Arts, Faculty of
English, Department of
DSpace
UBCV
Omercikli, Ipek
Master of Arts - MA
University of British Columbia
In 2011, media scholar Simone Murray encouraged other scholars to consider the “analytical blind spots” of adaptation theory, arguing that the field needed to move away from textual, aesthetic, and comparative evaluations of literary adaptations to instead consider the cultural economy behind the process. This thesis builds on this view while not completely disregarding the realm of the textual or the aesthetic. Rather, I analyze how these evaluations materialize in specific cultural, historical, and reception contexts, transforming or crystallizing in time though never retaining a static aesthetic or social value. This dynamic and conjectural aspect of adaptation leads me to consider adaptation-as-process as inherently speculative and concerned simultaneously with the present and future of a text; in this way the questions of science fiction coincide with those of adaptation studies, making it possible to lay grounds for a specific theoretical and analytic plane for studying SF adaptations. I then define what I call “speculative adaptation”: that is, science fiction adaptation that looks to the future of a text—not just through its generic conventions but through its historical, cultural, and industrial processes. Adaptation is also often concerned with the concept of fidelity and failure in the form of poor market performance, critical and audience reception, or the author’s disavowal. I complicate this concept of failure in adaptation and posit that SF as a genre is the most suited for illustrating this complication because of the volume of SF films labeled as failures, especially those that have gained a cult status. To do so, I focus on film adaptations that were either produced or abandoned at the production stage during the 1970s and the 1980s and aimed at American audiences: Frank Pavich’s Jodorowsky’s Dune (2013), a documentary on Alejandro Jodorowsky’s attempts to adapt Frank Herbert’s influential novel Dune to the screen in the mid-70s, Ken Russell’s adaptation of Paddy Chayefsky’s novel, Altered States (1980), and David Cronenberg’s adaptation of William Burroughs’ novel of the same name, Naked Lunch (1991).
FAILURE OF CINEMATIC (RE)CREATION: SPECULATIVE ADAPTATION AND SCIENCE FICTION CULT FILM by Ipek Omercikli B.A., Bo÷aziçi University, 2020 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS in THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE AND POSTDOCTORAL STUDIES (English) THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Vancouver) May 2023 © Ipek Omercikli, 2023 ii The following individuals certify that they have read, and recommend to the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies for acceptance, the thesis entitled: Failure of Cinematic (Re)Creation: Speculative Adaptation and Science Fiction Cult Film submitted by Ipek Omercikli in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in English Examining Committee: Dr. Miguel Mota, Associate Professor, English, UBC Supervisor Dr. Jeffrey Severs, Associate Professor, English, UBC Supervisory Committee Member iii Abstract IQ 2011, PHGLa VFKROaU SLPRQH MXUUa\ HQFRXUaJHG RWKHU VFKROaUV WR FRQVLGHU WKH ³aQaO\WLFaO bOLQG VSRWV´ RI aGaSWaWLRQ WKHRU\, aUJXLQJ WKaW the field needed to move away from textual, aesthetic, and comparative evaluations of literary adaptations to instead consider the cultural economy behind the process. This thesis builds on this view while not completely disregarding the realm of the textual or the aesthetic. Rather, I analyze how these evaluations materialize in specific cultural, historical, and reception contexts, transforming or crystallizing in time though never retaining a static aesthetic or social value. This dynamic and conjectural aspect of adaptation leads me to consider adaptation-as-process as inherently speculative and concerned simultaneously with the present and future of a text; in this way the questions of science fiction coincide with those of adaptation studies, making it possible to lay grounds for a specific theoretical and analytic plane for studying SF adaptations. I then define what I call ³VSHFXOaWLYH aGaSWaWLRQ´: WKaW LV, VFLHQFH ILFWLRQ aGaSWaWLRQ WKaW ORRNV WR WKH IXWXUH RI a WH[W²not just through its generic conventions but through its historical, cultural, and industrial processes. Adaptation is also often concerned with the concept of fidelity and failure in the form of poor market SHUIRUPaQFH, FULWLFaO aQG aXGLHQFH UHFHSWLRQ, RU WKH aXWKRU¶V GLVaYRZaO. I FRPSOLFaWH WKLV FRQFHSW of failure in adaptation and posit that SF as a genre is the most suited for illustrating this complication because of the volume of SF films labeled as failures, especially those that have gained a cult status. To do so, I focus on film adaptations that were either produced or abandoned at the production stage during the 1970s and the 1980s and aimed at American audiences: Frank PaYLFK¶V JodoUoZVk\¶V DXne (2013), a GRFXPHQWaU\ RQ AOHMaQGUR JRGRURZVN\¶V aWWHPSWV WR aGaSW FUaQN HHUbHUW¶V LQIOXHQWLaO QRYHO Dune to the screen in the mid-70V, KHQ RXVVHOO¶V iv aGaSWaWLRQ RI PaGG\ CKa\HIVN\¶V QRYHO, Altered States (1980), aQG DaYLG CURQHQbHUJ¶V aGaSWaWLRQ RI WLOOLaP BXUURXJKV¶ QRYHO RI WKH VaPH QaPH, Naked Lunch (1991). v Lay Summary This thesis considers the ³aQaO\WLFaO bOLQG VSRWV´ RI aGaSWaWLRQ studies by placing emphasis on the cultural economy behind the adaptation process. Moving away from textual, aesthetic, and comparative evaluations of literary adaptations, I analyze how these evaluations materialize in specific cultural, historical, and reception contexts, transforming in time though never retaining a static aesthetic or social value. This dynamic and conjectural aspect of adaptation leads me to consider adaptation-as-process as inherently speculative; in this way the questions of science fiction coincide with those of adaptation studies, allowing me to define ³VSHFXOaWLYH aGaSWaWLRQ´: that is, science fiction adaptation that looks to the future of a text. Complicating notions of failure in the field, I study three film adaptations that were either produced or abandoned at the production stage during the 1970s and the 1980s: FUaQN PaYLFK¶V JodoUoZkV\¶V DXne (2013), KHQ RXVVHOO¶V Altered States (1980), aQG DaYLG CURQHQbHUJ¶V Naked Lunch (1991). vi Preface This thesis is the original, unpublished, independent work of the author, Ipek Omercikli. vii Table of Contents Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... iii Lay Summary ...................................................................................................................................v Preface............................................................................................................................................ vi Table of Contents .......................................................................................................................... vii List of Figures .............................................................................................................................. viii Acknowledgements ........................................................................................................................ ix Chapter 1: Failure of Cinematic (Re)Creation: Speculative Adaptation and Science Fiction Cult Film ..................................................................................................................................................1 1.1 From Literary to Cultural Criticism: Problems of Aesthetic and Social Value in Adaptation Studies ...................................................................................................................... 1 1.2 Defining Speculative Adaptation: Science Fiction and Questions of Genre .................. 8 1.3 Historical Background and Issues in Reception ........................................................... 12 CKaSWHU 2: ³WKaW LV WR JLYH OLJKW PXVW HQGXUH bXUQLQJ´: JodoUoZVk\¶V DXne and Adaptation as Transgenerational Phenomenon .....................................................................................................18 Chapter 3: Externalizing Artistic and Scientific Creation in Ken RussHOO¶V Altered States and DaYLG CURQHQbHUJ¶V Naked Lunch .................................................................................................38 3.1 SFLHQFH aV SRXUFH TH[W: LRRNLQJ IRU E[WHUQaO TUXWK LQ KHQ RXVVHOO¶V Altered States.. 40 3.2 WULWLQJ aV a MHFKaQLFaO PURFHVV: E[WHUQaOL]LQJ CRQVFLRXVQHVV LQ DaYLG CURQHQbHUJ¶V Naked Lunch ............................................................................................................................. 47 Coda ...............................................................................................................................................55 Works Cited ...................................................................................................................................56 viii List of Figures Figure 1: Screenshot from a scene in JodoUoZVk\¶V DXne, dir. Frank Pavich, 2003«««« 28 Figure 2: Screenshot from a scene in JodoUoZVk\¶V DXne, GLU. FUaQN PaYLFK, 2003««««.29 ix Acknowledgements First and foremost, I would like to extend my gratitude to my committee: to my supervisor, Dr. Miguel Mota, for his guidance and encouragement throughout every stage of this project; and to my reader, Dr. Jeffrey Severs, for his thoughtful comments and incisive questions about my work. Thank you also to my amazing family for their endless love and support. To my friends in Turkey and at UBC² thank you for all the coffee/writing dates. 1 Chapter 1 Failure of Cinematic (Re)Creation: Speculative Adaptation and Science Fiction Cult Film 1.1 From Literary to Cultural Criticism: Problems of Aesthetic and Social Value in Adaptation Studies In his introduction to a special issue of the journal Adaptation, Thomas Leitch argues that adaptation as a process has a crucial role in questioning the universalizing claims of the hXmaniWieV diVciplineV b\ ³offer[ing] noW leVV fraXghW Za\V Wo police borders between different texts, media, and cultures, but ways that bring the issues involved in crossing those borders into greaWer prominence´ (162). PrompWing criWicV Wo look aW Whe Za\V in Zhich adapWaWion VhapeV (re)production and reception and vice versa, he prioritizes an ongoing discussion of adaptation rather than considering the end products as standalone art objects. This departure from essentialist discussions in adaptation studies undoubtedly reflects the theoretical turn in academia that has since at least the 1970s prioritized more dialogical, post-structural, materialist, and intertextual processes of signification. However, up until the turn of the twenty-first century, adaptation studies as a field largely remained faithful to its literary pretext, and consequently preoccupied itself with issues of fidelity and originality.1 These issues, far from being moot, remain inherent in discussions of cinematic adaptations²not necessarily in the form of valorizing fidelity or denouncing it, but in terms of foregrounding the textual and formal comparison of the texts in question rather than attending to issues of production and consumption as specific to the medium being discussed.2 Despite this trend, contemporary adaptation criticism 1 See, for e[ample, HXWcheon¶V Veminal Zork A Theory of Adaptation (2006) where she talks about comparative analyses of book-to-film adaptations that prioritize discussions of fidelity. 2 See Harold for hiV inWereVWing arWicle ³The ValXe of FideliW\ in AdapWaWion,´ pXbliVhed in 2018, Zhere he discusses thematic, rather than story fidelity. Another, and more comprehensive, example can be found in 2 has been moving away from critiques of fidelity, and I do not intend to rehash the same arguments in this thesis, but rather attend to issues of value and failure that reception brings up while also focusing on speculative visions that adaptations engender. It is nearly impossible to avoid some form of comparison in adaptation scholarship, but what I emphasize and challenge is the comparison of content and end result: that is, the assumptions about what each text is striving to relay and achieve, the presumption that the spiritual and/or political aims are or should be identical for both works, and the conclusion that they both possess a soul that carries an essential intent pertaining to a textual world that is configured as universal. Concomitantly, adaptations that do not conform to such expectations are categorized as failures. This perceived failure is located in issues of fidelity, authorship, commercial success, or cultural and intellectual impact. I propose that different understandings and definitions of failure in adapWaWion VcholarVhip and recepWion are ZorWh\ of criWical conVideraWion dXe Wo VXch ZorkV¶ contingent and evolving positions in mass culture. However, this project does not set out to argue that every adaptation is culturally and politically valuable or commercially successful. Rather, it attempts to investigate the interrelationships relevant to the production, distribution, and consumption of media and how these relations might generate particular insights into common questions in adaptation scholarship. Scholars such as Naremore, Stam, Hutcheon, Leitch, Elliott, and many others have discussed the need to move away from earlier approaches to adaptation and consider the larger conditions of citation, production, and consumption of adapted works, arguing against aesthetic value judgments of literature and film while expanding the definition of adaptation to include other parts of mass culture. For example, Linda Hutcheon has described adaptation as a product McCabe, Warner, and MXrra\¶V aWWempW Wo redefine and reframe fidelity in adaptation in their important book True to the Spirit: Adaptation and the Question of Fidelity, published in 2011. 3 and as a process, an idea echoed in LeiWch¶V aforemenWioned claim. However, Hutcheon has also argXed WhaW iW iV challenging for Whe Vcreen Wo adapW ³Whe Vpace of Whe mind,´ WhaW ³Whe pV\chic reality [. . .] mXVW be made manifeVW in Whe maWerial realm Wo be perceiYed b\ Whe aXdience´ (14). I partially disagree with this assertion, considering films have their own language to portray such a ³realiW\´ WhaW iV connected not necessarily to its content or dialogue but to its cinematography and ediWing WhaW creaWe inWerrelaWed aVVociaWionV in Whe VpecWaWor¶V mind (14). This making-manifest is the very condition of the screen rather than a supplementary one. More recently, Simone Murray has discussed the cultural and economic circulation of adaptations in her 2011 book, The Adaptation Industry, a VWXd\ of ZhaW Vhe callV ³a Vociolog\ of adapWaWion,´ argXing WhaW eYen though adaptation has evolved as a field, those claiming to move away from literary criticism and universalizing aesthetic claims have consistently returned to a textual analysis of film (4). While I would contend that textual analysis is indeed important, the prominence of a literary language of textual analysis in discussions of film±both in critical and audience reception±stands in the way of historicizing and critiquing works that are often independent of the specific economic, cultural, and aesthetic conditions of their originary source(s). The social or aesthetic valorization of certain texts considered to be high literature, classical, or genre-defining is perhaps unavoidable, since literary scholarship has often focused on such works, whether for the sake of convenience or because of some perceived inherent value within the We[W iWVelf. In hiV arWicle ³Mar[iVm and PopXlar FicWion,´ Ton\ BenneWW locaWeV WhiV ³faXlW\ concepWion´ in Mar[iVW criWiciVm of liWeraWXre and iWV diVmiVVal of popXlar cXlWXre.3 Mainl\, he criWici]eV Whe ³accepWance of Whe YalXaWionV of boXrgeoiV criWiciVm Wo YieZ YalXe aV 3 Though there are certain exceptions to this such as the writings of Barthes, Gramsci, and Benjamin, Bennett is advocating for embracing evolving value judgments and emphasizes the questioning of that very concept. 