The Null Device

Sympathy for the Devil

In an attempt to cash in on the lucrative Christian-fundamentalist market, Murdoch's 20th Century Fox studio has announced a film adaptation of Milton's Paradise Lost. It's not going to be in Aramaic, but for most audiences, 17th-century English in iambic pentameter would undoubtedly be as much of a a party-killer.

The whole project raises some interesting questions. Are they going to aim it squarely at cultural-separatist Christians in the US red states, or put Mason Serif on the posters and try to sell it to goths and Neil Gaiman fans and such? If the former, would they keep Milton's representation of Lucifer or edit it to make it less sympathetic? And what other decisions would be taken to encompass the moral and aesthetic values of contemporary American Christian-conservative culture. I imagine the production design could end up looking very Franklin Mint.

There are no comments yet on "Sympathy for the Devil"