Atlas Shrugged Producer John Aglialoro on Ayn Rand's Enduring Impact


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I couldn't get past the little clip of Galt and Dagny at the top, an imbecilic obscenity.

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After dinner I tried again. 8 minutes of stupidity and then:

Aglialoro: "Ayn Rand made a mistake."

Jesus H. Fucking Christ. This moron ought to be taken out and shot -- and Peikoff and Kelley for enabling him.

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Wolf, your last line is not right, not funny.

I agree with you, as you know, about the "mistake" (not!) of Rand's talk of the virtue of selfishness. I would add that the dry "self-interest" has its intellectual and conversational place, but to pull back from "Wow . . . loving yourself is good" (indeed the good in terms of which all other good is, in Rand's vista) to "Wow . . . self-interest is good" is to miss the mark on the power of Ayn Rand in people's lives.

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Wolf, what you proposed was not that some fictional characters should be murdered in a fiction, but that three specific real persons should be murdered. Should means ought to be done, and you are wrong to propose such a thing ought to be done. Not joking.

PS

Talk of should was superfluous in the preceding, as Wolf had not expressed himself with that word, rather, he had gone directly to what ought to be done.

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Wolf, what you proposed was not that some fictional characters should be murdered in a fiction, but that three specific real persons should be murdered. Should means ought to be done, and you are wrong to propose such a thing ought to be done. Not joking.

I perceive that you are not joking. Horror at doing grievous wrong should have been voiced four years ago.

Best wishes to those working on making the first film of Atlas Shrugged.

Concluding sentences: "One can only hope for the best. But if Ayn Rand still exists in some dimension where rolling over is possible, I can imagine that she must be wanting to come back and torch the whole project: Prometheus Enraged."

Hopefully, the situation is not as bad as Skousen describes...

No, not as bad as Skousen described. It was infinitely worse. http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/atlas_shrugged_part_i/reviews/?sort=rotten

"Flubbed, under-produced representation of the first third of Ayn Rand's novel bodes ill for parts two and three." (Hollywood Reporter)

Mistakes of this size are never made innocently.

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"Mistakes of this size are never made innocently" Yes they are. All the time. Especially in Hollywood where producers are not unknown who routinely flush $100 million plus down the drain with box office bombs.

I have not seen Part 3 (yet). I can hardly remember Part 2..

I do not think it was possible to produce three dis-jointed movies with only around $30 million (give or take $10 mill). With different casts (!!!!) With different writers!!! With different producers and directors!!!

Nevertheless, I want to see Part 3.

I have said from the beginning of these discussions on OL, that Atlas Shrugged cannot "faithfully" be made into a movie, or movies. Or mini-series. Too long. Too many complex philosophical passages! If you leave those in, it will bomb with the short attention span of today's moviegoers. If you take them out, you gut the book of its whole meaning. They are not there for decoration, or as an afterthought!

Strahgely, Aglialordo did not consult me. What a surprise. But, he had The Atlas Society leadership solidly behind the effort. And David Kelley was there, overseeing the script, especially Galt's Speech. I feel better, already! :wacko::huh:

SO EVERYTHING'S GONNA BE OKAY NOW, RIGHT? ........right? :unsure: :rolleyes:

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Hire a hit man. The brand has been destroyed.

Justification straight from the horse's patoot in his Gillespie video...

Aglialoro: "It’s easy and proper to shoot cronyism."