4 eVVenWiall\ VWaWic [...] oYer large periodV of Wime,´ ³Wo regard iW aV a properW\ WhaW iV inherenWl\ inscribed within conventionally revered texts; and [...] to contend that such properties can only be e[plicaWed b\ reWXrning Whe We[W, anal\Wicall\, Wo Whe condiWionV of iWV prodXcWion´ (144). I find these issues particularly generative for discussing adaptation, specifically science fiction adaptation, because its certain claim to truth and inscribed scientific value, combined with issues of fidelity, brings up crucial questions about value or its lack. This is true especially in the context of science fiction cult films that are adaptations of beloved, canonical, and ³highbroZ´ texts. I will return to this point in my second and third chapters to discuss selected adaptations in this context, but in attempting a criticism of adaptation as process, I am skeptical of this ready acceptance of certain value judgments and comparisons or essentialist modes of historicizing. In placing the artistic production in its political context, this study instead investigates these negotiations between history, literary and otherwise, the cult SF text, as well as the source text(s) and their adaptations, resisting a relationship of direct causality. I see this project as a gateway to a longer VWXd\ of ³VpecXlaWiYe adapWaWion´± a term I will return to shortly± that destabilizes rigid frameworks of cinematic inspiration, production, and influence. Cult films are especially suited for discussions of failure because of their often-fraught history of critical and audience reception as well as their complicated production and distribution processes. In their seminal work Cult Cinema, Mathijs and Sexton discuss these issues of reception and production through various approacheV, conclXding WhaW cXlW cinema iV ³idenWified by remarkably unusual audience receptions that stress the phenomenal component of the viewing experience, that upset traditional viewing strategies, that are situated at the margin of the mainstream, and that display reception tactics that have become a synonym for an attitude of minoriW\ reViVWance and niche celebraWion ZiWhin maVV cXlWXre´ (8). The\ alVo VXggest that 5 filmmakers and the market reappropriate these impulses to generate films that would WheoreWicall\ aWWracW a cXlW folloZing ZiWh Wheir formXlaic ³WranVgreVViYe, e[oWic, offenViYe, noVWalgic, or highl\ inWerWe[WXal narraWiYeV and VW\leV´ (8). HoZeYer, b\ redefining Whe ³noWion of YieZerVhip,´ Whe\ VWill bring Xp generaWiYe qXeVWionV about the nature of authenticity, reception, and value (8). Whether because of their performance at the box office or their perceived aesthetic shortcomings at the time of their release, cXlW filmV¶ ³fracWXred recepWion WrajecWorieV,´ aV Zell aV their economic and cultural implications, allow for an evaluation of the notion of failure (Mathijs 7). It is important to note that some mainstream films that are produced within studio systems are also considered cult films; however, more often than not, these films are still criticized for not conforming to a specific expectation of their genre or their source text.4 It is difficult to propose a definitive formula for cult film since any definition leaves open avenues for contrasting trajectories, always accepting more theories, conventions, and conflicts into its body of study. These contradictions, however, do not stand in the way of theorizing for and in adapWaWion, Vcience ficWion, and cXlW VWXdieV. AV I¶Ye oXWlined earlier in WhiV VecWion, man\ scholars are attending to these complications in these ever-evolving fields and genres. I find MXrra\¶V approach Wo adapWaWion in particular fruitful in its attempt to theorize adaptation studies as a material phenomenon rather than simply a textual and individualistic one focused on aeVWheWicV and comparaWiYe eYalXaWionV of media. PoViWing WhaW adapWaWion VWXdieV need Wo ³begin to understand adaptation economically and institutionall\,´ she outlines and identifies various questions within adaptation studies to think through problems of literary value, aesthetics, and 4 CelebraWed mainVWream SF adapWaWionV WhaW are conVidered ³cXlW´ inclXde Whe commerciall\ and criWicall\ successful Blade Runner (1982). Sammon¶V Future Noir: The Making of Blade Runner (1996) discusses Whe film¶V fraXghW recepWion. When it was first released, the critical reception was mixed, with some arguing that its excessive SF visuals overshadowed its plot and that it was underdeveloped in terms of its narrative, along with issues with the voiceover and potential endings. 6 Whe field¶V ³anal\Wical blind VpoWV´ (16). In Wr\ing Wo formXlaWe a Vpecific approach to the field, I build on this view while not completely disregarding the realm of the textual or the aesthetic. Rather, I analyze how these evaluations materialize in specific cultural, historical, and reception contexts, transforming or crystallizing in time though never retaining a static aesthetic or social ³YalXe.´ ThiV d\namic and conjecWXral aVpecW of adapWaWion leadV me Wo conVider adapWaWion-as-process as inherently speculative and concerned simultaneously with the present and the future of a text; in this way the questions of SF coincide with those of adaptation studies, making it possible to lay grounds for a specific theoretical and analytic plane for studying SF adaptations. As one of the most central works in the science fiction film canon, Stanle\ KXbrick¶V 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) reveals this relationship between the speculative drive in adaptation and the SF genre. 2001 is constantly revisited in different reception contexts, allowing it to serve as an example of speculative adaptation that remains elusive in its connections to its source text(s), its (re)mediations, and its extratextual literary and visual elements. Consisting of long and dialogue-free sequences that center the visual experience over narrative progression, 2001 speculates on the dawn and future of man while prioritizing the metaphysical over the scientific. The juxtapositions of ape and Starchild, classical music and bureaucratic dialogue, endless space and rigid architectural settings work to suspend historical progression, and therefore narrative progression, to question the very concept of linear time by estranging the subject and the viewer from both earth and space. The film looks to an extratextual future (space travel) but also presents time as cyclical on the narrative level. ThoXgh XncrediWed, Whe film¶V origin is considered to be Arthur C. Clarke¶V ³The SenWinel´ and hiV oWher VhorW VWorieV. Clarke and Kubrick co-produced the screenplay for the film, and Clarke wrote a novelization concomitantly, published after the release of the film and based on the screenplay²thus 7 complicating the adaptation process further. The spatial and temporal totality is undermined by Whe film¶V ambigXoXV open ending and Whe noYel¶V aWWempW Wo e[plain the mystic sequences of the film, with the two works thus entering into an endless relationship of narrative and visual productivity as they add to and undercut each other. Hunter posits that for the cult viewer, ³acqXiring an emoWional inYeVWmenW in [2001¶s] production, meaningV, aXWhorVhip and µVecreWV¶, these texts may become resources of additional knowledge and cultural capital that inform and modify their repeated encounters with the supreme masterpiece´ (129). Implicit in this assertion is the speculativeness inherent in the adaptation process that generates alternative future receptions of the film depending on the context of consumption. Ranging from academic articles on the legitimacy of the science behind the film to conspiracy theories arguing Kubrick staged the moon landing in 1969, 2001¶V recepWion elXcidaWeV Whe relaWionVhip of SF Wo its material transformations that create a certain reality effect for the spectator. While 2001 is not one of the films discussed in this thesis, its adaptation history as it relates to its speculative scope illuminates the temporal and spatial parameters and limitations of the genre. Vivian Sobchack has argued that the uniqueness of SF lies partly in the fact that its ³film imageV deriYe Wheir poZer Wo indXce Zonder in Whe YieZer noW from Whe imaginaWiYeneVV of Wheir conWenW, bXW from Whe imaginaWiYeneVV of Wheir VWance and Wheir Vcope´ (101). So, b\ condensing the imaginative and the speculative into a material form, the SF film contains an imaginary alternate universe where palpable science becomes fantastic possibility and a site for poWenWial (diV)idenWificaWion, appealing boWh Wo Whe VpecWaWor¶V realiW\ and iWV projecWion inWo a future of endless reproduction of alternativity and aesthetic singularity that is never fully realized in the material and the visual realm. Therefore, it always remains speculative and elusive. With these issues in mind, I turn to my next section Zhere I define ZhaW I call ³VpecXlaWiYe adapWaWion´ 8 in order to address these questions of spatiality and temporality, as well as the limitations they pose. 1.2 Defining Speculative Adaptation: Science Fiction and Questions of Genre Adaptations teach us that theories cannot predict or account for adaptations in all times and places, not only because the field is too large, but also because adaptations are always changing and adapting. Any theory of adaptation must therefore itself incorporate process and change. Adaptations admonish us to move continually beyond our present ideas and methodologies. (Elliott 34) ConVidering Whe field¶V formXlaWion and progreVVion, adapWaWion VWXdieV iV±and must be± preoccupied with the notion of failure. It appears that every study of the field attempts to fill a certain gap or address criticism of a shortcoming, always striving to theorize itself by attending Wo a cerWain ³failXre´ of VcholarVhip, fideliW\, or medium specificity. While this preoccupation is typical of a relatively new field, it is more at the foreground in adaptation because of its ready dismissal and questioning of borders. In challenging rigid disciplinary boundaries, it sets itself up for a failure of theorizing. The concept of failure extends also to the discussions of adaptation-as-product in the form of poor market performance, critical and audience reception, or the author¶V disavowal. I aim to complicate this concept of failure in adaptation discourses and posit that science fiction as a genre is the most suited for illustrating this complication because of the volume of science fiction films labeled as failures, especially those that have gained a cult status. In diVcXVVing cinemaWic ³failXre,´ When, iW iV imporWanW Wo attend to these theoretical and practical questions of genre and field. SF cult film holds a special place in adaptation discussions precisely because of the accumulation of fractured histories resulting from the conventions of both the genre and its academic reception. AV ³a generic area WhaW haV WradiWionall\ been held in 9 loZ eVWeem b\ Whe criWical eVWabliVhmenW,´ SF haV deYoWed fandomV WhaW reconfigXre cinemaWic engagemenW and add Wo SF film¶V cXlW recepWion (Mathjis 206). Bringing these different approacheV Wo failXre WogeWher, I WXrn Wo ³VpecXlaWiYe adapWaWion´: that is, science fiction adaptation that looks to the future of a text²not just through its generic conventions but through its historical, cultural, and industrial processes. The perceived predictive potential of SF mirrors adapWaWion¶V Wemporal parado[ aV Zell: iW WakeV from Whe paVW and We[WXall\ (and cinemaWicall\) informs the future and reception of a source text. Darko Suvin provides a rigorous definition of Whe liWerar\ SF genre aV ³a deYeloped o[\moron, a realiVWic irrealiW\,´ locaWing iW aV ³Whe Vpace of a poWenW [cogniWiYe] eVWrangemenW´ (Yiii). ArgXing WhaW ³Whe hiVWorical poWenWialiWieV of Whe genre´ are imporWanW in an\ definiWion of iW, he labelV WheVe poWenWialiWieV aV ³parWl\ VpecXlaWiYe´ bXW ³baVed on obVerYable facWV and probable laZV´ (Yii). Adding Wo WhiV, and acknoZledging WhaW Whe mediXm of film neceVVaril\ alWerV SXYin¶V description, I define ³VpecXlaWiYe adapWaWion´ aV a concept that unsettles this well-structured feedback loop of reality and fictionality (and ³irrealiW\´), and Whe one beWZeen VoXrce We[W, iWV adapWaWionV, and iWV e[WenVionV. I XVe Whe Werm ³VpecXlaWiYe adapWaWion,´ then, to refer to this process of never-ending negotiation between texts, science, history, and reception of SF film from the material of its source texts to its cultural imprints in its future. In doing so I complicate the concept of failure as it is used in much adaptation discourse. The noWion of cogniWiYe eVWrangemenW inclXdeV aW once an embrace of one¶V cXrrenW realiW\ and the simultaneous intellectual alienation from it due to a fictional newness in political, geospatial, scientific, and/or social realiW\. Fredric JameVon WakeV Xp SXYin¶V concepW in hiV VWXd\ of SF, arguing that it is indeed the defining feature of the genre with its epistemological function Wo imagine ³alWernaWiYe Vocial and economic formV´ (The Archaeologies of the Future xiv). 