It marks Sean Connery’s last big screen appearance and will always be remembered as a failure.
Stephen Norrington has had a solid career in special effects. He had participated in large productions such as Aliens, the return (1986) a Alien³ (1991), but he wanted to occupy another position behind the cameras. In 1995 you wrote, produced and directed your first feature film, lethal machinea low-budget film that allowed him to direct Lama A few years later.
It looked like Norrington’s career was going on. In a few years he was able to go from being in charge of special effects to directing big productions and, after his experience with Wesley Snipes as a famous vampire hunter, Norrington took the helm of another comic adaptation. This time, he would move to the big screen The League of Extraordinary Lordsby Alan Moore and Kevin O’Neill, which belongs to the steampunk genre and brings together various characters from nineteenth-century fantasy literature.
Stephen Norrington wanted to stay true to the original work, but the production company, 20th Century Fox, and Sean Connery, the film’s star and executive producer, disagreed. Executives opposed the director’s vision, resulting in 20 different versions of the script and a very tense relationship on set. Then came the budget cuts and financial losses. They also had to contend with a flood that destroyed the sets, and with a budget of $ 17 million, they had little room to act. All of this did not help to improve the atmosphere. Stephen Norrington resigned from his position, but faced with the threat of being sued, he had to return.
The League of Extraordinary Lords It premiered the same weekend as Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl. A battle in which she had everything to lose. She managed to raise $ 23 million in her first weekend, half that of her competitor, but the worst part was taken by the critics. The press trashed the feature film.
“A great premise ruined by bad execution” It was the most listened to complaint. The project had everything to destroy. It started off with a good story, with great characters and an adventure ready to be developed, but it didn’t pay off. The tape has a 17% in Rotten tomatoes and 30% in Metacritical and all those who have participated prefer to forget it.
The director abandoned his career and Sean Connery raised it
The tensions between the lead actor and the director are remarkable. According to The ScotDisputes could arise over the smallest details, such as a propeller gun. Apparently, the director stopped production for a full day because one of the guns “didn’t look right,” which angered Connery. After the film, each one took his own path and neither of them wanted to continue to devote themselves to cinema.
Sean Connery, who was 73 at the time, seriously considered quitting acting. “It was a nightmare”he assured in an interview with Times“The experience had a lot of influence on me, it made me think about the sector. I’m sick of dealing with idiotsIn fact, he had no qualms about pointing out that Stephen Norrington was “crazy”. The director decided not to appear at the film’s screening in Las Vegas, and when the press asked where he was, Connery simply said, “Take a look at the local psychiatric hospital.”
As for Stephen Norrington, he has no longer released a feature film. after you are done The League of Extraordinary Lords assured that he would never direct a movie again, even though he evaluated some offers that arrived and left other projects unfinished. He wrote some scripts and was interested in some productions, like the ‘reboot’ of The crowbut nothing has finished curdling.
If you’re curious to see it, it’s available on Disney +.
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