---------------

Aglialoro: "Leonard Peikoff and I were great friends. I used to know how to get to him, and he used to get to me too, and we’d laugh, and have great times..." http://www.theamericanconservative.com/atlas-shrugged-part-ii-producer-ayn-rand-institute-joining-the-ranks-of-society/

Rand left her estate to a longtime student, Leonard Peikoff, who eventually sold an option to Michael Jaffe and Ed Snider, a friend of Rand’s who owned the Philadelphia Flyers hockey team. But Mr. Peikoff refused to approve the script they developed. Other producers came and went, and in 1992 a New Jersey investor and Objectivist, John Aglialoro, bought an option to make “Atlas Shrugged,” eventually [significant term of art] paying Mr. Peikoff more than $1 million in exchange for full creative control. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/14/movies/14brow.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

In May 2003, Aglialoro granted Crusader the right to produce Atlas Shrugged... ultimately, Lion's Gate advised Aglialoro that they would not be renewing their option to produce Atlas Shrugged... After purchasing several extensions from Peikoff, the rights were set to expire on June 15, 2010. Peikoff would not sell another extension, and Aglialoro had not found anyone who wanted to finance and produce Atlas Shrugged. http://www.atlasshruggedmovie.com/atlas-shrugged-history-2

April 23, 2010, Aglialoro boarded a plane in Philadelphia bound for Hollywood to meet Harmon Kaslow, an attorney and [low-budget horror producer] who "knew how to get things done." They hit it off immediately and Kaslow came on board that day. Aglialoro agreed to personally commit the funding, the next day they hired a screenwriter [a Kaslow crony from low-budget horror] and within a month, the crew expanded to one hundred... Paul Johansson, a friend of Kaslow's, was interested in directing. http://www.atlasshruggedmovie.com/atlas-shrugged-history-3

Aglialoro had no previous experience as a film producer. None. http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2244438/

"With his option-time running out, only a month or two left, Aglialoro should’ve given up, which would’ve left the field open someday for an experienced, professional movie maker to tackle the project. Instead, hoping to protect his initial investment... [and get] a screenplay credit no less, he hastily threw together a dreary cast, an anemic budget, a first-time director and, worst of all, a lousy screenplay. He pissed in the well and ruined it in the future for everybody else. Now, Aglialoro is issuing statements blaming the liberal reviewers for the disaster at the box-office... The guy’s a schmuck." http://dollarsandcrosses.com/2011/05/al-ramrus-on-aglialoros-abortion-ayn-rand-and-her-great-novel-deserved-better/

Atlas Part I... Blatantly bastardized in the name of a quick buck. [Cinema Obsession]
Like watching early rehearsals of a stage play that's clearly doomed. [Reason Online]
Hasty, low-budget adaptation would have Ayn Rand spinning in her grave. [Variety]
Capitalist titans appear to be squatting in old abandoned Dynasty sets. [New York Times]
Cut-rate travesty... aimless, amateurish, stone cold boring piece of drivel. [The Playlist]
Rushed this film into low-budget production and it shows in every frame. [boston Globe]
Badly-acted, clumsily-written, stiffly-directed. [Movies.com]
Made on the cheap with no-name stars. [Globe and Mail]

What qualified Johansson to direct Atlas Part I?
headline: Incredibly saccharine TV movie, with warmed-over ideas and ho-hum acting
Written and directed by Paul Johansson (Showtime). From the slowly opening flower petals to the sad little smiles, it is pretty obvious what The Incredible Mrs. Ritchie is trying to accomplish. This is a coming-of-age drama meant to warm the cockles of your heart. Unfortunately, microwaved cockles is more like it... When it all finally comes to a close, after a long-drawn-out deathbed scene, we are supposed to feel our heartstrings being tugged. Instead we just feel jerked around. [san Francisco Chronicle]

Atlas Part II... Director John Putch struggles to find balance or generate a single spark from the clunky mix. [Los Angeles Times]

The producers have to hire a better director if they want moviegoers to buy a ticket for the third and final chapter. [New York Times]

Consistent with its predecessor, awkward translation of Ayn Rand's 1957 novel, handled with bland telepic style. [Variety]

If the novel is ultimate libertarian porn, the first two installments of the screen adaptation are soggy softcore. [Hollywood Reporter]

A disaster as a film, Atlas also is laughable in its presentation of Rand's ideology. [Philadelphia Inquirer]

Niche movie on a par with any cheapjack faith-based picture, which is why it resembles one. [Mountain Xpress]

A stupid person's idea of what a smart movie sounds like. [McClatchy News Service]

What qualified Putch to direct Atlas Part II?