10 JameVon¶V study is an investigation of Utopia and the Utopian impulses in the individual, the society, and the text from sixteenth-century political works to modern and contemporary SF; however, considering that Utopian impulses can be present in SF texts that are not necessarily Utopian in content, as well as in their reifying cult receptions, his insights help illuminate these modes of alternativity. Jameson offers questions that unsettle the very foundation of SF as a relaWiYel\ naVcenW field b\ conVidering ³hoZ ZorkV WhaW poViW Whe end of hiVWor\ can offer an\ usable historical impulses, how works which aim to resolve all political differences can continue to be in any sense political, [and] how texts designed to overcome the needs of the body can remain maWerialiVWic´ ([iY). AV he speculates on these contradictions, he claims the SF narrative presents an ideological dead end WhaW incorporaWeV boWh ³a WoWaliW\ of e[perience in Vpace and Wime,´ Zhich denoWeV a form of spatial, temporal, and therefore narrative closure, and that end as ³a mark of WhaW boXndar\ or limiW be\ond Zhich WhoXghW cannoW go´ (148). Thus, he creates an irreconcilable contradiction he calls future history: that is, the process of historicizing our present from a non-existent but somewhat palpable future that is impossible to wholly imagine. So, for Jameson, since SF incorporates both this necessary closure and its projected impossibility, it exposes the ideological limitations inherent in the production and consumption of itself by intensifying these contradictions on a plot and structural level. JameVon¶V linear hiVWorical approach might seem at odds with SF¶V fXWXre-oriented imaginings that reconfigure the present as history, but Jameson, rather than denouncing the genre and its implications, attempts to analyze it through that same lens with which he attributes a political unconscious to all texts of specific moments in history. Even though its impulses seem to on the surface contradict the larger historical project, the politics of the present are detectable in the SF text, not only in its context but in its unconscious. One might place the SF text to be 11 outside this framework of cognitive estrangement and ideological closure of its narrative possibilities by removing it from its immediate textual environment to imagine its replications and transformations that are not necessarily (only) tied to its narrative and formal operations. Adaptation as product and process factors into this conversation with its drive to engender other texts and WranVcend Whe originar\ VoXrce¶V poliWicV and modeV of prodXcWion in order to multiply in different material and cultural environments. This certainly complicates the concept of ideological closure though it does not necessarily promise escape from its limitations. After all, the adaptation industry is founded on its ability to generate profit and accommodate the market. Rather, speculative adaptation introduces some lines of flight from these apparent ideological constraints of the genre, lines that prolong the process of closure in the context not of an individual text but of its mediatic and material transformations. This process necessarily redefines SF¶V claim Wo VpaWial and Wemporal WoWaliW\ b\ boWh amplif\ing and challenging Whe contradictions put forward by Jameson. Crucial to this investigation is locating the speculative drive in adaptations: does this drive stem from an inherent quality in the process of adaptation? Is it a question of the agency of the author or the text? Or is it simply reducible to the market drive for endless reproduction and profit? Hutcheon seems to arrive at this latter bleak conclusion in her A Theory of Adaptation, remarking WhaW ³Whe enWerWainmenW indXVWr\ iV jXVW WhaW: an indXVWr\´ (88). GranWed, in WhiV conWe[W, she is mainly analyzing Hollywood franchises that spawn across different media and marketplaces rather than more obscure cult films. However, the same market drive is necessarily present in all works of literature and media with varying degrees of primacy. Elsewhere she formulates a Darwinian approach to adaptation as an evolutionary process where texts adapt to different environments through mutation and replication, underlining the persistent presence of 12 certain narratives in different cultural contexts through narrative, cultural, and geographic transmission (32). Leitch, on the other hand, takes this idea further by introducing the unlikely question of desire as inherent in the movie itself, asserting WhaW ³We[WV of all VorWV can be Veen aV having some of the same drives and desires that are commonly imputed to their creators, and that movies ± that is, commercially released narrative cinema ± offer a quintessential example of WheVe driYeV and deVireV in acWion´ (³WhaW MoYieV WanW´ 155). He gives an overview of different approacheV Wo Whe concepW of agenc\ in moYieV, VWarWing from PaVolini¶V theory of screenplays as ³We[WV WhaW ZanW Wo be oWher We[WV´ and moving to sociobiological tenets of adaptation theory put forward by Hutcheon, Distin, and Dennett based on meme theory (157). This is where the speculative aspect of this replication becomes salient: the texts and their processes are inherently speculative in their associations with outside forces such as the (im)possibilities of their production and reception, their projected market value, and their adaptation into different media. 1.3 Historical Background and Issues in Reception To formulate a more concrete approach to speculative adaptation, I will take up various cinematic adaptations and discuss them as case studies to problematize these issues of social, aesthetic, and political value and failure in media studies. While analyzing specific adaptations of specific texts could appear somewhat contradictory to my outlined project because of the necessary emphasis on interpretative methods alongside cultural and industrial investigations, I intend to explore how these specific cinematic narratives interact with their cultural and material environment, and how these reciprocal relationships engender possibilities for endless (re)production and critical or audience engagement. Nevertheless, these processes of production and engagement do not necessarily offer a departure from modern capitalist frames of reference that SF implicitly maintains or seeks to uproot. In my second and third chapters, I will focus on 13 science fiction adaptations that were either produced or abandoned at the production stage during the 1970s and the 1980s and aimed aW American aXdienceV: Frank PaYich¶V JodoroZsk\¶s DXne (2013), a docXmenWar\ on Alejandro JodoroZVk\¶V aWWempWV Wo adapW Frank HerberW¶V inflXenWial novel Dune to the screen in the mid-70s, Ken RXVVell¶V adapWaWion of Padd\ Cha\efVk\¶V noYel Altered States (1980), and DaYid Cronenberg¶V adapWaWion of William BXrroXghV¶ noYel of Whe same name, Naked Lunch (1991). These films are now considered cult films with varying degreeV of ³VXcceVV,´ defined aV failXreV in one Za\ or anoWher and reYered aW Whe Vame Wime for adapting or attempting to adapt the unadaptable. They all emerge during a specific era in the US when the military-industrial complex and counterculture clash, co-exist and feed into each other. Just as people¶V relaWionVhipV Wo hiVWor\ and mainstream politics are being redefined, so is their relationship to constantly evolving technology and media. The 1970s and 1980s saw a crucial shift in the relationship between the aXdience and Whe image, aV Zell aV beWZeen ³realiW\ and repreVenWaWion,´ Zhere ³conVcioXVneVV haV been reconfigXred b\ America¶V obVeVViYe conVXmpWion of dehXmani]ing imager\´ (KnighW 34). Accordingly, one can situate these films in this commodified media culture in contemporary (U.S.) history, specifically a twentieth century filled with political ruptures. From the late 70s to the early 80s, videocassettes became widely available and redefined spectatorship with ³Whe idea of repetition,´ and YieZerV¶ greaWer ³maVWer\ oYer filmV WhroXgh fXncWionV VXch aV faVW-forward, rewind and freeze-framing´ ineYiWabl\ WranVformed conVXmpWion and recepWion of media (MaWhijV and Se[Won 4). MoreoYer, ³filmV Zhich flopped or diVappoinWed aW Whe bo[ office foXnd a neZ life on YideocaVVeWWe´ and led Wo alWernaWiYe markeWing campaignV deVigned Wo Vell filmV WhaW Zere perceived to be failures by labeling them as cult (4). 14 In a 1997 think piece he wrote for The New York Times, Don DeLillo, a writer very much preoccupied with the idea of the cult and mass culture, looks back on this newly available concept of image repetition: «Whe Wape iV pla\ed and repla\ed, e[haXVWing all Whe reality stored in its magnetic pores [...] and the culture continues its drive to imitate itself endlessly -- the rerun, the sequel, the theme park, the designer outlet -- because this is the means it has devised to disremember the past. (³PoZer of HiVWor\´) If conWemporar\ cXlWXre¶V projecW iV Wo diVremember hiVWor\ b\ conWinXoXV repeWiWion and estrangement, SF as a genre and SF adaptation are two of the greatest weapons in that project because of their deliberate meditations on absurd and irreal futures, their apparent historicizing of our present, their speculative ruminations on material realities, and their continuous drive to imitate and replicate their narratives in different environments. This speculative drive in SF and adaptation-as-process stands in direct opposition to the perceived static values or shortcomings of We[WV and maVV cXlWXre; and aV DeLillo poViWV, cXlWXre¶V procreaWiYe inVWincW can eYen be a fatalistic drive rather than a productive one. The Dune franchise, for example, inspired countless arWicleV on Zar leVVonV Wo be Waken from iW, ZhaW iW WellV ³XV´ aboXW Zar, poliWicV, drXgV, or hoZ iW predicWed ³modern Zarfare.´5 Since the novels are cherished by military fanatics and counterculture audiences alike, Dune¶V poVVible adapWaWion b\ a figXre like JodoroZVk\, a famous counterculture cult figure, certainly speaks to these contradictions of historical, political, and social value as well as the reification that renders historical processes of media production and consumption insignificant. The essential, though unanswerable, question of SF ± does it take 5 See, for e[ample, Roblin¶V ³WhaW Sci-Fi Classic Dune Can Tell Us about the Relationship between War, Religion and NaWXral ReVoXrceV´ and Greenberg¶V ³Dune Foresaw²and Influenced²Half a CenWXr\ of Global ConflicW.´ 15 reality as its source, or does it predict the future? ± takes precedence in any discussion of SF, though a better approach might be to attend to its manipulation of history and reality, which gives birth to transhistorical readings, rather than assuming an inherent instructive, predictive, or historical value in the literary text as an individual object. While dominant culture and counterculture stand in apparent opposition, the latter hardly stands as a counter-political force against the dominant power structures of the Cold War U.S. HiVWorian BrXce SchXlman argXeV WhaW a ³general alienaWion from mainVWream America´ and ³diVillXVionmenW ZiWh poliWicV´ pXVhed people Wo Whe coXnWercXlWXre in Whe earl\ 1970V, Zhich in WXrn fed drXg cXlWXre ³aV an entryway to expanded or altered consciousneVV´ (16-7). This preoccupation with drugs and altered consciousness is at the forefront in all three adaptations and their source texts, informing their reception as cult films that resist conformity and critique late capitalist culture; but an alternative reading might suggest that this is the result of reliance on a ³VelfiVh indiYidXaliVm´ reVXlWing from ³VenVor\ decadence and Whe commerciali]aWion of lifeVW\le choiceV´ (Cornea 90). RaWher Whan oVcillaWing beWZeen WheVe WZo approacheV or argXing WhaW Whese adaptations conform to or critique such power structures directly, I will explore how their production and reception might give way to such readings. The content and form of the films, as well as the apparent aspirations of their directors, will be crucial in discussing them as speculative adaptations. Equally important are the ways in which they inform social, economic, and industrial concerns in media. The Vecond chapWer Zill diVcXVV PaYich¶V docXmenWar\ JodoroZsk\¶s DXne, a film about JodoroZVk\¶V failed aWWempWV Wo carr\ Dune to the silver screen in 1974. Undoubtedly, JodoroZVk\¶V VWaWXV in Whe US aV a cXlW direcWor and a V\mbol for Whe poVW-1968 counterculture moYemenW accoXnWV for Whe Xnmade film¶V perViVWing popXlariWy. Jodorowsky, knowing his 16 audience and their ritualistic loyalty to his work, as well as their use of drugs during their viewings, had envisioned a film that would once again realize his performative radical surrealism and violent absurdism in a visually and technically stunning way rather than portraying the internal content of intricate politics and historical referents of the Dune universe. Even though, in the end, he did not adapt Dune into a film, he certainly created a narrative of his interpretation as the quintessential SF film whose (non)conception pioneered the way other SF films are made from then to now. It is challenging to discuss an adaptation that never finally was as a product, WhoXgh PaYich parWl\ animaWeV JodoroZVk\ and GiraXd¶V VWor\book in his documentary to speculate on what such a film might have looked like. This unmade adaptation certainly brings up particular issues concerning the adaptation industry and the questions of authorship. My third chapter will discuss Altered States and Naked Lunch. I have decided to pair these two films together because of their preoccupation with consciousness and drug culture and how they externalize the scientific and creative process in a viscerally violent way. Both film adaptations take consciousness as their starting point to visually realize scientific and artistic ³WrXWh.´ Altered States iV an adapWaWion of Cha\efVk\¶V noYel and also an adaptation of coXnWercXlWXre figXre and VcienWiVW John C. Lill\¶V manXVcripW on VenVor\ depriYaWion experimentation in isolation tanks that separated him from the mainstream scientific circles of the 1960s. A science fiction horror film, Altered States propelled the rubber-reality genre by influencing a whole new trend of rubber-reality films.6 LikeZiVe, Cronenberg¶V Naked Lunch constructs the writing process as a physical act fueled by drugs rather than an intellectual one, justifying its adaptation of BXrroXghV¶ noYel b\ being lo\al noW Wo iWV conWenW or eYen iWV form, 6 Flanagan, Ken RXssell: ReYieZing England¶s Last Mannerist, 193. ³RXbber-realiW\´ iV a VXbgenre of horror that includes characterV ZhoVe percepWionV and e[perienceV of Whe ³real Zorld´ differ from Whe WrXe reality of their environment. 17 but to its aesthetic and economic implications about consciousness, the body, and the creative act. A flop at the box office, Naked Lunch is aware of its shortcomings in its adaptation of an Xndecipherable noYel, BXrroXghV¶ oWher Zork, and hiV perVonal life. ThiV iV noW Wo argXe WhaW simple self-awareness is its saving grace, but it nevertheless investigates the possibility that the complex text can engender other possibilities of creation and meaning by reaching for originality WhroXgh replicaWion, eVpeciall\ conVidering Whe inWerWe[WXal naWXre of Cronenberg¶V adapWaWion along with his own indelible aesthetics and preoccupation with the visceral, the body, and its mechanics in an emergent technologically mediated culture. The aim of the following two chapters is not to argue that these adaptations are successes or failures in any political, economic, or aesthetic sense, but rather to complicate readings that perceive them as such and investigate the relationships behind their cult status. By adopting a theoretical framework that situates these films in their historical moment while also finding their echoes in contemporary discourses, I attempt to consolidate them as speculative adaptations that are self-reflective of the (im)possibilities of their content and form to examine how the process of Wheir adapWaWion iV alVo VpecXlaWiYe. JameVon mainWainV WhaW ³Whe fXncWion of Whe maVV cXlWXral We[W´ VhoXld noW Vimpl\ be Veen aV ³Whe V\mbolic reaffirmaWion of WhiV or WhaW legiWimi]ing VWraWeg\,´ nor aV a direcW challenge Wo iW, aV Whe proceVV iV neYer WhaW of ³Vheer Yiolence,´ bXW of a more complex negotiation of power (Political Unconscious 277). Thus, in historicizing the adaptations in a specific period, this thesis does not argue that they fundamentally challenge or conform to mainstream politics of the era nor to that of their source text(s). These adaptations, and SF in general, take from and question material reality, and they also conceive of their source texts as cultural and material objects of inquiry and possibility in an ongoing series of conversations and negotiations, rather than as any kind of originary authority. 