Posted by lauowolf
The problem is, as has been pointed out, that the PR to date has packaged the product of weeping Edda and her martyred innocent child. There are side excursions into the honor student, the young lovers, and the evil Italians.
And these have been attractive images to the public, providing an easy script for followers. The family was pretty good at staying on script - we’ve all marveled at their ability to seemingly lie themselves blue in order to keep the official story straight.
I won’t say it worked, because I don’t believe the PR effected the outcome of the trial. What it did do was finance itself, Knox’s lawyers, and a lot of travel by her family, as well as turn Knox herself into a closely-watched oddity and tabloid fodder for the rest of her life.
Edda terming the media “a curse” is rich indeed, since without the families’ deliberate choice to go down this road, the whole trial have been an obscure local matter, and with a verdict either way Knox could have held her head up high .
What the PR project has left behind it is another meaningless media hype, up for grabs. Amanda Knox _________ [your product name here].
Knox’s slander conviction and three-year prison term seriously stains things, and limits the options. As does the huge and poisonous ongoing campaign to flame the growing number who think that Meredith has been ill-served. .
It is difficult for them to celebrate the Italian court for getting it right and releasing her, and still argue at the same time that they are Italian and medieval and found “poor her” guilty of slandering an innocent black man.
Especially since that part of things is pretty open and shut.
Besides, even arguing about it opens the door to the rest of what she said in that confession, and they certainly do no want people thinking about her admitting to being at the cottage. The less said of that the better.
So. Does her story have the makings of a Hollywood blockbuster? Probably not.
For one thing, the producer types would have to know that the case is still live. The public won’t be keeping track of that, or at best will be considering it a case of the prosecutor continuing to seek revenge.
But people looking to invest millions of dollars in movies tend to go into all the fine print.
And the looming third trial in 2011 is just the kind of complication they are likely to want to avoid.
And there’s just too much inconvenient information floating around about the story.
Finally, there really isn’t that much “there” there with Amanda Knox herself. What would her storyline be, anyway, and who does it appeal to?
I’ve been thinking about the concept of the “blockbuster” movie, and the general marketing and all.
- Is it the story of the young lovers, AK and RS? Nah, AK and RS are not going to complete the story arc for them, so no drama-romance. And you can’t substitute the Seattle boyfriend, because he’d look like a fool.
- Is it the story of Edda, getting her daughter back, a la Not Without My Daughter? Nah, Amanda is getting a bit old for that storyline to work. The PR played out this line in Amanda’s absence, so that it is already stale, and besides, the target audience is wrong. The Lifetime movie worked that thread, and it didn’t really do all that well.
- Is it a story of Amanda suffering, arrested, in prison, on trial? Nah, there really isn’t much filmic going on there. Arrested people end up sitting in rooms, and prison is boring. Even if they wanted to spend a lot of time on AK giving the performance of her life in court, they’d have to deal somehow with the accusations and evidence. And they really, really don’t want to do any of that.
- Is it the story of Amanda herself? Nah, the PR has reduced her to such a little painted doll that there isn’t anything to be done with her. Seriously, weekly mass and the prison choir? Or hanging out with the middle-aged married Italian political type? Who wants to watch a movie of that? They’ve set her up as a frail, pale victim, and it is difficult to create an entire movie focusing on someone being done to, rather than doing.
In both of these, Amanda herself is only a McGuffin, an excuse for other people’s emoting, or detecting.
Unless they wanted to portray the REAL Amanda, warts and all? I do think there could be quite a compelling portrayal of the initial behavior, the lying, the family tensions, her downward arc in Perugia, and the final unbelievable acquittal.
Hitchcock could do it - think of Marnie, or Vertigo.
But I can’t see Amanda or her families cooperating with such a project. No, the cashing in will have to be the interviews (QUICKLY) and a book project. They’ll shop around for the best advance and slap something together fast.
But dont expect the movieplexes to be overwhelmed.
http://truejustice.org/ee/index.php?/tjmk/comments/long_lines_for_any_amanda_knox_movie/
