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Mars Attacks!
A Tim Burton film
Plot (Spoiler Alert)Flying saucers have been spotted and the Earthlings want to believe the martians might be friendly. Earth welcomes it’s new visitors, but shorty after the martians arrive, they attack. Tim Burton with his martian friends 
Blaine: After he made “Ed Wood”, Tim Burton wanted to do something fun that is somewhat like “Earth vs the Flying Saucers” and those other 1950s sci-fi movies he watched as a kid. “Mars Attacks!” is based on trading cards from the 1960s owned by the Topps company. Tim had an idea for making it into a movie after stumbling upon the trading cards. Tim and the screenwriter, Jonathan Gems, had to look through the cards for inspiration to write a screenplay. Once the casting call went out on “Mars Attacks!” there was a huge list of actors. Like I said it’s an incredible cast of well known actors and Tim Burton said he was lucky to have a cast like this be apart of the project and they had just as much fun making “Mars Attacks!” as Tim did. Jack Nicholson had worked with Tim before when he played the Joker in “Batman”. Tim had sent the script to Jack in hopes of working with him again. Tim asked Jack if he would play a part and if so which part and Jack’s respond was that he could play them all, but he only settled for two characters, the Vegas developer and the President of the United States. Every time Nicholson arrived on the set they would play Hail to the Chief and he liked it every single time. Nicholson said that he has always wished that Tim Burton would be for him the same way Scorsese is for DeNiro. Tim was also reunited with Danny DeVito after “Batman Returns”. Tim called Danny and wanted him to play the gambling man in Vegas. Danny would do anything for Tim because he really likes him, respects his work and wants to apart of anything he does. Other actors Tim had worked with before included Sarah Jessica Parker, who had previously worked with Tim on “Ed Wood”, and Sylvia Sidney who was in “Beetlejuice”. Tim knew Annette Bening and the both of them were going to work together on “Batman Returns” until she got pregnant, but she was able to get a part in “Mars Attacks!” as the Vegas developer’s wife, who is a free spirit and a recovering alcoholic. Annette modeled the character after Ann-Margret’s performance in the 1964 “Viva Las Vegas”. For the Martian Girl, Tim had his girlfriend at the time, Lisa Marie, do the part. Tm said Lisa had that kind of quality like in those old sic-fi movies like “Queen of Blood” or “The Astounding She Monster” and that is why she was perfect for the part. In 1994 the Topps company reissued Mars Attacks trading cards with several new images and they introduced Martian Girl through a comic book cover. Tim was fascinated by the illustration and drew stretches. Lisa Marie had to develop her martian motivation. It took seven hours of make up to turn Lisa into the Martian Girl. The dress wasn’t easy for Lisa to wear because it was so tight she couldn’t sit down or go to the bathroom. The wig was actually two wigs of real Polish hair and it was torture for her to wear because of the weight of it. Natalie Portman was fifteen at the time and she played the presidents daughter. Natalie has a unique view of Tim Burton. He has a great mind and maintained a level of imagination that kids have and he’s been able to become an adult without loosing that creativity. Tim Burton went to Vegas to see Tom Jones while he was doing a show and told Tom about “Mars Attacks!”. He wanted Tom to be in it because Vegas is one of the places it’ll take place. Tom had loved the work that Tim has done in the past and he was in. Like I said “Mars Attacks!” has an amazing ensemble of well known actors. Other actors include Glenn Close as the First Lady, Pierce Brosnan as a Professor who works for the President and is in charge of studying the martians, Martin Short as the Press Secretary, Michael J. Fox as a news reporter, Rod Steiger and Paul Winfield as U.S. Army generals, Lukas Haas as a teenager who works at a donut shop, Jim Brown as a retired boxer who now works at a casino to provide for his family, Pam Grier is his former spouse and then there’s Jack Black as U.S. Army private who is well respected by his parents. It never ceases to amaze me to see all these actors in one movie especially one directed by Tim Burton. Originally Tim burton wanted the martians and flying saucers to be stop motion, but there wasn’t enough time and enough money to do it, so the co-producer, Larry Franco, convinced Tim to do computer animation. The effects on Tim’s previous films involved stop-motion or models. “Mars Attacks!” was his first movie using computer effects. Tim was impressed that Industrial Light & Magic was able to add three dimensional characters in a blank space. He wanted the movement of the martians to somewhat look like stop motion like in Ray Harryhausen’s work. My rating on “Mars Attacks” is five out of five stars Music by Danny Elfman |