed that way.
The setting is perfect. A real DP on photography, and it would be more than perfect. The acting, especially the dialogue by The Kid, is a little flat, but it's test footage.
What would you have chosen- Arnold, Sly and the bloated loon Deniro on the Mersey? Lena Dunham and Lady Gaga as the baddest of the bad gang members who turn into love interests once they get to the ferry? Anyone who attempts a film adaptation of Blood Meridian gets a chance to fail, or make a masterpiece, and I'll stand back and eagerly await the result.
When you read the book, the landscape, the smells, the sounds, the silence, the voices all of Blood Meridian is in your mind's eye, ear, nose, tongue, skin all of your senses, organs and gut. Who can capture that in two dimensions. It's the beautiful prose that makes Blood Meridian what it is. Without the prose it's just another, be it X-rated, western. A commercial meat packing plant that you can tour.
Sorry, sent too soon. Sum it up by saying no dif than touring a meat packing business. The book is the thing the way Cormac McCarthy created it or it's ... bloody junk.
There are still passages out of that book that I think of in my head randomly after over a decade from the last time I read it.
The only other novel that stuck to me in such a potent way was Naked Lunch.
It’s one hell of a journey. I don’t want to see (on screen) the baby tree, or scouts hanging by the ankle tendons, brains boiled out, or the old woman with Glanton’s pistol firing into her skull. And that’s only a start! Cheers!
I lent this book to a coworker after lending him The Road and I warned him that it was very disturbing at times. "What could possibly be worse than a headless newborn roasting on a spit?" Ummm...... Yeah he didn't talk to me for like a month after this one.
Absolutely well said. I loved reading your comment. Story in great lit is progenitive and moves from mind to mind, and the process of depiction destroys the process. To "work" on film it has to be redone. And when the finished product is accepted by the viewer it is like but other than what's written. IMHO Blood Meridian should in reverence be left alone.
In the book the Judge is at least six and a half feet tall. But, on the whole, this looks like a noble attempt.
The Judge's height is literally the last thing that should be considered when casting. The ability to pull off the sweeping monologues, to come across as both imposing and charismatic, and the ability to believably pull off fluency in multiple languages and areas of study are all WAY more important
I don’t really believe he has a southern or even English accent, just plain American, he’s just plain evil as is. He is not involved with anything or anybody. He’s just Evil itself. He will never die, and he’s still well with us.
@@thebigshep All characteristics of each of these characters should be considered equally when casting for a work like this. Your attitude is why great works get shitty adaptations.
This is test footage. In The Lord of The Rings, none of the hobits were actually 3 feet tall. They used clever editing and camera tricks to make others appear taller than them. I'd imagine if this pasted testing phase, they would've done the same.
Mark Pellegrino is the actor playing the Judge. He played Lucifer in Supernatural, among other roles. He's a great actor and can be truly haunting in his performance. I'm sure he could pull the Judge off if he worked on the voice and his physicality.
To be honest i can't imagine it as live action, with the right art style i could see it more as a series of graphic novels, but even then its the thought of someone having to be all in on portraying the many violent acts within the book and capturing that atmosphere
Jodorowsky's Blood Meridian would be a trip to watch....
He really would have been the right man. With all his boldness, he would have turned the whole thing on its head and created true art beyond all conventions. No Hollywood director today has the courage or freedom to do that. That's why you can forget about the adaptation.
This actor isn’t speaking the way that they should. He doesn’t have the cadence right.
The Judge in this short is too “normal”; he needs to be BIG in every sense - body and word.
"some bears dance, some bears don't dance"
Interesting find, but wow did they ever miss the mark when it came to casting Judge Holden. The traits that are supposed to immediately typify the Judge are completely absent. His size, complexion, clothes, etc. are almost completely opposite to how he's described in the book, apart from the fact that he's completely bald- including eyebrows, etc. Additionally weird casting choice since he barely speaks. All they really needed was a tall, fat, bald dude who has some modicum of acting experience and was willing to shave his eyebrows.
Vincent D’onofrio or the guy who played Errol Childress in True Detective would be excellent choices (especially the latter)
Brendan Fraser!
The scene where Holden scalps the child while it sits peacefully on his lap would earn the film a distribution killing NC-17.
In film you'd have to make the Judge completely alien to his encounterers. A monk-like poet-warrior-scientist fits the bill. He is imposing in this test film in his own way. He is imposing in the way all these "hard men" follow him willingly.