18 Chapter 2 “What is to give light must endure burning”: JodoUoZVk\¶V DXne and Adaptation as Transgenerational Phenomenon In his op-ed called ³ThiV Film DoeV NoW E[iVW´ pXbliVhed in The New York Times in 2023, Frank Pavich discusses the haunting possibilities of the role of machine learning and emergent technologies in artmaking. Having shot a docXmenWar\ on Alejandro JodoroZVk\¶V failed aWWempWV Wo adapW Frank HerberW¶V Dune in the mid-70s, often labeled ³Whe greaWeVW film neYer made,´ Pavich expresses shock at having seen stills from a film he has never heard about: a Tron film directed by Jodorowsky, clearly carrying his signature vision paired with imaginative SF effects and aesthetics that are reminiscent of the visual effects that were drawn up for the failed Dune film. Yet, Pavich writes, this film does not exist but is an instantaneous creation of numerous stills generated by an A.I. program called Midjourney ZiWh onl\ Whe ZordV ³Tron´ and ³JodoroZVk\´ aV iWV inpXW. PaYich obVerYeV WhaW Where ³VeemV Wo be a correlation between how Alejandro¶V Zork ZaV abVorbed and referred Wo b\ VXbVeqXenW filmmakerV and hoZ hiV Zork ZaV ingeVWed and meWaboli]ed b\ compXWer programming´ (³ThiV Film DoeV NoW E[iVW´). Even though he does not directly suggest that influence and algorithm are identical concepts, he concludes that they may not be so different in the twenty-first century. Every visual (cinematography, costume design) and contextual (the setting, the races, and genders of the characters) decision in these stills belongs to the AI itself, even though it is feeding from a million online sources to imitate and recreate existing commentary and visuals on Jodorowsky and 70s SF to create something new. Maybe more so than ever before, Romantic and post-Romantic notions of creativity, originality, and authorship are being redefined under these new 19 technologies whose very existence defies easy categorization regarding questions of aesthetics and art. If AI can (re)create a non-existent film inspired by a never-shot adaptation in twenty-first century media, VXrel\ SF¶V cenWXr\-long ruminations on the darkest and the most exciting potentials of artificial intelligence systems start to merge with the actual industry behind SF film and art. The possibility of a tech-authored future begins to infiltrate artistic creation at the level of narrative and industry. While we do not have accumulated data regarding AI art and authorship, these questions still lead me to investigate the obscure relationships between influence, production, and consumption of art, specifically SF art. As Pavich does in this piece ZiWh JodoroZVk\¶V Tron, my project is to study a non-e[iVWenW film, JodoroZVk\¶V unmade Dune. PaYich¶V docXmenWar\ JodoroZsk\¶s DXne (2013) is a crucial part of that investigation as the sole work that brings somewhat critical attention to the questions this unfinished adaptation raises. AV Whe qXinWeVVenWial SF noYel, Frank HerberW¶V Dune, first published in 1965, is undeniably one of the most beloved and respected works of the genre and therefore has an adaptation history that is fraught with complications and failures. Why is it that the influence of Dune and JodoroZVk\¶V poWenWial Dune film persists to this day, to the extent of framing questions around AI art? While it is impossible to study a never-made adaptation as product, we can discuss it in the framework of adaptation as process. The questions AI art brings up are not wholly different from the ones adaptation does, with multiple stakeholders claiming ownership of content, form, originality, and so on. New technologies certainly complicate these notions further, but they also illuminate problems of film adaptation in their increased emphasis on the obscurity of influence and production. This chapter will discuss the adaptation history of Dune with a focus on Jodorowsky and his project under the lens of speculative adaptation. In doing so, 20 it will conceptualize a tradition of adaptation in the Dune franchise owing to its unfulfilled promises that are continuously revisited by different artists who are trying to crystallize the comple[iW\ of Whe noYel¶V XniYerVe inWo Whe cinematic image. By situating adaptation as an inherent part of the Dune franchise, from HerberW¶V political perspectives on the Middle East to JodoroZVk\¶V radical VXrrealiVm, it will reframe adaptation as a conflicted transgenerational phenomenon that appeals both to the past and the future of an influential text, complicating its reception as a failed adaptation. The documentary film, and JodoroZVk\¶V projecW, haYe WhXV far receiYed liWWle criWical aWWenWion. AV Whe moVW e[penViYe film WhaW ZaV neYer made, JodoroZVk\¶V YiVion ZaV reali]ed in a 20-volume storyboard of which only two copies exist, drawn by the famous comic book artist Jean "Moebius" Giraud and partly animated in the documentary. With a proposed budget of $15 million and a rXnning Wime of 12 hoXrV, JodoroZVk\¶V Dune was rejected by every major Hollywood studio even though it had everything needed for a film except the film itself²notably including the extremely detailed shot-for-shot storyboard consisting of 3,000 drawings and every planned camera movement .7 UndoXbWedl\, JodoroZVk\¶V VWaWXV in Whe US aV a cXlW direcWor and a symbol for the post-1968 coXnWercXlWXre moYemenW accoXnWV for Whe Xnmade film¶V perViVWing popXlariW\, ZiWh iWV grandioVe claimV of being ³Whe greaWeVW film neYer made.´8 Often cited as cult films, his films El Topo (1970) and La montaña sagrada (1973), both of which incited riots at the time of their release, redefined film spectatorship as ³a form of riWXal´ Vince Whe\ ³inVpire[d] cXlWV, ZiWh aWWendanW riWeV,´ mirroring the ³geneViV of commodified coXnWercXlWXre´ (Jaramillo 173). Reading JodoroZVk\¶V aWWempW Wo adapW Dune in light of his place within a certain cultural 7 See JodoroZVk\, ³The Film YoX Will NeYer See,´ Métal Hurlant, no. 107, 1985. 8 Ibid. 21 and poliWical momenW WakeV precedence oYer an\ conVideraWionV of fideliW\ Wo HerberW¶V narraWiYe. In fact, in the documentary, Jodorowsky cheerfully proclaims that he had not read Dune before deciding to make the film and admits the process was not about Dune iWVelf: ³I ZanWed Wo giYe people who took LSD at that time the hallucinations you get with that drug, but without hallXcinaWing. The film ZaV going Wo change Whe pXblic¶V percepWionV´ (00:02:50-00:03:12). Jodorowsky, knowing his audience and their ritualistic loyalty to his work, as well as their use of drugs during their viewings, had envisioned a film that would once again realize his performative radical surrealism and violent absurdism in a visually and technically stunning way rather than portraying the internal content of intricate politics and historical referents of the Dune universe. It was his vision, his artistic genius, and his audience that would simultaneously adapt and consume Dune. Even though Jodorowsky, in the end, did not adapt Dune into a film, he certainly created a narrative of his interpretation as the quintessential SF film whose (non)conception pioneered the way other SF films have been made from then to the present day. IW haV been almoVW fifW\ \earV Vince JodoroZVk\¶V failXre to realize his Dune project, yet his vision persists in some internet circles to this day. In NoYember 2021, TheSpiceDAO, ³a network of Dune-loYing cr\pWocXrrenc\ enWhXViaVWV,´ bid $2.9 million Wo bX\ a cop\ of the ³direcWor¶V bible,´ WhaW iV, JodoroZVk\ and GiraXd¶V VWor\board, and Zon Whe aXcWion (SeWhi). The crypto-community, after raising $3 million for the auction, raised an additional $12 million to ³make an animaWed film inVpired b\ Whe YolXme´ and Wo ³hold freqXenW IRL YieZingV Zhere enWhXViaVWV can Vee iW for WhemVelYeV´ (SeWhi). One of Whe memberV argXeV WhaW JodoroZVk\¶V storyboard is the perfecW Vpecimen for cr\pWocXrrenc\: ³The onl\ people Wo Vee [Whe VWor\board] were Hollywood insiders, but the public has never seen it. It is a very strong, crypto-minded sensibility ² decentralization, underdog story ² Wo liberaWe iW´ (SeWhi). PaXl AWreideV¶ Vo-called 22 liberation of the Fremen folk from the dictatorship of Harkonnens and the Emperor certainly VeemV Wo relaWe Wo WhiV profeVVed idealiVm, recalling alVo JodoroZVk\¶V ambiWionV Wo liberaWe Whe mind and Whe VoXl WhroXgh Whe cinemaWic, ³XniYerVali]ing´ image. Dune¶V perceiYed revolutionary potential for its readers persists through generations; the book becomes a ³WranVgeneraWional phenomenon´ WhaW geWV ³reWold in differenW Za\V in neZ maWerial and cXlWXral enYironmenWV, ³adapW[ing] Wo neZ enYironmenWV b\ YirWXe of mXWaWion´ (HXWcheon 32). ThiV evolutionary view of adaptation is generative in the context of Dune, seeing as its myth of greatness has evolved by mutation from the counterculture of the 70s to the late capitalist, neoliberal crypto-senVibiliWieV of Woda\. Like JodoroZVk\¶V Xnreachable and Velf-fulfilling vision, Whe ³democraWi]ing´ poWenWial of cr\pWocXrrenc\, aV profeVVed b\ iWV folloZerV, remainV questionable, since its conformity to hyper-capitalistic technology deepens inequality and ecological devastation. Either way, the cultural imprint of Dune is indubitable: it constantly reproduces its content, aesthetics, and form in mutable ways, consistently shaped by its viewer and reader as well as the market environment in which it is being produced and adapted. The implications of speculative adaptation might seem bleak in the face of emergent technologies that redefine authorship and creation, but the mediatic, cultural, and economic evolution of an SF text can never be inherently progressive or reductive. However, it is always speculative as a process and its reception exposes the ideological limitations of its spectator-consumer, a paradoxical position that forces one to reconsider mediatic and theoretical borders of production and influence. Arguably, Jodorowsky made Dune conform to his own style rather than adapting Dune. To a cerWain e[WenW, WhiV iV WrXe of all direcWorV Zho are adapWing a We[W, bXW JodoroZVk\¶V unrealized film never had to adjust itself to studio demands simply because it refused to do so, 23 hence why it was never made. Since it was not shot, any claim about what the film could have been remains convincing to JodoroZVk\¶V fanV. Therefore, it is difficult to contest its status as the greatest film never made as it remains a vision and a process. However, even though it was not Dune¶V liWerar\ meriW WhaW had firVW capWXred Whe aWWenWion of JodoroZVk\, Where mXVW be a reason why, at the time, it had aligned with his artistic vision. Dune (the first book in the series) takes place in a galactic empire where different planets and houses serve Padishah Emperor Shaddam. The desert planet Arrakis, also called Dune, is home to the Fremen, the Arab-coded religious natives who are waiting for a prophet to lead them to salvation. Arrakis is the only planet where the spice melange can be found, the drug necessary for interstellar travel, which is controlled by the Space Guild. At the beginning of the novel, the Atreides family and their son Paul, Zho iV Wo become Whe meVViah Whe Fremen are ZaiWing for, WraYel Wo DXne: ³Wheir morWal enemies, the Harkonnens, had been on Arrakis eighty years, holding the planet in quasi-fief under [... ] contract to mine the geriatric spice, melange. Now the Harkonnens were leaving to be replaced by the House of Atreides in fief-compleWe´ (HerberW 21). Published in 1965 during the Cold War and Whe VieWnam War, iW iV remarkable WhaW HerberW¶V XniYerVe predicWed a VecreW Zar that had been brewing along with other Cold War proxy wars² the Soviet-Afghan War and later, the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. As Senior notes in his article, ³Whe Middle EaVW had been perceived much as Arrakis in Dune as a place for the major powers to exploit and ignore. The political machinations of the Emperor and the Harkonnens (imperial powers - Harkonnens as the Soviet bloc, Atreides as the American/Western), the covert manipulation of the Guild (transportation and oil companies), and the changes in ruling factions recall the post-WWI hiVWor\ of Whe region´ (318). IW ZoXld be idealiVWic Wo VXggeVW WhaW Dune, and SF in general, predicts the future. Still, one might suggest that the genre manipulates existing (in this case 24 American) public anxiety over industry, politics, foreign policy, and technology to project a view of the future that is familiar to the present audience, and indeed to its reader now who is eager to XnearWh a hiVWor\ of Whe Cold War and Vee conWemporar\ America¶V Middle EaVWern poliWicV aV predicted by Dune. The impossibility of imagining totality in the SF genre, whether in the form of utopia or dystopia, reflects on the reception of SF where audiences and critics alike are constrained by the politics of the era in which Whe\ are reading and ZaWching. JameVon¶V theory of SF¶V poWenWial Wo expose ideological closure comes to fruition in the Dune franchise with the constant emphasis on its predictions and influences, especially concerning what it says about the US military and its foreign policieV. JoXrnaliVW And\ Greenberg¶V 2021 arWicle on Dune, published in WIRED, starts ZiWh a bold claim WhaW mirrorV WheVe WendencieV: ³From Afghanistan to cyberattacks, Frank HerberW¶V noYel anWicipaWed and Vhaped Zarfare aV Ze knoZ iW´ (³Dune ForeVaZ´). The arWicle consists of different people of various military ranks exploring how Dune influenced the US and Soviet military, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and global cyberattacks that use codewords from the Dune universe during their covert operations. Lieutenant Kort rehashes his memories from Iraq, declaring WhaW ³Whe parallelV felW Xncann\´ and that the prayers he heard raising from Whe moVqXeV made him ³VenVe a connecWion Wo Dune,´ making him feel like he ZaV parW of VomeWhing larger b\ ³WranVcend[ing] Whe momenW [he] ZaV in.