Cougar Town, an American sitcom that airs on TBS

US audience dropped from 11 million to 6 million over the 24 episode run

Putch is the son of actress Jean Stapleton (All In The Family)

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You can't always trust the reviewers, but in this case the goddamned, effete, liberal media snobs had it exactly right: AS 1 and 2 were epic clunkers. The lesson? Millions of dollars and good intentions do not by themselves make a good film.

Get a load of AS 3's official poster and you'll understand why one should approach this with expectations set low:

AtlasShrugged3-640.jpg

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Get a load of AS 3's official poster and you'll understand why one should approach this with expectations set low:

AtlasShrugged3-640.jpg

Hmm, so John Galt is a top heavy chubby glowing guy?

Good grief!

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Nothing shocks me any more about these wankers.

I lasted 3 minutes with that goofball. 3 minutes I will never get back.

Just great. John Galt, played by a goofball. Gravitas quotient of approximately zero.

How is it possible that this guy is John Galt? So very, very sad.

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New, improved, politically correct Eddie Willers, "a freethinker."

He wanted no sadness attached to his childhood; he loved its memories; any day of it he remembered now seemed flooded by a still, brilliant sunlight. It seemed to him as if a few rays from it reached into his present: not rays, more like pinpoint spotlights that gave an occasional moments glitter to his job, to his lonely apartment, to the quiet, scrupulous progression of his existence.

"The first scenes that were dropped were the childhood flashbacks." (screenwriter Brian O'Toole)

brian-otoole.jpgQuite a swell bastard, O'Toole, who was Aglialoro's pick to adapt Atlas for the screen: "I will never apologize for my work in the horror genre. Horror films hold up a mirror to society and show us the darkness in us all. I am a huge fan of horror. The good ones are able to tap into our basic cores and stir up true terror. That’s an art. They make us think."

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Geesh! In two days, I and everyone else who wants to see Atlas 3 in the theaters will have their chance,...but if you want it on the BIG screen, you may need to act fast. Atlas 2 showed up here for a couple of days,...I don't think it made it more than a week at most, and then was pulled. Of course, it showed up later as DVD or as cable channel fodder, which is the fate of Atlas 3 if it is really awful, as some claim. I want to see for myself.

A few points, though. There is no way that Aglialordo could get this made and see it as a theater blockbuster. Certainly not on $30 mill. But even if he got a couple hundred million and got George Lucas and Steven Spielberg to produce and direct it, I predict that it would fail, at least for Rand fans.. Because as their price for participating, they would demand script control, adopt it to their own moneymaking world-view, and would come up with something like "Raiders of the Lost Jurassic Gulch Strikes Back at the Empire," or something like that. Being from Spielberg-Lucas, it probably would make a lot of money, but would be unrecognizable as Rand's novel. They would pull all the speechs until Galt's where he gets eaten by a velociraptor five minutes in. They could even find good use for the expertise of Aglialordo/Kelley/Peikoff as bit-parts ("Boys, better put on your running shoes!").

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Seriously though, what's wrong with this picture? I don't mean the movie, I mean Aglialordo blowing over $30 million of (apparently) his own money, and the Atlas Society and David Kelley putting their reputation in jeopardy? Why? For what purpose?

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Seriously though, what's wrong with this picture? I don't mean the movie, I mean Aglialordo blowing over $30 million of (apparently) his own money, and the Atlas Society and David Kelley putting their reputation in jeopardy? Why? For what purpose?

I've given a great deal of thought to that. I suspect Aglialoro and pals are laundering OPM.

Aglialoro compensation in 2011: salary $549,422, all other compensation $34,251, according to Forbes.

