With mankind’s first uncertain steps into the atomic age comes a warning from beyond the stars: cease your fighting and your wars or you will be destroyed. “The decision rests with you,” Klaatu says by way of farewell at the end of “The Day the Earth Stood Still,” a classic of Cold War science-fiction from 1951.
Fifty years later and Klaatu has a new message for humanity, but one with equally dire consequences should we choose to ignore it, Keanu Reeves, who is playing the alien in Scott Derrickson’s upcoming remake, told MTV News.
“The first one was borne out of the cold war and nuclear détente. Klaatu came and was saying cease and desist with your violence. If you can’t do it yourselves we’re going to do it. That was the film of that day,” Reeves explained. “The version I was just working on, instead of being man against man, it’s more about man against nature. My Klaatu says that if the Earth dies, you die. If you die, the earth survives. I’m a friend to the earth.”
While humanity still engages in a staggering number of international conflicts, the environmental message is one that, not only encompasses wars, and fights, and terrorism, but one that goes beyond constrictions to become a millennial message of “what we are doing and who we are as a species,” Reeves insisted. “We’re trying to reach beyond the idea of [just] environmentalism.”
Among the other changes in the film, none may be more radical than Gort, Klaatu’s robot companion (or leader in some versions), that, let’s face it, looked like the tin-man in 1951. FX should change that, right?
“Hey man, don’t put that tin man down! That was iconoclastic!” Reeves protested. “[But] yes, we have another version of the [robot].”
One thing that won’t change? According to Reeves, he still says the immortal words, “Klaatu barada nikto.”
How does “The Day the Earth Stood Still” speak to you? What do you make of the new Earth friendly message? Sound off below.
March 24th, 2008 at 11:52 pm
Frankly, now I know I won’t watch it. Bet not many do. The link is a petition by the way, so please sign to tell Fox you won’t?
March 25th, 2008 at 3:10 am
i really do not why i am posting at all ,because i just realized people are really rude , i saw the original it was good not the greatest movie but decent for today’s standard it would have done poorly. So hollywwod changes the storyline big whoop it happens all the time . It might not be as bad as these people think. i will wait to make jugement until i know more . PS I AM REALLY TIRED OF PEOPLE INSULTING KEANU REEVES INTELLIGENCE. MAKE A COMMENT ABOUT THE MOVIE.There are worst actors around for them to get their kicks from
March 25th, 2008 at 8:37 am
Damn it, it’s not about the message! The original story had a different ending:
(Gort takes Klaatu back to ship)
(Humans tell Gort to take care of his master)
Gort says, “I am the master.”
That was the whole point of the remake, to make it more like the story!
March 25th, 2008 at 9:39 am
The first one was global communist propaganda designed to get us all to surrender more control over every aspect of our lives. This one will be global communist propaganda designed to get us all to surrender more control over every aspect of our lives. Nothing’s changed but the propaganda. And it comes from hollyweird which has long been full of communists. McCarthy was right.
http://www.willowtown.com/promo/links.htm
March 25th, 2008 at 2:11 pm
niel- “Mostly Harmless, try to think for yourself. Numerous brilliant scientists are speaking out against the propaganda of GW;”
AGAIN I ask, WHERE IN THE ACTUAL STORY IS GLOBAL WARMING EVEN MENTIONED? My comments were not about global warming, other than to point out that it was never mentioned in the story! Or did you even read the article before jumping in line? Huge dead zones in the oceans, overfishing, depleted aquifers, etc… these are all just “propaganda”.
March 25th, 2008 at 4:20 pm
We need an unknown actor for this one; Can’t they give Keanu a step ladder and just have him play Gort?
March 29th, 2008 at 1:24 pm
The timing is so wrong.
This would have flown back when the whole Global Warming thing hadn’t begun to fizzle.
