MovieChat Forums > Unthinkable (2010) Discussion > Wow! Unthinkable #3 on IMDB!

Wow! Unthinkable #3 on IMDB!

posted 15 years ago by Caldecot
255 replies | jump to latest

As producer, I am really pleased that the picture is stirring interest and attention, and mostly positive. Getting 7.3 in User Reviews is a good mark. Hitting #3 in the IMDB title rankings is astonishing, especially since it's a climb from about 3000 two weeks ago.

But I have to ask, how are you seeing the movie? There's no theatrical release because the deal collapsed in the money crisis and the distribution company went belly-up. SONY hasn't released it on DVD in the US yet. That comes in two weeks, on June 15.

Are you seeing it on pirated torrents? Googling "Unthinkable Samuel Jackson movie torrent" gives me many choices from which to download an earlier cut with only temp music (Graham Revell created a terrific score, by the way). It's not the finished movie but it's sorta close. The ending's a little different, for one thing.

Personally I feel strangely conflicted. On the one hand, there's so much positive response -- believe me, I've made movies no-one cared about! -- and on the other, all this seems to be coming from folks who have stolen the work of a lot of people, watched it without paying for it.

That this is a ticking bomb movie that asks a moral question makes a moral question about how you see it appropriate, I guess.

I'm not interested in condemning you if that's how you saw it. I'm interested in asking the question. How do you feel about it?

[–] djnobeat 15 years ago

Hi.
Greetings from Norway and tnx for this fantastic movie.
I'll be blunt and tell you that I'm one of those pirate thiefs you're speaking of.

On the other side I'm 41 and I've been collecting movies since I was 17.
Do you know how much money I've wasted these years?
Let's see:

1986-1995 aprox 1200 original movies on VHS.
1995-1999 aprox 450 original movies on laserdiscs. (This was the future back then)
1999-2010 aprox 535 original movies on DVD.
2006-2008 aprox 75 original movies on HD DVD. (Bad mistake hehehe)
2006-2010 aprox 120 original movies on BlueRay.
And still counting...
It's hard to be a movie collector:-)

But:
There have been some market research on "netpirates" here in Norway, and what's really interesting is that the majority of downloaders, are also the highest majority of people who actually buy movies and music.
Kind of interesting uh?

So anyways, I'm really sorry I stole your movie, but hey... I will buy it when it comes available.

And by the way; great to the read your comments.
Not many producers would do what you've done here on IMDB.

[–] Caldecot 15 years ago

Thanks, drnobeat. Really complicated situation. A chance to learn something from actual people engaged in actual behavior.

And now there's a little press attention from the LA Times. http://tinyurl.com/233vso9

Glad you liked the picture too. Sony releases it here tomorrow but Norway? I dunno. Hope they put the right version out, without that fourth bomb ending.

[–] sadsam 15 years ago

Can you please reply what this is?

http://img813.imageshack.us/img813/666/bombexpert.jpg

Haha, the young bombexpert at the end disarming a nuclear bomb with excel? well..
I understand that a movieset can be very stressful och the final result don't always come out as how u planned it in ur head in the first place.

But im waitning for ur next movie, i enjoyed this one anyway.

Best regards from Sweden

[–] 15 years ago

[deleted]

[–] Caldecot 15 years ago

Interesting concept and new to me.

We'll recognize our business model in the rear view mirror, I think. It may not have been conceived yet.

Something like this will eventually be tried. And we don't know what will work in advance. Which makes it hard to raise significant money in a time when every source of capital is "de-risking."

[–] msteph2 15 years ago

silly people...in the words of UFC color commentator Joe Rogan, "You can't stop the internet".

I was a professional twice over - an analyst and a therapist. The world's first analrapist

[–] kohakuslayer 15 years ago

Sorry to burst your bubble but The Scene released a copy of this film months ago.

The bitterness of a Nuggets fan: cheering for other teams to beat L.A.

[–] Artharas 15 years ago

Since I did not read the whole pages, I might be just reiterating what others have said, if I am, I apologize :)

There is also more questions which should be asked. They are:
"Are you seeing it on pirated torrents?"

If yes:
"Do you think you'd see this movie in cinema, rent it or buy it?"

If yes:
"Having seen it, will you now not see it in cinema, rent it or buy it?"

These are pretty important questions to ask too. If a person is never going to see the movie via these methods, you are not loosing money but rather reaching to more viewers.
On top of that, many studies have indicated that you are not even loosing viewers in the process, since those who would pay money for it, are likely to do it anyway, assuming the movie has something to offer.

Furthermore, the MPAA of my country get a % of all sold hard drive, be it CDs, DVDs, HDDs, VHS, etc etc. Everything that can store "illegal download" is bumped up in price, so those scums get money they have no rights to(surely the VHS that has home movies on it are not pirated, or the HDD filled with baby pictures).
This has pretty bad effect on me as a movie buyer, I have no real interest to buy movies, that is not in the store, so if I do buy movies I rather use amazon(to not pay that organization any money other than what they've already robbed of me) and being restricted like that already, in most(heck lately all) cases I'll rather download the movie first to ensure I'm not going through the trouble for garbage.