Cybex International agreed to pay $19.5m to a Cheektowaga woman, who was injured by a piece of Cybex equipment when she improperly used a leg machine to stretch her shoulder in October 2004... The settlement is also down from the $44m awarded by the appellate division in November 2011... $44m was expected by analysts to bankrupt Cybex, which had $4m in liability insurance... the reduced settlement may allow Cybex to continue to operate and let its workers keep their jobs. http://www.nylawsuitreform.org/2012/02/cybex-reaches-19-5m-settlement-in-product-liability-case-tort-reform-lrany/

Cybex erratic net income/loss (most years barely breakeven) http://www.statista.com/statistics/235561/net-income-of-cybex/

Share trading suspended. Cybex website investor relations and company financial pages are blank.

"According to Peter Key in his article for the Philadelphia Business Journal, the sequel [Atlas Part II, not Part III] was made possible due to producer John Aglialoro, a New Jersey businessman who raised funds for the movie by privately selling $16 million worth of his production company’s debt." http://atatheaternearyou.net/pages/2135/

If I felt like it, I could find out who's behind it all -- but it ain't Aglialoro or Kaslow or net proceeds from Atlas II, that's for damn sure.

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"OPM?" ....Other people's money?

:blink::huh:

Well, I hope that Aglialoro has kept all the financing of the Atlas movies completely legitimate, and that he can show that.- if necessary!.

Any such improprieties/illegalities would have very serious ramifications for all involved - and for those not involved! (gross understatement).

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I hope that Aglialoro has kept all the financing of the Atlas movies completely legitimate

 

If he did, it would be the first movie in history produced on that basis. I think Aglialoro is the patsy, puts his name on everything, probably went into debt before he was introduced (by who?) to Kaslow. I'd say Kaslow is the bag man, no heavy money of his own, just taking "expenses" off the top. That's what Hollywood producers do.

 

Separately from the money at risk, I'd say cast, crew, and digital post are working on partial deferments. Theatrical distribs take 30-40% plus P&A, theatrical exhibs take 25-30% for an independent film (no studio publicity or merchandising deal). DVD, free TV, pay TV, foreign, and streaming are probably broken up six ways from Sunday, but ancillary distribs take 40-50%. It's impossible for any of the three Atlas movies to pay back anything to production company investors or bondholders, after all the "first money" and "second money" deferments, residuals, union benefits, attorney and accounting fees, taxes, and bank interest are paid off (not necessarily in that order). So, somebody put up $30+ million and doesn't expect to get it back. In the wider scope of things, that's spare change to -- well, use your imagination -- certain parties in Las Vegas, New York, and elsewhere. It could be an OGA project to make Rand look stupid. It could be Koch.

 

Kelley's involvement might be a combination of payola and blackmail. There's something wierd about these movie plugs.

Is he a philosopher or a grade school teacher? -- reading from a teleprompter and tossing softball publicity questions.

 

 

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You're making some serious, possibly criminal accusations. The burden is on you to make good on them or, at best, to look silly.

If the movies had outside lenders or shareholders, I suspect that the participants got in as a labor of love rather than as a money-expecting investment. When Frank Ll Wright was going broke in the 1920s, he incorporated his practice and sold stock to Clarence Darrow among others. None of the buyers could have expected to make any money, and none of them did, but Wright kept his country estate (where Rand and her husband houseguested some twenty years later).

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You're making some serious, possibly criminal accusations. The burden is on you to make good on them or, at best, to look silly.

That's okay. I'm silly. Nobody ever lies to the business press. http://www.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/blog/peter-key/2012/02/interview-atlas-shrugged.html?page=all

Ed Snider was involved on funding Atlas Part I. http://articles.philly.com/2011-04-16/news/29425367_1_ayn-rand-harmon-kaslow-randians

His wife Joan is a director at FreedomWorks, along with Steve Forbes. http://www.freedomworks.org/about/board-of-directors

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