´ I conVider military fantasies such as these as the objectification and the subsequent reification of the historical processes that are behind SF, where, as Adorno writes, ³objecWV become pXrel\ Whing-like the moment they are retained for us without the continued presence of their other aspects: when something of them has been forgoWWen´ (321). ThiV ³VomeWhing,´ in WhiV caVe, iV Whe Xnderpla\ing of Whe accumulation, positionality, and knowledge of military and political tensions between the US and 25 other world forces that culminate in wars and disasters, where the eventual consequence of ³Zar´ has been constituted as an inevitable outcome of a fictional prediction and has become a thing in itself outside of the dialectical and historical relations that precede and shape it. In other words, Dune, for the military subject, becomes a biblical text in which every suspicion and connection is solidified, becoming a universal interpretation of political and military struggle before the act. This exposes, in JameVon¶V terms, the perceived aesthetic and ideological closure of the overarching text by revealing how, for the reader, it becomes impossible to read it without considering it as universal and therefore transhistorical in its conception. Dune then seems to put forward a future history that confirms and sustains the current policies of the state and loses its dialectical dimension where such totality is consistently problematized at the aesthetic level. This reification can also be conceived of as an instrumentalization of the aesthetic object where it is the perceived purpose and the end of the text that takes precedence over anything else. This certainly speaks to the continuous interest in adapting Dune, from Jodorowsky to his cyber-currency-obsessed fans, maintaining its drive to evolve through decades. The military-entertainment complex is certainly a part of this excessive interest in the franchise where Hollywood technologies are being simultaneously used in the military. While such military fanaWicV deriYe leVVonV from Whe We[W, iW iV inWereVWing hoZ JodoroZVk\¶V anWicolonial YiVion aligns with that of Dune aV Zell. HerberW¶V noYel VWarWed garnering aWWenWion in Whe laWe 60V Wo early 70s, ³circulating in squats, communes, labs and studios, anywhere where the idea of global WranVformaWion Veemed aWWracWiYe´ (³DXne, 50 \earV´). ConVidering JodoroZVk\¶V poViWion in Whe American counterculture in the 60s and the 70s, it comes as no surprise that Dune¶V inherenW politics, deeply tied to colonialism, drug use, and consciousness, would be in agreement with his explorations in his earlier films. This predictive potential in Dune certainly falls in line with 26 JodoroZVk\¶V egoWiVWical pXrVXiW of Whe Xnreachable: ³For me, Dune will be the coming of a God. An arWiVWical, cinemaWographical God´ (00:03:49). In a Za\, JodoroZVk\ VeemV Wo ZanW Wo mirror PaXl¶V eYenWXal maVWer\ of hiV mind and hiV embodimenW of Whe XniYerVal conVcioXVneVV ZiWh hiV use of spice, both abstracted from and deeply tied to the intricate politics of Dune. While Dune¶V politics are not discussed in JodoroZsk\¶s DXne, neither by Jodorowsky nor by others, JodoroZVk\¶V anWicolonial YiVion alignV ZiWh WhaW of HerberW¶V (ofWen conWeVWed) ambitions since in hiV filmV, ³raWher Whan appeal Wo poliWicV,´ Jodorowsky encoXrageV ³Whe YieZer Wo Xndergo spiritual and kinesthetic training in order to evade the vulnerabilities of the body under colonial economic relaWionV´ (Jaramillo 176). For him, adapting the spiritual elements and aesthetics of Dune takes precedence over adapting its quasi-hiVWorical narraWiYe and liWerar\ VW\le. SF¶V mind-bending and meVVianic poWenWial becomeV a frXiWfXl Yehicle for JodoroZVk\¶V oZn aeVWheWicV (and veiled politics), fueled by his influence on the 70s drug-infused counterculture. This simultaneous appeal to the present and the future, of a universal overarching consciousness, is an inWegral parW of HerberW¶V Dune and JodoroZVk\¶V XnfiniVhed Dune. It is the abstract questions about the human consciousness generated by Dune that motivate Jodorowsky rather than the noYel¶V hiVWor\ of prodXcWion and conVXmpWion. To folloZ Sobchack once again, Whe Vcope of SF, rather than its content, takes the center stage in its predictive potential to generate interest and market value while its failure is also ironically connected to its unrealizable and conjectural scope. Considering Herbert developed Dune from a VhorW VWor\ (³DXneZorld´) firVW pXbliVhed in 1963 in SF magazine Analog owing to positive fan response, it would not be inaccurate to suggest that Dune¶V Yer\ concepWion ZaV a direcW reVXlW of iWV readers.9 Originally, Herbert had 9 See Herbert, Brian. The Road to Dune, pp. 97. 27 planned to write a shorter novel called Spice Planet of which only an outline exists, unearthed by hiV Von, and labeled aV ³a compleWel\ differenW, neYer-before-seen version of Dune´ (HerberW xx). Taking place in ³recogni]able bXW VkeZed placeV, aV if YieZed WhroXgh a fracWXred lenV,´ Spice Planet both recalls and departs from Dune, consolidating Whe laWWer¶V status as a novel that is constantly in process and unsettling its immutable position as a source text (3). While Brian Herbert and Kevin Anderson attempted to write a short story from the outline, and Brian Herbert to this day publishes Dune sequels, any attempted reproduction appeals to an alternative form of itself, thus confirming the impossibility of adapting its unattainable scope. This impossibility does not stem from content or form but the noYel¶V status. ConVidering ³Whe Vheer Vi]e of Dune¶V liWerar\ cXlW,´ JodoroZVk\¶V oZn cXlW perVonaliW\ cerWainl\ alloZV him Wo XnderWake VXch an impossible project; consequently, his perceived failure of finishing his adaptation only increases his and Dune¶V cXlW VWaWXVeV broXghW aboXW b\ Whe conWinXoXV XnreachabiliW\ and Whe promiVe of greatness (Sikov 75). Clearly, this speculativeness is inherent in the production and reception of cult cinema. The consistent redefining of boundaries and possibilities form the literary and consequently the cinematic cult of Dune. While dismissing the influence of Dune¶V VpecXlaWiYe narrative content would be irresponsible, it certainly is not the only reason behind its cult reception. Rather, the speculative and potential material and mediatic transformations establish Dune as a process that never quite culminates in the eyes of its spectator. BecaXVe iW ZaV noW WXrned inWo a film, JodoroZVk\¶V Dune project is often labeled by news media as failed, even though his storyboard consists of thousands of drawings, character and spaceship designs, camera movements, and the description of every single shot he had planned for his film.10 While the documentary focuses on JodoroZVk\¶V aWWempW Wo adapW Dune, it 10 For discussions of JodoroZVk\¶V failure written by the entertainment media industry, see Asher-Perrin, Terry, and others. 28 uses Jodorowsky and GiraXd¶V VWor\board aV a VoXrce We[W Wo animaWe VeYeral VceneV from Whe book, situating itself within a series of intertextual relationships in the Dune franchise and carrying part of JodoroZVk\¶V YiVion Wo Whe Vcreen. AV he recoXnWV in Whe docXmenWar\, Jodorowsky had envisioned a long shot to begin his film, a pure white view of the universe, inVpired b\ OrVon WelleV¶ e[poViWor\ VhoW in Touch of Evil, transposed to the galaxy. The sequence starts with a close-up of the first frame in the storyboard, with the borders of the panel eventually disappearing outside the screen frame in order to demonVWraWe ZhaW JodoroZVk\¶V Dune could have been. As the sequence plays out, there is a psychedelic score playing in the backgroXnd, once again recalling JodoroZVk\¶V oZn VXrreal aeVWheWic Zhile VimXlWaneoXVl\ alluding to the potential film and its universal appeal. Of course, this scene is animated and is an interpretation of JodoroZVk\¶V storyboard rather than of HerberW¶V Dune, but the same could also be Vaid of JodoroZVk\¶V oZn adapWaWion. For him, GiraXd¶V WalenW VeemV Wo have overshadowed HerberW¶V: ³I XVed MoebiXV aV a camera,´ he Va\V, ³I made Whe picWXre ZiWh draZingV´ (00:17:20). Fig 1. From Pavich, JodoroZsk\¶s DXne (00:21:48). 29 Fig 2. From Pavich, JodoroZsk\¶s DXne (00:22:28). GiraXd¶V VWor\board iV noW Vimpl\ a Za\ Wo enYiVion Whe planned film but is itself an independent artistic creation by a renowned comic book artist. If one takes this storyboard as its own product, and as a source text, it becomes possible to analyze it under a comic book lens precisely because, afWer Whe ³failXre´ of Dune, it was developed into a published comic by Giraud and Jodorowsky called L¶Incal. As seen in the above screenshots from the documentary, Pavich certainly uses the storyboard to continue Dune¶V legac\ aV in-process, animating and coloring various scenes as Jodorowsky narrates his vision in the background. In the animated sequences, the panel frames slowly dissolve, and the storyboard-as-object transforms into storyboard-as-diegesis, transposing the viewer from the documentary space to the fictional space of Dune. While JodoroZVk\¶V original Dune plan fell through due to its rejection by Hollywood, it succeeded in an alternative form owing to the VWor\board¶V reconfigXraWion aV a VoXrce We[W and PaYich¶V brief glimpVe inWo what it could have transformed into had it been accepted by a studio. Like Jodorowsky, Herbert had also refused to give in to the demands of his publisher and had taken a long time to publish Dune. According Wo hiV Von, ³if [he] had written Spice Planet according Wo hiV original plan [«] he might have had a much easier task finding an editor and a publishing house´ (Herbert 4). Spice Planet, like JodoroZVk\¶V Dune, turned out to be something different from its original 30 conception, and was later developed into a story by Anderson and Herbert. Perhaps someone will Wake Xp JodoroZVk\¶V VWor\board and WXrn iW inWo a liYe-action or an animated movie in the future. Certainl\, if an AI iV able Wo generaWe JodoroZVk\¶V Tron with access to the available stills from this storyboard, there might come a time when AI is developed enough to make its own films. JodoroZVk\¶V direcWorial YiVion cannoW direcWl\ be paralleled ZiWh Whe obsessively replicative drive in AI creation, but it certainly illuminates the intertextual and self-reflexive adaptation process that is being reconfigured as new technologies and tools emerge in market environments that adapt to such demands. Either way, the fact that every design for the Dune project went into the making of L¶Incal demonstrates that the unfinished film adapted to its commercial environment and relied on its loyal fanbase. It has become something else, following its transgenerational legacy of constant evolution. With the re-emergence of Whe VWor\board ³bible´ and Whe promiVe of a neZ animaWed film, the future of the Dune franchise remains once again undecided, continuing the long-standing tradition of its in-process status. Here, it is important to acknowledge the recent Dune film, released in 2021, by Denis Villeneuve, which received mostly positive critical and audience response and made $400 million at the box office.11 It adapts the first half of the book with the promiVe of aW leaVW WZo more moYieV. VilleneXYe ciWeV ³Whe ZeighW of e[pecWaWion WhaW haV bXilW behind Whe franchiVe´ as cause for the decision to slowly adapt the novel over the years (King). While VilleneXYe¶s Dune is not the main consideration of this chapter, it is important to note that Dune¶V ³perViVWence in a [cerWain] cXlWXre´ largel\ relieV on iWV hiVWor\ of ³failed´ adapWaWionV²hence why this new film must navigate its position within that history during its process of 11 See ³DXne,´ Rotten Tomatoes. 31 adapWaWion (HXWcheon 32). Like JodoroZVk\¶V Dune, VilleneXYe¶V film does not and cannot stand as an independent adaptation; rather, it is part of an ongoing phenomenon. HoZeYer, before VilleneXYe¶V YerVion, and afWer JodoroZVk\¶V Dune, there was another Dune adaptation. In 1982, film producer Dino De Laurentiis bought the film rights to Dune and took the project from Jodorowsky, giving it to David Lynch, an unusual choice, like Jodorowsky, for directing a mainstream SF novel. While JodoroZVk\¶V film iV conVidered a failXre becaXVe iW did noW geW made, L\nch¶V Dune suffered a fate much worse as it grossed only $30.9 million domestically, resulting in a seven-figure loss for the De Laurentiis family. Amadio notes that ³the reviews were overwhelmingly negative, and to re-read them now is to engage in a kind of VadiVWic noVWalgia´ (435). HoZeYer, deVpiWe its market failure, Whe film¶V cXlW VWaWXV perViVWV. Alegre argXeV WhaW ³cXlWV are bXilW onl\ aroXnd [failed] We[WV (liWerar\ or filmic) ZiWh eYidenW imperfections: some hate them because of their faults, others love them because they see these imperfections as a sign of the arWiVW¶V RomanWic e[erWionV Wo reach perfecWion´ (143). RaWher Whan Veeing L\nch¶V film aV an end prodXcW, When, one mighW conVider iW Xnder a VerieV of intertextualities that constantly (re)shape the Dune universe, its value inscribed by its ambitions and its fanbase rather than any claims to an internal or objective worth. Now one of the most renoZned direcWorV of hiV Wime, L\nch iV knoZn for hiV WhemeV of ³enabling Whe groWeVqXe, interiority and the unconscious mind, and the relationship between industr\ and fleVh,´ constantly and actively opposing rigidly set cinematic and literary narrative structures (Amadio 435). Considering Dune¶V fraught adaptation history and the economic expectations it had been carrying for two decades, it seems apparent in retrospect that Lynch would never be able to realize his own Dune YiVion dXe Wo VWXdio preVVXre, folloZing in JodoroZVk\¶V fooWVWepV. 32 E[Wremel\ denVe and packed ZiWh confXVing Werminolog\, HerberW¶V Dune cannot be directly translated to the cinematic image at the level of content and narrative. At the end of the book, Where iV a chapWer called ³Terminolog\ of Whe ImperiXm´ in Zhich all Whe Xnfamiliar WermV used in the book are defined with the narrator claiming WhaW ³increaV[ing] XnderVWanding iV a laudable goal, hence Whe definiWionV and e[planaWionV giYen beloZ´ (HerberW 1244). While reading, it is fairly easy to turn the pages to get to the chapter and familiarize oneself with these terms if one gets confused. For the reader, the disruption of the narrative is minimal. The glossary is a part of the universe since the narrator still maintains the suspension of disbelief. In addition to the terminology, there are whole sections on the history of the Dune planets, communities, and ecologies that add to the impossibility of conveying the whole plot. However, L\nch¶V Dune seeks to convey the universe in its entirety, introducing most of the unfamiliar terms without explanation and complicating its narrative for the unaware viewer from the start. HerberW¶V Dune begins ZiWh an e[cerpW of ³ManXal of MXad¶Dib,´ PrinceVV IrXlan¶V (Whe daXghWer of Whe Emperor and laWer Whe Zife of PaXl) accoXnW of PaXl¶V riVe Wo poZer. She ZriWeV: ³A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the balances are correcW´ (HerberW 18). The ZordV cerWainl\ ring WrXe noW jXVW for Whe book¶V oZn narraWiYe and Whe ficWional accoXnW of PaXl¶V life, bXW alVo for Whe film adapWaWion. Similarl\, L\nch¶V Dune begins with Princess IrXlan¶V propheWic ZordV aV Whe camera VhoZV a close-up of her face, gradually panning out to reveal her whole face foregrounded against a view of the galaxy. Her voice-over relays information about the unfamiliar universe throughout the film. Considering the vast amounts of information and detail of the Dune universe, this attempt at fidelity becomes problematic when Whe film cannoW folloZ Xp on iWV promiVe of accXrac\. ThroXghoXW Whe film, PrinceVV IrXlan¶V 33 voice-over explains and maintains the plot, giving a literary structure to the narrative that is uncharacteristic of Lynch. ConVidering hiV XVXal preoccXpaWion ZiWh Whe ³XnconVcioXV´ and Whe VXrreal, this adherence to narrative differs from his earlier works The Elephant Man and Eraserhead, preVXmabl\ reVXlWing in Whe film¶V negaWiYe recepWion aW Whe time of its release. While Lynch joXrne\V inWo PaXl¶V unconscious in several dream sequences that signal the relationship between his material reality and his dream states, these sequences are the visualizations of PaXl¶V prophetic dreams in the novel rather than a reflection of the Lynchian unconscious at the formal level. For example, when Paul has what looks like a psychedelic trip in the desert after taking the spice melange, Lynch shows an assemblage of surreal images that include an open palm against a black background, a bloody fetus, and dripping water. Amadio