It is test footage, none of this is final. The casting obviously would have changed
I like the way that this video is filmed like a snuff film, with no real center point within the different scenes and no emphasis put on one specific thing, regardless of how important said thing is. It's very similar to the way that the book was written.
It's because it's a bunch of compiled test footage lol. It's not deliberate.
I don’t think Blood Meridian can possibly be made into a movie, even as a 3.5 hour epic you couldn’t possibly capture everything in the book. I feel like it could only work as a mini series with 8 or so episodes. Not only does a movie limit the amount of content, but the slow-burn, atmospheric sort of storytelling would be lost in a rushed format.
A 3 hour epic could work, Daniel day lewis or Russell Crowe(think Russell in 3:10 to Yuma) could pull off the judge. The cinematography would have to be amazing to capture the land and colors of the sky which is a huge part of the book, get the Coen bros, Paul Thomas Anderson or Quentin Tarantino and it could be done
that’s so sad that we’re never gonna see this completed movie with luke perry.
I like seeing the visualisation of book and somewhat coming to life, perhaps the best part in the book.
Why is the judge a regular bald guy
I appreciate that even this was made. But imo Blood Meridian should be an HBO mini series. Like true detective season 1
What finally gets me, is they got the same actor who played SATEN in Supernatural……damn good casting in terms of test footage
Oh goodness the portrayal of the Judge here is not at all what I would have imagined lol. Not seven feet tall, not pale white, no booming voice like I'd imagine. This guy does not embody the judge by any means.
That which exists without my knowledge, exists without my consent.
Sending Franco out to do this movie is like letting the Idiot out of his cage to pilot an airplane. It's so crazy it might just work--but everyone knows it won't. Also, hand-held cameras aren't gonna cut it with a tale this riveting.
Good to see this again. I thought maybe the Judge had written it in his book and then destroyed it. I'm pretty sure Franco made it as a test reel to attract investors so its not a perfect rendition. Good scene to use, exciting like a conventional western. Maybe he was hoping to get the money and start production before they looked too close at the source material.
I can forgive the bad sound editing and cheap effects. I can forgive the fact that the gang just looks waaaaay too clean and healthy and pampered and I'll even look past Dylan from 90210 leading the Glanton gang, a gang of ruffians and scalp hunters mind you. But one of literatures greatest villains, an albino beast of a man/literally the charismatic silver tongued devil being a silent average human who cant even match the screen presence of Scott Glenn is why I despise this so much and why the 32:33 felt like a 3 hr runtime
I think that the only directors who can film Blood meridian are Jarmush or Eggers.
but even this short film is very interesting.
Disjointed confusing and no action, yet I was glued to the screen for every second.
Without Brando, the only other actor I can see pulling off the judge is Daniel Day-Lewis
Man, a film adaptation of the book would be great in the right hands and circumstances.. But this sure as hell wouldn't have been it.
"PISS FOR THE LOVE OF CHRIST, PISS!"
Even *if* there was a director or showrunner out there that could get close to it, no network in existence would get anywhere near the essence of the original work. They would leave out some part of the poeticism, violence, language of the time, you name it. And if you leave any part of this work out, it would lose that essence.
If you want to experience it, read the book and imagine it in your mind's eye. Good God Almighty.
Yeah kinda sucks that even if they adapt it theres just zero chance it will hold a candle to the book.
Tobin comes across as Irish in the book. Colin Farrell would be great for him.
Michael Mann and HEAT be vanquished! Behold, the Blood Meridian shootout.
Legend has it they used the sound of actual popcorn machines discharging in a men's restroom for the gunfire.
If this movie is made well, it will offend a lot of people. It's a great novel, however.
John Hillcoat could do the book justice. He already did a great job with McCarthys the Road and the proposition is basically blood Meridian in Australia
You’re getting your wish.
@@josephmitchell6112we will see, productions of this have gone tits up before.
That piss scene went exactly how i saw it in my mind's eye while reading it, amazing. I thought it was just going to be referenced briefly but they did a great job
“He does not sleep, the Judge, he says he will never die, because he says there’s nothing stronger than family”
He’s a good actor but he’s not the judge. He’s like 5’9 lol
Edit: btw luke Perry actually makes a pretty convincing glanton
I expected someone like Josh brolin but Perry definitely has the look
Could not of picked a worse person to play the Judge
If its going to be shot like your average western, dudes on horses, campfires and dust..then it will completely miss the psychedelic otherworldly state this story truly exists within.