And lastly I also believe the business model of movies(and esp. music) has long since past. The internet is here to stay and it will only improve, so I think rather than fight the technology the movie industry will have to adapt and use it.
Seeing as you are a producer, you will be better with cost estimates on movies, but I cannot imagine making X amount of DVDs, Y amount of bluerays, special editions and what have you, doesn't come with some risk cost. What if some of them don't sell? You have to bump up the price a bit, sell it expensive at start to make up for selling it at or under production price in some years.

Torrents could make that particular risk non-existent, you would hold up a server which shouldn't even need that much bandwidth since, just like torrent sites, people will share it together, your server would just be making sure there's always at least 1 sharer. Prices would be lower, access would be easier(esp for people like me, which don't have as much access as people from larger countries), your viewers in general would be happier.

I know this is not something just anyone can change overnight, but the movie industry must stop these endless snipings on the internet via MPAA and such organizations and rather use the technolical advancement we've seen in the later years.

Sorry this became a bit longer than I was going for, on the plus side, I liked the movie. Was quite disgusting to watch, but made me question myself and my ethics(and since I did read the first comment or two, I like it better with 4th bomb).

[–] imgneevrythng 15 years ago

I just wanted to chime in with my opinion on the movie. I think it's great that as Producer you're reaching out to the people who are viewing your product and trying to learn more about them, and potentially better yourself in your profession through it. So kudos to you.

My opinion on the movie is short. It was great. I find myself disliking movies that are heavy on special effects, and unfortunately in today's time, that's where a lot of movies are heading. So to watch a movie that was solely driven by the story is really refreshing. It might've been a "time bomb" movie, but the story was very unique. It became more about the characters then the bombs themselves.

I also have to say when H had the kids in the interrogation room, I honestly have never felt more suspense from watching a movie. I was literally on the edge of my seat. The movie turned into not just getting Younger to believe H will do the unthinkable, but getting the audience to feel the same way as well.

Once again, I think it's great that you're taking time out to read everyones thoughts on the movie and thank you for helping to make, what I feel, is a great movie.

[–] Caldecot 15 years ago

Obviously, thanks! Your reaction was one I hoped to evoke, to carry the audience through a lot of emotional identification into some really uncomfortable places.

Made me laugh, the other day, when somebody was ranting that we'd made a movie that glorified terrorism by making us like Younger. I thought that was the point of movies, to get you identify with characters!

You feel what the characters feel, even though they are in opposition to each other. When Sam says, sorry when H says, Oh so now I'm the bad guy?, it's such a great moment because it's hard not to hate him at that moment even though we know he's trying to force Younger to reveal the bombs. And when Younger winks (winks!) at H, it's hard not to admire him, even though he's murdered 53 people.

That's why we made his demands reasonable (sort of), to keep whipsawing the audience in their allegiances, until you have a chance to feel everything and you don't know how to get out of the box.

Because the truth is, we're not out of the box. For sure what we depict in Unthinkable will happen. Some nutter convinced of his or her own rectitude will threaten us. And somebody will have to decide how far to go when there's no time.

So the question really becomes who are we and what happens to us when we have no limits? Can we remain human if we tear another human apart when we think, just think, not know, that the threat is real?

All that in a cheap genre movie, a ticking bomb thriller!

[–] sammy-fischer 15 years ago

All that in a cheap genre movie, a ticking bomb thriller!

Personally, I'd say it's a psycho-thriller, but well, as long as you don't try to promote it as a "Romantic Action Comedy" ... ;)

[–] regdricos 14 years ago

Hi Caldecot,

I'll just reproduce my separate thread here, in response to your first rate film:

This was good...
by regdricos 2 days ago (Thu Aug 5 2010 04:22:11)

...posed and explored the interesting (and topical) question of the lesser evil versus the greater good.

I actually thought it was a pretty balanced exploration, not providing any neat and tidy answers and forcing reflection on the viewer, without preaching or failing to entertain along the way - a hard balancing act to strike.

Probably too strong stuff for the mainstream, however, and (maybe?) buried by the powers that be...

;0)

Ricos.

>> Two things to take from this, one, you and your associates made an excellent, courageous, cleverly crafted and exquisitely poised film that educated, exercised and entertained at once - as I say above, something that very few films do, *ever*.

Two, maybe you could have made a virtue of necessity and used your unfortunate circumstance surrounding the film's distribution in alliance with its topical and controversial subject matter to launch a viral marketing campaign along the lines of, "the film they didn't want you to see..." I appreciate this bears no relation to the truth, but it could have been a runner with the modern public's taste for conspiracy theories, IMHO.