reads this sequence as neglecWing HerberW¶V ³figXraWiYe´ langXage of dreamV and creaWing a confXVing ³V\nWa[´ WhaW does not relay the meaning of the symbols used (445). However, I find this sequence, like the overall visual language of the film, self-explanatory in its attempt to account for PaXl¶V menWal awakening and the unlocking of his powers as a leader. The atmospheric soundtrack, with metallic clangs and softly whispered keywords, give meaning to the images used: namely the intellectual aZakening of PaXl, JeVVica¶V (hiV moWher) dangeroXV pregnanc\, and Whe lack of ZaWer in Arrakis. Hence, this dream works to assemble PaXl¶V fragmented subjecthood and materialize his consciousness rather than complicate it. While the studio likely demanded a conventional narrative that would do well at the theaters, iW iV noW impoVVible Wo Vee L\nch¶V efforWV Wo engage ZiWh hiV characWerV on a deeper level. As Amadio also notes, the character design of the Harkonnens and the Emperor reflects L\nch¶V e[ploraWionV beWZeen ³fleVh and indXVWr\,´ WhoXgh this creates an immense disconnect in 34 the viewing experience when contrasted with the otherwise medieval feel of set and costume design as well as the color scheme (435). This disconnect seems to reaffirm Dune¶V repXWaWion aV an absurd film that can only be loved by cult circles.12 However, this love appears to be retroactive. When Whe film firVW came oXW, hiV fanV ³Zere dismayed to see the auteur literally conVXmed b\ Whe machiner\ of epic cinema and Whe demandV of Whe µeYenW picWXre¶¶ (Rodle\ aV qtd. in Amadio 436). Lynch himself admits that Dune is his least favorite film in his oeuvre, claiming he had Wo ³Vell oXW´ Vince he ³did noW haYe Whe final cXW,´ going so far as to suggest that Whe film iV noW hiV (Barne\ 71). DaYid L\nch¶V Dune, even though it is seemingly a finished product, remains haunted by a version it could have been had Lynch had full creative control. This is not to suggest that this theoretical version would be received better or that it would be aesthetically beWWer, bXW like JodoroZVk\¶V XnfiniVhed Dune, its legacy of unrealized greatness haunts the Dune franchise. Every adaptation looks back to²and will look back to²Jodorowsky and L\nch, bXilding from Wheir ³failXreV´ ZhaW Whe\ ZiVh Wo become. Like most adaptations, Dune adaptations are constantly informed by this often antagonistically nostalgic relationship to their precedents while simultaneously recalling the poVVibiliW\ of Wheir alWernaWe YerVion. In ³AdapWaWion and NoVWalgia,´ Kenned\-Karpat calls noVWalgia an ³adapWiYe impXlVe´ and argXeV WhaW iW ³ma\ be XnderVWood aV a failXre or aW leaVW a relXcWance Wo adjXVW Wo changing circXmVWanceV [«] prompW[ing] criWical reflecWion on Whe paVW WhaW prodXcWiYel\ VhapeV WhingV \eW Wo come´ (283). If boWh adapWaWion and noVWalgia ³emerge and e[iVW in Whe preVenW,´ bXW ³alVo remain fi[aWed on prior e[perience,´ adapWaWionV are, from Wheir Yer\ concepWion, doomed Wo ³fail´ in Vome aVpecW (283). While this perceived failure is deeply tied to the impossibility of capturing the source text, adaptations often transform their source by 12 See, for e[ample, Sn\der, ³The MeVV\, MiVXnderVWood Glor\ of DaYid L\nch'V DXne.´ 35 constantly re-contextualizing them in a new cultural environment²a phenomenon exemplified by Dune¶V cXrrenW enWanglemenW ZiWh Whe emerging cr\pWocXrrenc\ cXlWXre. Looking back 30 \earV inWo Whe paVW Wo XnearWh JodoroZVk\¶V Dune, PaYich¶V 2003 documentary practices this conflicted nostalgia by arguing that Jodorowsky influenced and shaped every major SF film post-1975 with his storyboard. Jodorowsky himself fervently voices this rather refutable argument in the documentary, but Pavich consolidates it with his convincing editing, juxtaposing scenes from famous SF films with various panels from the storyboard. These films include Star Wars, Terminator, Flash Gordon, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Masters of the Universe, Contact, Blade Runner, and notably the prequel to Alien, Prometheus, which includes a fortress remarkabl\ like H.R. Giger¶V deVign of Whe Harkonnen forWreVV. In Whe docXmenWar\, film critic DaYid Faraci argXeV WhaW LXke Sk\Zalker¶V Wraining VceneV in Star Wars and Terminator¶V scanning scenes would not be possible ZiWhoXW JodoroZVk\ and GiraXd¶V VWor\board. WiWh PaYich¶V ediWing, Whe argXmenW cerWainl\ VeemV Wo hold Vome WrXWh aV we watch the rapid succession of familiar SF film scenes that carry traces of the Dune storybook which is said to have circulated in Holl\Zood VWXdioV afWer Whe film¶V rejecWion b\ Whe Vame V\VWem. The memor\ of the potential Dune and its persisting nostalgia lives on WhroXgh oWher filmV, or Vo PaYich¶V subjects and editing argue. Since films are often informed by other films, this argument becomes almost irrefutable preciVel\ becaXVe JodoroZVk\¶V adapWaWion ZaV neYer made aV a film. IW ZaV planned as a film, and it could have been what Star Wars, Terminator, or Alien was had it been greenlit. It is the nostalgia for what never was that cements Dune as the precursor to the contemporary SF film. Clearly, emerging technologies such as CGI and special effects have an immense effect on shooting technically complex scenes that were only imagined in the making of Dune. Dan O¶Bannon, H.R. Giger, and ChriV FoVV all meW WhroXgh JodoroZVk\, worked on his 36 Dune project, and later went on to make Alien. As shown in JodoroZsk\¶s DXne, the work they did for Dune undoubtedly informed Alien and their later films. Through its editing, the documentary suggests that these films are adaptations of the Dune storyboard at the aesthetic and technical level and that the spirit of JodoroZVk\¶V Dune lives on. Such arguments about influence inevitably add to the cult status of the unmade Dune and the persisting interest in getting it right. Kennedy-Karpat contends that like nostalgia, adapWaWion ³can be XnderVWood boWh aV a logic of conVXmpWion What (de)prioritizes future textual encoXnWerV baVed on prior e[perience´ and ³a meanV of Vhaping inWerpreWaWionV of and affecWiYe reVponVeV Wo inWerWe[W´ (291). ThiV VimXlWaneoXV appeal Wo Whe paVW and fXWXre of a We[W iV an inherent part of JodoroZsk\¶s DXne²in itself an SF text that speculates on the possibilities of the genre. This speculative drive is also reflected in its animation of the storyboard and its ruminations on the influence of Dune as a canonical work. PaYich¶V documentary functions both as an adaptation through its animation of the storyboard illustrations and a nostalgic attempt to seize a possible past that informs and is informed by other intertexts. As he gleefully claims in the documentary, JodoroZVk\¶V projecW ZaV Wo inclXde Salvador Dalí as the Emperor and Orson Welles as Baron Harkonnen. On top of that, its soundtrack would be scored by the psychedelic rock band Pink Floyd (and other bands). Casting such influential figures within and outside cinema is undoubtedly a deliberate choice to change Whe VpecWaWor¶V percepWionV of ZhaW cinema mighW become and pave the way for generations of filmmakers to come. However, while his project remained unfinished, it certainly did not fail as it set the expectations for other Dune adaptations that consistently strived (and strive) to capture the elusive spirit of Dune. ThiV iV noW Vo mXch an effecW of JodoroZVk\¶V Dune project in and of itself but its legacy, extending beyond its immediate content and its status as an SF text, with its 37 past and future-oriented nostalgia transforming the subsequent adaptations. While there is much to be said about other adaptations of Dune, JodoroZsk\¶s DXne, as both the planned movie and the documentary, is a generative starting point not only for studying the transgenerational phenomenon of adaptation within the Dune universe but also for questioning persisting claims of failure in the adaptations of beloved works. 38 Chapter 3 Externalizing Artistic and Scientific Creation in Ken Russell¶s Altered States and David Cronenberg¶s Naked Lunch Modernist conceptions of authentic and valuable art have long been at the forefront of cultural studies, and discussion of film, as a newer art, is necessarily a part of the conversation. Adorno has famously claimed that film falls under not art but the culture industry with its capitalist formalizations of thought and image, (re)producing false consciousness under market impulses that hinder originality and value. While the time and place in which he is writing, post-war Germany in the late 1940s, differs in obvious ways from our contemporary world, and though Adorno is concerned with early cinema, hiV obVerYaWion WhaW ³Whe cXlWXre indXVWr\ iV geared Wo mimeWic regreVVion´ and ³Wo Whe manipXlaWion of repreVVed impXlVes Wo cop\´ cerWainl\ speaks to and complicates adaptation and its perceived artistic value (201). Adorno undoubtedly predicts certain truths about the culture industry, from the Hollywood studio system in the Golden Age Wo Whe DiVne\ monopol\ of enWerWainmenW franchiVeV in oXr preVenW momenW: ³[The cXlWXre indXVWr\¶V] meWhod iV Wo anWicipaWe Whe VpecWaWor'V imiWaWion of iWVelf, Vo making iW appear as if the agreement already exists which it intends to create. It can do so all the better because in a stabilized system it can indeed count on such agreement, having rather to reiterate it riWXaliVWicall\ Whan acWXall\ Wo prodXce iW´ (201). For Adorno, When, the culture industry and thus film as a medium cannot produce authentic feeling or valuable political thought. Attributing to art the capacity to recoil from reality while simultaneously being embedded in it, he posits that the image, as a manipulation of the industry, always conforms to and reiterates the capitalist reality rather than providing any meaningful critique of it. 39 The view of the moving image as inferior to the written word persists in much contemporary criticism and reception, especially in the case of adaptations of modernist or highbrow texts that are considered to possess an inherent artistic and aesthetic value.13 This is the question that leads me into my final chapter: is it possible to study adaptations of canonical and highly experimental works outside the framework of aesthetic failure in their attempt to capture the spirit of the creative work under a market that encourages reproduction and financial gain? Here I discuss two such film adapWaWionV, Ken RXVVell¶V Altered States (1980) and David Cronenberg¶V Naked Lunch (1991), adapted respectively from Padd\ Cha\efVk\¶V novel Altered States (1978) and William BXrroXghV¶ novel Naked Lunch (1951) as well as from a variety of other artistic and scientific works. Both films externalize the artistic and scientific creative proceVV b\ cenWering Whe arWiVW/VcienWiVW boXrgeoiV VXbjecW¶V conVcioXVneVV aV Whe Wool for finding a tangible truth. Unsettling the SF genre with their speculative musings on their contemporary artistic moment and discarding future-oriented speculations of the genre, these films attempt a serious reconfiguration of their artistic and scientific origins. They self-reflexively comment on the tools of artistic creation in order to analyze an art industry and the mechanics of its production, informed by the source texts in terms of content but constantly undermining them through their excessive visual form and the ways in which they reflect on different material conditions. This clash between the obsession with drug-induced altered consciousness and its mechanics of representation informs my analysis of these films as putting forward a different view of SF. That is, these films are at once self-reflexive of their status as artworks and adamant in their claim to a plausible artistic or scientific truth rooted in the process of creation rather than 13 See, for example, MXrph\¶V arWicle on Naked Lunch in which he accuses Cronenberg of the ³poVWmoderni]aWion´ of a YalXable ³moderniVW We[W,´ argXing WhaW iW ³fXrWherV the capitalist process of deVingXlari]aWion and WoWali]aWion´ b\ eVWabliVhing a ³Romantic postmodernism´ that is apolitical (122). I will return to this article in this chapter. 40 in their projections of a utopian or a dystopian future. To demonstrate their influence, I will also discuss their reception at the time of their release as it relates to their adaptation process. 3.1 Science as Source Text: Looking for External Truth in Ken Russell¶s Altered States Altered States went through a chaotic production process with many directors signing onto the project and subsequently dropping it until Ken Russell, an auteur in his own right, was hired to direct the film. The film would later be disowned by the renowned Hollywood screenwriter Paddy Chayefsky who had also written the screenplay for the adaptation. According to Russell, he was the twenty-seventh director Warner Bros approached after big names like Steven Spielberg, Stanley Kubrick, and Orson Welles. A British director with only one American film under his name, Valentino (1977), which had failed at the box office, Russell was and is known for an excessive visual style which the producers felt was crucial for Altered States. However, they also admitted that RXVVell¶V psychedelic sequences might have been too expensive for a film they did not think would do that well at the box office after test showings to middle-aged women in a mall.14 PerhapV RXVVell¶V inViVWence on VhooWing YiVXal VeqXenceV WhaW were on the screen for one-third of a second, taking maybe three days to shoot and costing anywhere between $30,000 to $300,000 depending on the technology necessary, was another reason for Warner Bros.¶ initial reluctance to sign him as director.15 In the end, though, Altered States made almost $20 million at the box office against a budget of about $15 million, becoming a hit among the younger American generation. It was simultaneously defined as a cult film because of its psychedelic and unconventional themes as well as its necessary associations ZiWh RXVVell¶V earlier diVWXrbing and YiVceral Zork VXch aV The Devils (1971), which was banned throughout Europe and to this day is unavailable in its entirety. However, putting together two 14 As quoted by Nancy Mills in the October 1981 issue of Television & Home Video magazine (22). 15 Ibid (28). 41 renowned figures such as Russell and Chayefsky culminated in the latter walking away from the set a week into production, ciWing RXVVell¶V diVreVpecW of hiV original Vcreenpla\. The director claimed that he had ³VhoW eYer\ Zord WhaW Padd\ ZroWe e[cepW for Vome Wrifling changeV in Whe Mexican VeqXenceV,'' conWending WhaW he ³ZaV more faiWhfXl Wo Whe VcripW in Altered States than in an\ preYioXV moYie´ (BXckle\). Chayefsky disowned the film, removed his name from the picture, and was credited as Sidney Aaron, his actual name. This dispute possibly affected his perVonal life and healWh Vo mXch WhaW he paVVed aZa\ Vi[ monWhV afWer Whe film¶V releaVe.16 Altered States as film and book takes its source material from various scientific aXWhoriWieV and e[ploraWionV VXch aV ph\Vician John C. Lill\¶V flotation tank trips chronicled in The Centre of the Cyclone (1972), the manuscript of his isolation tank experiments in The Scientist (1978), pV\chologiVW TimoWh\ Lear\¶V ZriWingV on LSD, and CarloV CaVWañeda¶V Don JXan bookV. The film¶V proWagoniVW, Dr. EdZard ³Eddie´ Jessup, a psychopathologist at Harvard University, experiments with sensory deprivation in isolation tanks, working with the hypothesis that altered states of consciousness are as real as the reality one experiences. His attempts to use experimentation to reach the Original Self ± the real self that is ³tangible and quantifiable´ (00:25:20) ±reVXlW in hiV hallXcinaWionV ³externalizing,´ and his genetic structure regresses into that of an ape in one experiment. The screenplay itself is so full of scientific jargon that the science behind the film is impenetrable to the regular spectator; the fast-paced dialogue in the film undermines itself with the underplaying of its own inherent seriousness in exchange for a visual feast that includes several dream sequences with rapid montages of consecutive close-up shots and alternating visual effects. In a review she wrote on the day of the film¶V releaVe, criWic Janet Maslin observes that Cha\efVk\¶V Vcreenpla\ ³crieV oXW Wo be Waken VerioXVl\´ Zhile 16 See HolWYedW¶V reYieZ of Mad as Hell: The Life and Work of Paddy Chayefsky where she discusses the effects of the process on Cha\efVk\¶V personal life (212). 