Huh, I never realized that James Franco became a pariah.
James franco plays the Judge while his acting students take turns playing the role of the man..
judge look like a bald Eric Andre wat da hell
Happy to finally see this. Also happy to know this was never made. Casting is all fucking off.
This was test footage. You do know how it works correct?
might not be perfect, but its all we have of a film adaptation for now! and I’m glad it exists.
everybody claims its unfilmable but film is young and the greatest works are yet to be made; HBO can do almost anything and have reset the standard for TV at least three times in the past two decades.
Stop cucking for this peice of crap,soap opera quality pucelige. " honey! I forgot to get food for dinner but theres a can of beef and salmon dog food, is that okay?"
aaaa, yes ...dear. are their chips?
This was terrible 😆 not every book needs an adaptation
The judge weighed 336 pounds in the book
24 stones according to the author
He was 7 foot tall, to wasn't he? I wouldn't expect to see someone that large on the screen, but a man of large stature would be more real to the book
Oh my God, thank you for uploading this. I was afraid that I'd never see it.
If this film ever gets made I would love to see John Goodman in the role of The Judge...this portrayal of him didn't cut it for me, the actor was too young for one thing.
Coen bros. Worked with Cormac before. Killed it. They’re the best ones for the job.
I cant wait till someone has the balls and the clout to make this movie and I hope they have the sense to cast David Morse as the judge
He pointed out a range of mountains maybe thirty yards distant and we pulled for those mountains and none of us asked what for.
If this was properly adapted then the violent scenes would've been much, much, _much_ more brutal.
Funnily enough, for as densely literary as Blood Meridian is, I believe a film adaptation made in the spirit of silent cinema would be best suited for it. It could have the scope and grandiosity of Griffith or Stroheim. McCarthy's otherworldy prose could allow for a more surreal, exaggerated depiction of its settings in the vein of, say, German expressionism. The Judge could modeled on horror icons like Conrad Veidt from The Man Who Laughs.
This is really well done. I adore the book, and this came pretty close to whats in my head. Even the cloud made an appearance.
It has to be animated, it has to jump from visual style to style and it has to be 100% faithful to a disgusting degree. Thats the only way to do it.
So glad this didn't happen. Franco is nnnot that guy.
Tyson Fury should play the judge, he's a 6 foot 9 boxer who would be absolutely perfect to play the judge visually.
Butterbean
Perfect😂
Nah, the scalpers should look like mad men from afar. One glance and you go "oh fuck".
I feel Denis Villeneuve could adapt the book to a film. After all he did Dune, which is also a book would people said could be adapt in film
I’m pissed that THAT was James Franco’s depiction of the Judge… you’d have to cgi him or something. No one can play the judge he’s beyond humanity
I think the true inspiration for this was the incredibly violent narco-wars that were going on in the 80's around this area, rather than the supposed violence of the old Wast.
I find it interesting that they are adapting the scene from the book that alludes to or copies Paradise Lost, and the actor they cast as the Judge portrayed Lucifer himself in Supernatural.
I’m not sure what the quality of the final film would have been but I truly respect this attempt bearing in mind it’s test footage. I care not for Franco’s controversies, I care about analyzing art independent of its creator. And so far he and his crew are the only ones with the balls to attempt adapting even a single scene from this book and it’s a shame it was scrubbed off the internet as lost media.
I’ve thought about that myself. Fitting as I’m certain the judge is in fact Lucifer himself.
I didn’t know Deadpool was playing the judge 😂
Well, this doesn't prove that 'Blood Meridian' can't be filmed; only that the search for the right screenwriter, director, & cast still needs to go on.
the right people probably aren't even born yet
Thank god that dueche failed in making this. He obviously couldn’t come close to bringing justice to the book.
Nope. This ain't it.
Has no one thought about an Anime or adult animation version? If you've seen Primal, you know that this can be done.
This is perhaps the online way. I just can’t see anyone realistically playing the judge. Has to be animated.
Kinda wish the judges looked scarier other then that they have a good cast
The Cohen brothers might be able to pull it off I've always thought.
Not even close to being dirty and stinky and sweaty and sticky enough this group on the screen makes me want to play hopscotch
Coen Bros. or Hillcoat. Looks like Hillcoat is gonna make it. The Road was pretty darn good. Funny thing is, Hillcoat looks just about how I picture the Judge.
So Dylan from 90210, and Jacob from Lost are in there. Stick from Daredevil, and Jame’s little brother