Thanks for helping make a tippety top film - more in this intelligent style please.

;0)

Ricos.

[–] misstjb-771-3225 15 years ago

This is an excellent movie and generates much thought into what one must do to 'get the job done', as Jackson's charachter repeated often in response to the others who were suppose to be on his side. He was focused on what he was there to do, not the moral issue of what is right or wrong. He clearly had strong emotional feelings that most of us have, for children, family, etc. It would not be an easy task to do such a job.

[–] ella_leona 15 years ago

Mmm I love me a dose of Samuel L Jackson, however, even he didn't make this movie for me.

Torture SHOULD never be justified, however when push comes to shove a lot of us do what we have to do to get results. This is human nature. Did I need to see details of this on screen - NO.

I live in the UK anyway and I suspect that the subject matter is too far removed for me to relate to it (no guatanemo bay here). In short, the movie failed to excite me.

However, wish you all the best for the future enough hype has been generated here so good luck (and yes I would have rented this from my local video store).

[–] sammy-fischer 15 years ago

Although answering to this is potentialy dangerous (hello Uwe "my movie suck so hard I need to sue people to make money" Bolls), I actually enjoyed your movie,and I would buy the DVD *IF I HAD A CHANCE*.
Living where I live, I heard about it through IMDB (I hope you realize how much this site is helpfull for your industry and that you support them financially by the way ... you know ... the other side of the equation.), but there would be no way for me to see the movie (or if there was, I would probably get a badly dubbed version). So the only way to enjoy good but obscure movies in my case is to download them.

My DVD Collection is relatively big, in case you're wondering (around 300 DVDs all in all), and the majority of those are Director's Cuts and Special Editions of movies, many of which I originally saw from a downloaded file and which I bought when I had the opportunity to do so. That's not to say that I buy DVD's from all the movies I saw illegal copies of, as many are just formulaic (aka. I already have the same movie .. just another director and different actors, but basically you can switch from one movie to the next and you won't really feel the difference), or plainly bad.
You wouldn't want to pay for something that just doesn't do what it say it would do (at the very least "entertain" in the case of movies) neither, would you? Trailers are very rarely representative (and sometimes, the trailer IS the movie. All that's missing are filler sequences), and, especially in the case of movies like Unthinkable, reviews are so polarized that it can be tough to decide. Short of watching the movie in a theater, downloading is infinitely better to find out whether a movie meets your particular taste or not. The rest is down to conscience I guess, although many people don't realize how much money and suffering is involved in any truely creative work (be it movie, video games or music), especially when you are working in a subgenre or are independant to some degree.

EDIT : the copy said Blue Ray rip, it was 720p and looked flawless. It did end inside the building with the squad. I wouldn't buy the Blueray, mostly because I'm running Linux and don't own a BR player. I would/will buy a DVD though, as I really liked your movie :)

Hoping not to find a lawsuit in my mail because of my frankness ... cya ;)

[–] 15 years ago

[deleted]

[–] pendergast7 15 years ago

I sometimes cringe when I go to Redbox and see big stars in movies I never heard of. It seems that Redbox gets few good ones and then fills the lot with misfit and misfire movies.

I didn't hate Unthinkable and actually started to really like it. I was wondering if it was coming from a liberal or conservative view or simply a middle finger fully extended at both kind of view. The movie FAILED big time in ending so quick. I understand that you can't show the bombs going off if there was a fourth one. I understand that. But it seemed rushed. I don't know what it is but movies seem to RUSH in to the movie then drag for a bit, take up time with stuff that wasn't necessary then RUSH OUT and it ruins it. The ending of the movie ruined it for me.

I did not like the cheap wrap up. It was like watching Silence of the Lambs and having it end when Hannibal escapes. END. And then you are left wondering what happened to Clarice and Buffalo Bill.

I think emotionally the writers and people filming might have thought that it was a natural cut off point (cause you see inside the characters' head and know motives, fears, etc, etc) but instead it seemed a great set up for no pay off. And keep in mind, the script made it easy for you. The bomber turned himself in. You didn't even have to find him. So there is no cat and mouse, more like cat plays with mouse and then BAM. Movie over.

The ending ruined it for me and was probably why I found it at Redbox. Adding on a few minutes would have worked better.

But, I think it rocks that the producer has been answering here. That simply makes my day.

[–] pooksilby 15 years ago

The point of the movie isn't to let you know if there was a fourth bomb or any bombs for that matter. The point is to explore what you think is acceptable in the war on terrorism. How far can "we" go to get information to save people.
And btw, I committed no theft as I just went to a Block Buster kiosk and rented this for $1 and it was a dollar well spent. Don't know what all the fuss is about that it is not available except as boot leg.

[–] sammy-fischer 15 years ago

the fuss is about the fact that the movie rose to its current position on IMDB *BEFORE* it was released on BR/DVD.