42 RXVVell¶V direcWion WreaWV Whe maWerial ³maWWer-of-facWl\,´ noWing WhaW RXVVell¶V ³diVregard for Whe dialogXe iV Vo compleWe´ and WhaW he ³raceV [Whe characWerV] WhroXgh Whe Vcreenpla\'V Wechnical jargon as if they regard [«] EngliVh aV a Vecond langXage´ (15). RXVVell reporWedl\ Xrged William HXrW (Dr. JeVVXp) and oWher acWorV Wo ³moXWh Wheir dialogXe Zhile eaWing´ and called ChayefVk\¶V dialogXe ³Vocial Vcience blabber´ (Lan]a 228). Regardless of whether this is RXVVell¶V aWWempW Wo be ³faiWhfXl´ and inclXde all dialogXe or a deliberaWe direcWorial choice Wo assert his dominance, there certainly appears to be a conflict pertaining to the scientific seriousness of the film between Cha\efVk\¶V VcienWific aVpiraWionV and RXVVell¶V YiVXali]ing of them. Most SF works necessarily take some of their source material from scientific theories and evidence; however, in the case of Altered States, some sequences appear as direct adaptations of John Lill\¶V manXVcripWV, eVpeciall\ The Centre of the Cyclone. Lilly is an important figure of the Cold War era in the United States as a scientist whose research and influence was co-opted by both military operatives and a counterculture that sought a way to regain agency over the individual. According Wo Seed, Lill\¶V Zork ZiWh neXroelecWric VWimXlaWion in Whe 1950V influenced the ³Cold War brainwashing scare,´ and in turn inspired films and literature in which brainZaVhing ZaV a cenWral ploW deYice´ (qWd in WilliamV 85). More Whan WhaW, miliWar\ and intelligence officials were interested in Lill\¶V research precisely because of its promise of controlling enemy agents. However, as Williams also observes, Lilly is remembered not for his involvement in Cold War military technology but as a figure of 1960s counterculture and the psychedelic scene with his experiments on consciousness in isolation tanks that emphasized individual agency in the panoptical scene of Cold War America. His scientific manuscripts detailing his isolation tank experiments read as both idiosyncratic and enlightening. It is easy to 43 see why he was shunned from the mainstream scientific circles of the 60s and 70s with his research increasingly presenting itself as SF and autobiography. In The Cyclone, he defines the hXman brain aV a ³biocompXWer´ WhaW can reach other states of consciousness physically. He defines an episode where he finds himself regressing into his ancestor until his face becomes that of a ³hair\ anWhropoid´ (Lill\ 12). While Whe VcienWific (if Whe\ can be called WhaW) implicaWionV of his experiments are outside the scope of this thesis, they do demonstrate the direct links to Cha\efVk\¶V screenplay and novel as attempting to incorporate a certain scientific moment in American culture with Dr. Jessup functioning as a figure similar to Lilly who attempts to reach the final truth about hXman naWXre WhroXgh Vcience. AdapWing cerWain epiVodeV from Lill\¶V book, Altered States as a literary text is inherently speculative not in its depiction of a future history (as in JameVon¶V anal\ViV) bXW in iWV WreaWmenW of VcienWific e[perimenWaWion What promises an escape from the limitations of being in history. The scientist subject, as both inspiration and character, is presented as the way out of a history fraught with conflict, and his journey emerges as a manifestation of his unique altered consciousness facilitated by drugs and isolation. Thus, RXVVell¶V WreaWmenW of dialogXe (ediWing and pacing) WhreaWenV Wo Xndermine Whe aWWempWed scientific legitimacy of the screenplay even as it stays faithful to it. It is within these tensions that Altered States¶ fraXghW prodXcWion proceVV informV iWV recepWion. Considering its subject matter and its director, it is no surprise that Altered States, despite being a Hollywood film nominated for two Oscars and a hit at the box office, has been categorized as a cult film. Its reception at the time of its release, especially during its previews, demonstrates its success among the young generation despite its mixed reception by critics, as detailed by Lanza in his book Phallic Frenzy: Ken Russell and His Films: 44 Before Altered States was unleashed on the general public, Warner¶V held previews. Among the first was at a shopping center in suburban San Diego for a sneering audience of what Russell calls "overweight women in slacks with beehive hairdos." But a group of mostly UCLA students in Westwood gaped before a 70 mm screen with six-track stereo and loved it. Russell states: "Many of the kids went back time and again for the hallucinations alone-sitting in the foyer between trips, getting high, while a lookout was bribed to stay in the auditorium, enduring the dialogue until it was time to poke his head around the door and shout next hallucination! (234) This anecdote undoubtedly illustrates how the tension between the two artists informed the reception of the film even before its release. Considering Altered States is his perhaps most acclaimed film afWer man\ WhaW Zere noW Zell receiYed b\ aXdienceV, RXVVell¶V enWhXViaVm aW WhiV uniquely American reception of his film is not surprising. Moreover, he attributes this to the trippy hallucination sequences that are solely the result of his vision rather than to the screenplay or plot. Cult films, as discussed in Chapter 1, are informed by unconventional modes of spectatorship and viewing settings, such as in the case of Altered States. Young viewers, under the influence of drugs, experience the visuals rather than consider the film as a narrative text with a naWXral ploW progreVVion. RXVVell¶V YiVXal langXage iV full of symbolism, clear in his use of religious iconography with psychedelic bursts of color in dark space, reminiVcenW of KXbrick¶V 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). His film transforms the viewing experience by overlooking its essential narrative subject-matter in favor of a film that prioritizes the act of watching. As Edward Jessup experiences the hallucinations in the sensory deprivation tank, and as his hallXcinaWionV ³e[Wernali]e´ and become maWerial be\ond hiV conVcioXVneVV, Whe film grows increasingly erratic and the visuals themselves, as consecutive movie stills, become the focus. By 45 visualizing sensual consumption, Russell reminds his audience that this is a unique encounter with the image as opposed to the written text that can only contemplate this psychedelic experience without reproducing it. Several sequences begin with the camera focusing in on computer monitors in the lab with the screens showing experiments being conducted on schizophrenic patients as well as on Jessup himself. In the second sequence where Jessup regresses into an ape, the camera shows the transformation on the lab screen, focused on his face as it transforms into a face of an ape-like primitive and a metallic screech is heard as the monitor goes static with an explosion of light. Unmistakably, Russell is commenting on the connection between film spectatorship and filmmaking in this scene beyond the pseudo-Darwinian explorations the film incorporates. The visuals, sound, and light in this sequence work to remove the subject from his spatial and temporal moment in an otherwise realistic narrative that takes place in an academic-dominated world. With this spatial suspension through the isolation tank (as an important device to separate the subject from narrative progression) and through the diegetic inclusion of another camera and screen, Russell¶V film implicaWeV Whe WoolV of cinema in an otherwise dialogue- and therefore subject-driven narrative. It is through the unique manipulation of the medium that the experience of drug-altered consciousness is relayed to the spectator²after all, watching a psychedelic sequence cannot be the same as reading the words describing it. Cha\efVk\¶V insistence on the word-for-word translation of his script Wo Whe Vcreen and hiV complainWV WhaW RXVVell ³kep[W] Whe acWorV moYing all Whe Wime,´ along ZiWh RXVVell¶V anno\ance aW Cha\efVk\¶V lack of cinematic understanding± WhaW he ³VeeV WhingV in WermV of VceneV, on a VWage, almoVW flaW´±highlights the tension between literary language and visual language that exists in adaptation as a process (Lanza 222). Russell considers choreography as a crucial element of cinema and uses the camera 46 aV a characWer in hiV filmV, WhXV hiV focXV on ³flXid VeqXenceV´ aV oppoVed Wo rigid oneV (222). For e[ample, in JeVVXp¶V hallXcinaWion VceneV, he opWV for a flXid progreVVion of YarioXV VignV and images, showing Jessup on a cross and not letting it linger against the background of a clouded sky, flying fish, and other animals. Thus, he invites attention to the pop art-inspired imagery behind the subject rather than the subject himself, reconfiguring the space of the screen with special effects. A commercial and a (mostly) critical success, Altered States influenced many films in the 1980s and the 1990s by using the latest special effects technology Hollywood had to offer. According to Flanagan, deVpiWe RXVVell¶V denial WhaW Altered States was a horror film, his ³Vpecial effects showcase unwittingly became the template of a new brand of horror films in the 1980s [«],´(181) specifically what is dubbed as the ³rXbber realiW\´ horror sub-genre, including films like A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984). Clearl\, RXVVell¶V film faciliWaWed Whe reprodXcWion of new technologies and genres and had a huge impact on mass culture. Though there is much to be Vaid aboXW Whe ³YalXe´ of WhiV VXcceVV in WermV of arW prodXcWion Xnder Whe cXlWXre indXVWr\ (following Adorno), it is nevertheless important to note that while Altered States might be deemed a failXre in WermV of iWV WreaWmenW of Cha\efVk\¶V Vcreenpla\, iW made new technologies visible to aspiring filmmakers and transformed the viewing experience of a younger generation at the time of its release. RXVVell¶V reliance on e[ceVViYe YiVXalV certainly informs the speculative nature of adaptation by anticipating the possibilities of new technology while the film itself negotiates the reach for scientific truth and the impossibility of such an endeavor through the image. Grant contends that SF¶V ³reliance on special effects is itself an enactment of science ficWion¶V WhemaWic concern ZiWh Wechnolog\´ (15) and WhaW ³Whe scopophilic pleasure of cinema is mobilized most intensely in special effects images, as viewers are swathed in their power´ (22). 47 Implicit in this observation is the possible obscuring of contextual material in the making of an SF film by its foregrounding of the shocking power of the image, undoubtedly self-reflexive in its representation of reality. WiWh WhaW in mind, I WXrn Wo m\ VecWion on Cronenberg¶V Naked Lunch, a surreal SF film that utilizes special effects in a way that ensures its distance from its source text²BXrroXghV¶ inflXenWial counterculture classic Naked Lunch. 3.2 Writing as a Mechanical Process: Externalizing Consciousness in David Cronenberg¶s Naked Lunch In contrast to Altered States¶ success at the theatres, Cronenberg¶V looVe adapWaWion of Naked Lunch tanked at the box office and many critics considered it a failed adaptation despite Burroughs giving it the green light and approving of Cronenberg¶V YiVion. IW made only $2.6 million against a production budget of almost $18 million. Cronenberg claimed that a literal translation ³ZoXld coVW $400 million to make and be banned in every country in the world;´ additionally, it would be an adaptation ³ZiWh no emoWional conWenW and ZiWhoXW Whe beaXW\, grace, and poWenc\ of BXrroXghV'V liWerar\ VW\le´ (Cronenberg, in Silverberg 55). Cronenberg does not so much adapt the content of Naked Lunch but the writing of it, providing a portrait of William Burroughs informed by his other autobiographical writings and fiction. Burroughs famously did not intervene in the production of the film, considering it a personal interpretation of his work, haYing ³no ZriWing inpXW inWo Whe VcripW ZhaWVoeYer´ (Burroughs, in Silverberg 15). Shying away from a direct adaptation of the literary text is perhaps an acknowledgment of the impossibility of it, or an attempt to sidestep risk, since Cronenberg is notably influenced by Burroughs throughout his oeuvre. Choosing to adapt the intertexts of the process of writing instead seems to have been very much deliberate, eVpeciall\ conVidering ³hiV aWWempWV Wo emXlaWe BXrroXghV´ in his work b\ Veeking ³a direcW, oneiric connecWion ZiWh Whe XnconVcioXV inVWincWV and 48 associations´ (Beard 123). If it is neither the content nor the form of BXrroXghV¶ Naked Lunch that Cronenberg is trying to capture, is it simply the portrait of an independent artist-subject? William Beard cerWainl\ argXeV aV VXch Zhen he poViWV WhaW Cronenberg ³haV alZa\V e[preVVed his allegiance to the romantic-existentialist-modernist idea of the artist as heroic and transgressive explorer - explorer especially of the inner sourceV of WranVgreVVion´ (123). Cronenberg himself suggests that this was his plan for Naked Lunch when he defines his attempt aV ³a combinaWion of BXrroXghVian maWerial bXW pXW inWo a VWrXcWXre WhaW'V noW Yer\ BXrroXghVian´ WhaW ³accXraWel\ reflecW[V] Vome of the tone of Burroughs, what his life stands for, and what his work has been"' (Cronenberg, in Silverberg 65). Implicit in these complications of adaptation-as-process is the question of authorship as it relates to the production of these films. Clearly, the animosity, in the case of Altered States, and mutual respect, in the case of Naked Lunch, (re)defined the production process while the directors and producers negotiated the difficult relationships involved in it. A perhaps more important consideration seems to be the market limitations stunting the process, though of course this is true of all films. However, it is worthwhile to pay attention to exactly how the film negotiates these extratextual processes, how it is informed by the industry, and how that relates to SF as a genre that exposes the ideological closure of the spectator-consumer, keeping in mind that these films do not necessarily transport their textual conditions to an indeterminate future as Dune does. Evidently, in Cronenberg¶V Naked Lunch, there is an attempt to be faithful to the tone of BXrroXghV¶V Zork