Monday, June 9, 2008

Raiders: The Adaptation...

Last Thursday night at the Belcourt we hosted the Tennessee premiere of Raiders of the Lost Ark: The Adaptation. In 1982 three 12 year old boys made a shot-for-shot remake of Raiders of the lost ark, it took them 6 years to finish. We had the privilege of having filmmaker Eric Zala, one of those "boys" to be in attendance for the screening. The crowd was very energetic and gave Eric a standing ovation at the end of the film before his Q & A. It was a great evening, and a hilarious and an inspiring experience.


In his adult life, Eric had been working at EA sports as Quality Control Director for 10 years making 6 figures, but wasn't satisfied, so to the behest of his childhood buddy Chris, one of the other boys who did the shot-for-shot remake, he left his job at EA moved back to Mississippi and is pursuing making an independent film with his friend, they've finally finished thier script and are shopping it around next week. Also Producer Scott Rudin (No Country for Old Men, There Will Be Blood, ect.) has bought the life rights to the boy's story of the making of the Raiders: Adaptation.

Here's a pic from the night, plus a picture of the boys as kids, a pic of me and Eric, the Raiders guys with Spielberg and the letter Spielberg wrote them after he saw a bootleg VHS copy of the film : O

-Josh


2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The Adaptation night was one of the most fun screenings I've ever been to in Nashville—thanks for putting it together. And congratulations on the blog! I can't wait to see what you all come up with.

Anonymous said...

Loved it. Incredible. Would see it again in a heartbeat.