But now Al Gore and company are starting to look a bit like jackasses, what with the findings showing that earth has been cooling for nearly a decade now, and that carbon increases may follow rather than precede warming, and that instead of a positive feedback effect to accelerate warming, there’s a negative feedback loop which causes it to self-correct and taper off, and the discovery of corruption in carbon offset trading, and the growing certainty that action sufficient to impact warming would also be so impoverishing as to doom millions to death through malnutrition, disease, et cetera.
By the time this movie comes out, we may be at the point of viewing environmental alarmists the same way you view that crazy uncle you’ve got who responded to the Y2K “crisis” by stocking up on canned food and guns and converting his house-heat to propane.
“To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven…” and the time for this movie was ’round about 2005.
Sorry Keanu.
March 31st, 2008 at 1:44 pm
Robert Wise took an ordinary pulp fiction science fiction story and turned it into the first anti-nuclear masterpiece of the atomic age. Its message resonates as powerfully today as it did in 1951. FYI, senior national security officials at National War College study the film as part of a course on weapons of mass destruction in the public consciousness.
And now Keanu Reeves wants to morph this masterpiece into a enviro-terrorist techno-thriller with himself as Klaatu the Avenger.
Perhaps there is a reason that in an era of Hollywood remakes, The Day the Earth Stood Still, has not been remade? Hollywood can’t do it any better than Wise did. Keanu Reeves certainly can’t.
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:50 am
Hollywood hasn’t done anything creative since “Star Wars.” “Independence Day” was simply a variation of “The War of The Worlds,” and now they are going todo a remake of a true classic–TDTESS! Funny how they haven’t done a remake of “Citizen Caine,” though they did redo (as extraordinary flops) some other true greats including “Casablanca” and a (ahem) sequel to “Gone With The Wind.”
As for the 2008 TDTESS: am I the only one who thinks a far more interesting story would be a hypothetical “what happens next?” film? What of Klaatu’s judgement to his colleagues of “the other planets”? Speaking of which, I’ll have some more thoughts on that on a new website very soon. The manuscript has been underway for years.
Gort, beringa. For the rest of you, good luck!
April 10th, 2008 at 5:26 pm
Marvelous, Hollywood feels the need to “do over” a classic, and in the process ruin it with political correctness.
Won’t waste my money.
April 10th, 2008 at 9:14 pm
As I mentioned in my earlier post, I have been working on an essay/commentary very loosely based on what happens AFTER Klaatu’s visit in 1951. To read it, go to:
“When Klaatu Returns: The Day the Earth Stood Still Revisited”
http://hubpages.com/hub/When-Klaatu-Returns
April 24th, 2008 at 6:26 pm
I can’t wait for the day when all mankind has destroyed itself by it’s greed and hatred. When our species no longer inhabits or infects the planet. Then the Earth can heal itself and maybe a better lifeform, less arrogant will prevail.
April 28th, 2008 at 10:12 pm
Wow! I can’t wait to see this on DVD! Preferably a bootleg.
May 3rd, 2008 at 3:49 am
Keanu Reeves is perfect for the job. He is know as a person of mystery in Hollywood. He is a misfit there because he really is differant. Some have called him “Zen master of the Universe” He has a touch of the exotic in his looks which are still stunning . Some pictures of him do not do him justice, however. When he was younger he was the most outstandingly good-looking guy in the business. One writer called him “supernaturally beautiful ” Some don’t like his acting, but just his presence sometimes does the trick. This part is perfect for his type of actor though. The crowds are still screaming and falling all over him, by the way- I was looking at some photo-shots of him at the first showing of “Street Kings” in other countries, and he had floods of fans .
May 16th, 2008 at 2:36 pm
I’m 52. I first saw the film in my 30’s and always thought it was a parable of the arrival of Christ on Earth or perhaps the second coming. Mr. Carpenter (what was Christ’s occupation?) brings us the news of a better way to live and (of course) we kill him. He is resurrected. Gort represents God’s judgement if we don’t obey. The nuclear age angle represents our hubris and how we’ve strayed from the word. Am I way off here? I don’t think Hollywood would remake it with that message and I certainly don’t think US Americans would view it if they did, but its a shame that the remake will go the PC route.