and life, and mXch of the criticism of the film tends to revolve around the relative success of that mission. However, there is a considerable lack of criticism of Cronenberg¶V film WhaW conViderV Whe mechanicV of arW prodXcWion±a common thread in the Cronenberg canon±at a diegetic and non-diegetic level. There is also a lack of discussion on how 49 the film engages with the SF genre as it relates to its visual elements. Scott Bukatman considers BXrroXghV and Cronenberg aV arWiVWV belonging Wo Whe VXbgenre of ³Whe Vcience ficWion of VpecWacle´ Zhere image haV Waken oYer eYer\ parW of VocieW\ and biolog\, YiraliW\, and media are the centerpieces in narrative form. He goes on to suggest that the extratextual universe is also implicated in SF: Representation and textuality become the explicit subjects of the text; discourse will comprise the content as well as determine textual form. The inherent rhetoricity of the genre is extended as the text turns in upon its own production and status. The science fiction of the spectacle often demands the recognition of its own imbrication in the implosion of the real. (Bukatman 200) Considering the rhetoricity and the self-referentiality of the genre, and its claim to comprising a separate literary and filmic language, one can begin to complicate criticisms of fidelity and value as they relate to an influential modernist text. The speculative aspect of SF, even when there are no conceptionV of ³fXWXre,´ comeV inWo pla\ ZiWh iWV negoWiaWionV of arWiVWic prodXcWion WhaW textually and extratextually narrate a reach for truth. The rhetorical aspect of the genre informs the process by which the film constantly tries to prove itself to an ambivalent originator and a perceived audience, no matter, in the case of Cronenberg, its romanticizing of modernist conceptions of the transgressive author. It speculates on its own production as an artwork with its ruminations on its mechanics of production and its visual configuration of a literary work like Naked Lunch that is both cinematic and considered unfilmable. FXrWhermore, Cronenberg¶V BXrroXghVian inflXence iV clear in hiV earlier filmV in terms of his preoccupation with images of virality in an emergent technological culture in North America. As Beard notes, Reagan-era Hollywood films possessed a conformity that was characterized by a 50 ³plaVWic happineVV,´ reflecWed alVo in Canadian cinema (³The Canadianness of Cronenberg´ 120). These films were mostly conservative in their approach to their material and had an unquestioned reliance on emergent film technology. However, Cronenberg did not follow suit, even with an American text such as Naked Lunch, mirroring BXrroXghV¶ interventions in his own methods of artistic creation. As Chris Rodley observes, however, in the case of Stereo (1969) and Crimes of the Future (1970), Cronenberg emXlaWeV BXrroXghV noW in WermV of YiVXalV bXW WhroXgh ³Yoice-oYerV and Whe ZorldV Whe\ deVcribe´ (112). HiV earlier Zork, When, inclXdeV direcW referenceV Wo the themes of BXrroXghV¶V ZorkV, VXch aV conWrol and conVpirac\, and Naked Lunch presents a commitment to certain images in the literary text. However, there seems to be no attempted fideliW\ Wo a BXrroXghVian VWrXcWXre in Cronenberg¶V Zork. ThiV choice, or raWher neceVViW\, mighW be the reason why it has been considered a failure by some critics. While Naked Lunch was well received by certain cult audiences, for some Burroughs scholars and critics, it failed to adapt the novel to the screen successfully. One such critic is Timothy Murphy who accuses Cronenberg of disregarding the political dimension of the discontinuous text by turning it into a celebration of Whe arWiVW¶V VWrXggle Wo creaWe and compleWel\ alWering iWV form: ³«one would have to exercise great caution in extracting any simple generic or genetic element from [Naked Lunch], but the structure of Cronenberg's Naked Lunch is one of the simplest and most linear imaginable´ (115). He goeV on Wo VXggeVW WhaW ³the object of the film is the novel as artifact or hermetic thing, not as readable matter that can enter into relations with readers or into assemblages with social situations,´ poViWing WhaW Whe film iV ³XncriWical´ in iWV VWance (115). Evidently, as Cronenberg also admits in his short piece in Everything is Permitted: The Making of Naked Lunch, the structure of the narrative is linear and he does avoid adapting actual scenes from the novel, resisting a direct adaptation of the text in favor of its speculations on what it means to write²both for 51 Burroughs specifically and for the contemporary writer-artist more generally. MXrph\¶V poliWical lens is valuable if we are to consider Naked Lunch the film as the narrative afterlife of Naked Lunch the literary text, but I ZoXld complicaWe hiV aVVerWion of Whe film¶V poliWical iVolaWion b\ suggesting that Cronenberg is commenting on his process from a different medium and historical moment where new technologies of creation clash with those of the past. By visualizing the practice of writing under systems of power that colonize every part of consciousness and creativity, Cronenberg is certainly speculating on BXrroXghV¶V legac\ aV a counterculture figure whose novels had been banned in Boston and other cities as recently as 1962, not only because of their sexual and visceral but also their political daring. Naked Lunch as a literary text is extremely convoluted in its content and form with its use of the cut-up method and no clear spatial or temporal consistency. It emergeV from a cXlWXre of ³diVgXVW ZiWh and reYolW againVW Whe gra\ Cold War conformiW\ of Whe 1950V´ ZiWh iWV preoccXpaWion ZiWh narcoWicV and its fatalistic attempts at escaping its own entanglement in the industry (Indiana, in Silverberg 122). AV BXrroXghV makeV clear in hiV addiWion, ³DepoViWion: TeVWimon\ Concerning a SickneVV,´ jXnk fXncWionV aV a poZerfXl meWaphor for a capitalist industry that takes over every parW of life. JXnk iV ³Whe ideal prodXcW« Whe XlWimaWe merchandiVe´ WhaW does not need to be markeWed becaXVe iWV merchanW ³VellV Whe conVXmer Wo hiV prodXcW´ inVWead and lastly, it ³iV an indXVWr\´ WhaW iV an eYil YirXV (Naked Lunch 221). Concerned with the image industry under capitalism and its effects on the body throughout his oeuvre, Cronenberg undertakes to turn the mechanics of artistic production against itself by implicating them in a malign art industry. Naked Lunch as written text adapts to a filmic language that configures writing as a physical and visual act, exemplified by its obsession with typewriters that act as Interzone agents existing under global and extractive capitalist practices. Bill Lee (presumably William Burroughs), an 52 e[WerminaWor WXrned agenW Zho iV addicWed Wo ³bXg poZder´ and illegal ³black cenWipede meaW´ produced in the Morocco-coded Interzone, voices it as such when his Clark Nova typewriter turns into an insect-agent that talks back to him and warns him of the dangers of artistic creation: ³I XnderVWood WhaW ZriWing coXld be dangeroXV. I didn¶W reali]e iW coXld come from Whe machiner\´ (1:00:03). The ZriWing inVWrXmenW WXrnV againVW Whe acW of ZriWing Zhen iW becomeV incorporated into a mechanized industry of artistic creation. Every word Bill Lee types runs the riVk of implicaWing him in poZerV he iV Wr\ing Wo reViVW. Cronenberg¶V choice of indiYidXal cloVe-ups, especially during Bill and the typewriter-as-inVecW¶V dialogXeV, reinforces this tension between subjects and the systematic forces that surround them. Most readings, including Cronenberg¶V oZn YiVion, inWerpreW Whe inVecW W\peZriWerV, InWer]one, MXgZXmpV, and oWher fanWaVWical creaWXreV aV Whe e[WenVion of Bill Lee¶V imaginaWion Zhen he iV on drXgV, indeed supported by the primacy of close-XpV of Bill Lee¶V face, WhXV disregarding what type of externality these creatures might imply. For example, William Beard, in his The Artist as Monster, ZriWeV WhaW all Whe ³creaWXreV, and oWher relaWed 'effecWV' maWerial in Whe film, are b\-products of hallucination [...] induced by invented drugs that stand in for their real-world eqXiYalenWV of YarioXV opiXm deriYaWiYeV and hallXcinogenicV´ (280). IW is true that real life narcoWicV in BXrroXghV¶V XniYerVe WXrn inWo highl\ ficWional and abVXrd drXgV (bXg poZder and black centipede meat) here, but if we take them to be physical commodities that facilitate SF conventions instead of simply labeling them as hallucinations, we can observe the anxiety inherenW in Whe prodXcWion of Whe film. TranVpoVing BXkaWman¶V earlier aVVerWion of Whe SF We[W¶V self-refle[iYe WendencieV Wo Whe image iWVelf, Ze can VWarW Wo VpecXlaWe hoZ ³the image no longer exists as a sign, bXW raWher aV an objecW: a commodiW\, a YirXV, a Zeapon, an idenWiW\´ (Terminal Identity 32). This is perhapV dXe Wo SF¶V ³generic WranVformaWion´ in Whe 1980V ³which 53 acknowledges the text's complicity in the maintenance and construction of the society of the VpecWacle´ (32). CerWainl\, Cronenberg¶V obVeVVion ZiWh YiVcera and Whe YiVceral confirmV WhiV transformation. The amount of funding and special effects that went into the Mugwumps17, not simply as a hallucination but as physical creatures that elicit a visceral reaction from the VpecWaWor, reflecWV alVo Cronenberg¶V oZn direcWorial ambiWion of capWXring Whe elXViYe relaWionV between creation and control. Following the anxiety of adapting Naked Lunch aV Zell aV Whe film¶V oZn commenWar\ on iWV prodXcWion, hoZ mighW one XnderVWand Whe ZriWing Wool¶V enWanglemenW ZiWh jXnk cXlWXre? IW iV only in Interzone Incorporated that typewriters turn into insects, working for invisible global powers that threaten to literally suck the life force out of Interzone habitants- Westerners and natives alike. Perhaps the most extreme articulation of this is the Mugwump dispensary. One of the few commonalities between the book and the film, the Mugwump resembles a tall and elongated humanoid creature whose head looks like an insect and, according to Cronenberg, is VXppoVed Wo look like ³an old jXnkie,´ and Wherefore, BXrroXghV himVelf (Cronenberg, in Silverberg 90). The setting of the dispensary is the typical SF setting where evil is realized by centralized power structures with a disturbing Cronenbergian spin: Humans are forced to suck on MXgZXmp ³WeaWV,´ become addicWed Wo ZhaW BXrroXghV and Cronenberg call ³MXgZXmp-jiVVXm,´ and become inYolXnWar\ agenWV of InWer]one Wo maintain their power and control. In an earlier scene, when Bill Lee kills the insect-typewriter in a panic, he goes to a local blacksmith Zho ³fi[eV´ iW b\ WranVforming iW inWo a MXgZriWer (a W\peZriWer ZiWh a MXgZXmp head, Whe ke\V inside the mouth in which Bill must insert his hands to type). Thus, the writing process becomes 17 Jody Duncan details CWI, special effects, and make up VWage of Whe prodXcWion in her arWicle ³BorroZed Flesh: Special Effects in Naked Lunch,´ inclXded in Everything is Permitted: The Making of Naked Lunch. 54 completely entangled in the industry, visualized by the Orientalized streets and markets of Tangier (though shot on set in Toronto). Bill Lee conVWanWl\ ZriWeV ³reporWV´ on Whe acWiYities of Interzone as an agent and consistently denies that he is writing the novel Naked Lunch. Cronenberg WhXV boWh commenWV on hiV oZn inabiliW\ Wo ³WranVlaWe´ Naked Lunch to the screen and Whe independenW arWiVW¶V VWrXggle Wo creaWe Xnder laWe capiWalism. While he is very much occupied with the idea of the transgressive author, he does not completely surrender to it as he seems to be aware of the impossibility of complete transgression over the industry. Consequentially, the film always remains speculative of its own potentialities as an adaptation of an influential text and excludes what it must while including what it can. It recognizes that writing and therefore creating must negotiate the power relationships that exist between the text (as novel or film) and the structures that produce or inhibit its freedom. ThroXghoXW WhiV chapWer, I haYe diVcXVVed RXVVell and Cronenberg¶V adapWaWionV aV caVe studies in my study of SF cult adaptations that are speculative in their approach to their production, reception, as well as scientific experimentation and artistic creation. Both questioning and perhaps making peace with the conformity of the image, using unconventional filmmaking techniques with Hollywood technology, and emphasizing the visual aspect of the SF experience, these cult films have a fraught relationship with their authors, their audience, and their position in the market. Unlike Dune, these SF works do not speculate on a textual future, but rather, they reconfigure their contemporary moment as an alternate universe where the surreal and shocking visual effects undermine any authenticity to which their status as an adaptation aspires; yet they still intervene in conventional forms of artistic creation that prioritize the written text. 55 Coda Throughout this thesis, I have discussed Whe poWenWialV of ZhaW I Werm ³VpecXlaWiYe adapWaWion.´ I have explored science fiction film adaptations to investigate how we might read them outside the framework of failure and aesthetic value in their attempt to capture or challenge the creative spirit of their source texts. In a similar fashion to the SF genre, adaptation as a process looks to the future of a text to reconfigure it in a new material and mediatic environment, providing new avenues for discussing SF in its temporal and spatial parameters and limitations, reflected not just in its form or content, but also in its remediations on history, science, and artistic creation. In studying these films within the framework of speculative adaptation, I do not mean to suggest that they hold an abstract political or artistic value inherent in their status as artworks. What I emphasize is the reflection between speculative fictions and adaptation as it relates to visual language and its reception. While JodoroZVk\¶V XnfiniVhed Dune ruminates on the future possibilities of the SF film, Altered States and Naked Lunch intervene in their contemporary artistic moment to comment on the industry and mechanics of creative production. While much has been written on adaptation and the notion of fidelity, as well as comparative evaluations of written and visual works, the connections between adaptation and reception relating to SF cult film have been mostly overlooked. This study only scratches the surface of this generative area of study, but it strives to solidify the links between the notion of failure and adaptation as it relates to the process of production and reception rather than aesthetic evaluations of media, though it inevitably uses some interpretative methods in doing so. 56 Works Cited Adorno, Theodor. Minima Moralia: Reflections on a Damaged Life. Translated by E.F.N. Jephcott, Verso Books, 2005. Adorno, Theodor W., and Walter Benjamin. The Complete Correspondence, 1928-1940. Edited by Henri Lonitz, Harvard University Press, 1999. Alegre, Sara MarWin. ³CXlW NoYelV on Whe Screen: DXne and Whe Naked LXnch.´ Actas Del XXI Congreso Internacional de A.E.D.E.A.N, 1999, pp. 141±45. Altered States. 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Thesis/Dissertation
eng
English
Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library
Graduate
Mota, Miguel
Failure of cinematic (re)creation : speculative adaptation and science fiction cult film
Text