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Aaron Sorkin Discusses Steve Jobs Movies and the Pressures of Writing

arefbe said:
You could be right. But I don't know. If this picture had been in production while Steve was still alive, or even around the time he died, it might have been big. But now, 3 years later, when all the furor had died down, I don't think the audience is still there. The people who will go to see it are those who still yearn for the "good old days" at Apple. Most everyone else has moved on. I see this movie going to NetFlix faster than JOBS did.
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A Jobs movie, like their planning is a relatively low budget affair with a strong cast and dialogue. So, close to being an indie. There's always place for those kinds of movies and they don't need to make a mint to pay themselves back. A pre-sale of movie rights to HBO, or even Netflix could cover most costs easily.
 
arefbe said:
If this picture had been in production while Steve was still alive, or even around the time he died, it might have been big. But now, 3 years later, when all the furor had died down, I don't think the audience is still there. The people who will go to see it are those who still yearn for the "good old days" at Apple. Most everyone else has moved on.
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Abraham Lincoln has been dead for about 150 years, and all his fans have moved on. Yet people still came out to watch a movie about him a couple of years ago.

I've got a great idea. Let's have a movie (with a first rate script, director, and cast) about a completely fictional genius tech entrepreneur who starts a business in his garage, walks all over people, is cast out of the company he founded, wanders in the wilderness and comes back to triumph. A visionary, demagogue, and manipulator supreme. An egotist guy with the passion of ten. It won't be about Steve Jobs, let's make it all about some completely other made-up character. Now, we don't have to pitch it at the Apple fanbois who you think won't want to see it. And we don't even have to think about casting Noah Wyle, or think about Ashton Kutcher at all!!!

What do you think?
 
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I don't doubt that Sorkin's script is compelling. I'm curious to know what is going on with the production that led to Fincher, DiCaprio, and Bale bowing-out. Something is awry.
 
Seems people on here would like Sorkin to;

- be more open about the script so it can be MacRumorForumApproved

- let us know why an actor is moving on, e.g. "So Mr Bale is no longer doing the role. We had to push out the start date and he has a movie scheduling conflict", would be good.

Possible reasons Bale won't be acting as Jobs

- "I just heard DiCaprio walked away from this. I'm not taking on something he discarded"

- "Sorkin, Bale here. You know when we were drinking the other day and I said I'd do Steve's role, I'd drunk too much and, well, yeah, I'm not up for it"

- "Yeah look I just met with my psychic horoscope person and this isn't the role for me"

- "When you said no audition I thought you were joking, and when I said yes I'm in, I think you missed the subtle sarcasm undertones. I can't do the role"

- "Yeah Sorkin, I won't have time to prepare for this, my dog ate the script"

- "Yeah look, my manager says if I do this I'll never get another decent acting Job and I'll have to turn my hand to be a tech advisor or something"
 
Bobby Corwen said:
I thought Jobs was decently entertaining even if not memorable. But in spirit with what you were saying, I wanted it to be a longer full life Dramamentary.

The thing about Steve Jobs' life is that the full story is a sweeping epic biography and if you look at the ups and downs in his real life, it looks like the plot of an epic movie complete with triumphant come back in the unibody Mac era.

So its almost odd not to utilize that theme and create a whole thesis around that.

I would like to see like a full "modern Pirates of Silicon Valley but with Steve Jobs as the main character" type thing where its a full epic biopic with the full story start to end and not skipping huge chunks for some half baked thesis but rather express the whole grandeur of his epic scope properly and triumphantly for what it is.

I totally trust Aaron Sorkin for what he is doing because his attention to nuance is impossibly calculated such as with Moneyball and the Sports Night series amongst many other things are pure brilliance understanding that type of swag and detail.

One thing that Ashton Kutcher had right but didn't emphasize enough is that Steve Jobs got a lot of his power from having movie star good looks in an industry that attracted mostly the type of people he parodied in the Mac/PC ads essentially starring "himself" and the benefit being he saw and understood people differently "better" and was able to become a superior salesman for that reason.

So there are many ages that would need to be played and I would even want to see some scenes of his parents as a young kid to emphasize the influential role they played in his swag.

But maybe Aaron Sorkin is saying that as an excuse to make some sort of piece about a contained thesis and maybe (unless he can tell the whole story with what he is doing -which i wouldn't count it against his potential) he's saying that a full biopic is still yet left to be made.
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Sorkin isn't trying to 'tell the whole story', he's trying to give people a glimpse into the psyche of a brilliant, successful, and still very flawed person.
 
TheRainKing said:
Instead of all these stupid movies, I would rather see a really good Steve Jobs documentary. It could have interviews from people who knew Steve best, and we might actually learn something we don't already know.
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ive said this a few times as well.

in a feature film so much attention and effort will be on making everything seem bigger (roi) and focusing on how this actor portrayed this character etc.

as you say interview the people that knew him. whether its a 2 hour documentary or a kind of a mini series just do something before its too late.
 
Patriot24 said:
I don't doubt that Sorkin's script is compelling. I'm curious to know what is going on with the production that led to Fincher, DiCaprio, and Bale bowing-out. Something is awry.
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Michael Fassbender is in early talks to play Steve Jobs.
 
Gasu E. said:
Abraham Lincoln has been dead for about 150 years, and all his fans have moved on. Yet people still came out to watch a movie about him a couple of years ago.

I've got a great idea. Let's have a movie (with a first rate script, director, and cast) about a completely fictional genius tech entrepreneur who starts a business in his garage, walks all over people, is cast out of the company he founded, wanders in the wilderness and comes back to triumph. A visionary, demagogue, and manipulator supreme. An egotist guy with the passion of ten. It won't be about Steve Jobs, let's make it all about some completely other made-up character. Now, we don't have to pitch it at the Apple fanbois who you think won't want to see it. And we don't even have to think about casting Noah Wyle, or think about Ashton Kutcher at all!!!

What do you think?
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It has possibilities! But it'll still go rather quickly to Netflix!
 
This movie has been in development nearly as long as the new Mac Mini. I hope when it comes out it's not as much of a disappointment as that was.
 
Patriot24 said:
I don't doubt that Sorkin's script is compelling. I'm curious to know what is going on with the production that led to Fincher, DiCaprio, and Bale bowing-out. Something is awry.
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Because neither one of them is honestly right for it. Playing Steve, there is so much depth and its insanely hard to capture it and if someone of their caliber is gonna do a project they have to feel like it is something they can crack.

Acting is insanely hard. Thats why they get millions of dollars.

I think the American Psycho paradigm is analogous to the overall swag of Steve. Especially if you watch some of his late 80s/early 90s stuff his mindset is very similar to the confidence style of Bateman.

And maybe that is also part of a conflict is that christian bale was actually bateman in the movie, and now playing another shade of it, but maybe that would be some baggage that affects his ability to play Jobs even though its an extension of that similar thesis.

It would be bale doing bateman doing Jobs.

Same with Leo, too much baggage.

There needs to be some relative unknown who can pull it off properly.
 
eff this crap. I want a fantasy genre Jobs movie. I want Zombie Jobs to return to Apple and make keynotes cool again. I want him to say "one more thing" and eat a giant mash of bozo brains he harvested from Apple's iCloud and iPad Mini teams. I want him to take a bent iPhone 6+ and throw it at Ive, asking "why do you work here? More brains!"

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teslo said:
"steve djobs unchained"

missed a golden opportunity there :D
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iJobs Unchained. "The "i" is silent."
 
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