I’ve often lamented that, despite there being no less than four films released which claim to be based on his work, none could truly be considered an adaptation. The world of television was not much better, with the three Conan programs virtually unrecognizable as Howard’s creation. It would seem that despite the hundreds of stories and eighty years’ worth of influence on many genres of fiction, there hadn’t been a single professional adaptation of a Robert E. Howard story.

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Looks like a final piece of news for The Cimmerian, at least for the month of May: according to TheOneRing.Net, Guillermo Del Toro is apparently leaving production of the upcoming film adaptations of The Hobbit.

This doesn’t come as a surprise to me. The financial and legal wrangling going about the project looked like they weren’t going to be over anytime soon, and with over two years going, I can’t blame Del Toro from moving on. While I think Del Toro may have surprised us with the films, Jackson (pictured above with Del Toro) & company are still in control, and that will always be a source of intense division among fans.

The question now becomes, who will step up to the plate in Del Toro’s absence?

Shooting my longbow out in the back yard last weekend, my thoughts turned to one of the most colorful warriors to ever nock an arrow.

Nay, it was not Robin Hood who occupied my thoughts; nor was it Bernard Cornwell’s archer-hero Thomas of Hookton. As is my wont, my archer hero is a man who carried the style and the virtues of ancient warriors into the  cauldron of the 20th Century. “Mad Jack” Churchill sent many an enemy to hell with a well-placed broadhead arrow and forced many a prisoner to throw down his arms at the point of a broadsword. What makes Mad Jack exceptional is that he accomplished these feats in the midst of World War II.

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It would've been nice to have "Robert E. Howard" on the side of the bus, but hey, it's something, right?

It’s been a few months since Solomon Kane came to European screens, but with the fight to get it on American screens (so Howard fans across the pond can praise or condemn as they will) still raging on, there’s the danger of things simmering down too much, and the wave of critical acclaim and controversy over the character from the Howard community dying down.

Well, leave it to Michael Moorcock to start splashing those waters again.

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We know that Robert E. Howard was a big fan of the movies. His letters to Tevis Clyde Smith and Harold Preece mention numerous films that Howard saw and many, such as The Mark of Zorro (1920) and Robin Hood (1922) with Douglas Fairbanks, no doubt had some influence on his yarns (a full list of films mentioned by Howard, along with an brief discussion on the subject by Rusty Burke is available on the REHupa website). One film, though, that Howard never explicitly mentions, but that scholars have often wondered if he saw, is King Kong (1933). King Kong was revolutionary film when it came out, with incredible stop-motion animation that would influence future filmmakers for decades. It was the Star Wars or Avatar of its day. And with its theme of savagery versus civilization and hints of a lost advanced culture on a Pacific island it had elements that surely would have appealed to Howard. But if he did see it, there is no mention of it in the existing corpus of his letters.

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Robert Rodriguez

Only a short while after the sad news of Frank Frazetta passing, many have reflected on the man’s impact on the worlds of television, film, music and art. One of the most ambitious was his collaboration with Ralph Bakshi, Fire and Ice. Among the fans of that rotoscoped extravaganza are director Robert Rodriguez and Harry Knowles. The long-haired, bearded, bespectacled (no relation) master of Aint-it-Cool-News talked with Rodriguez recently, where he announces he has gained the rights to Fire and Ice.

In addition to this new news, Rodriguez talked about Machete (where he likens Danny Trejo’s character to his take on Frazetta’s Conan) and Frank Frazetta himself.  A fan of Frazetta taking control of one of Bakshi’s most celebrated films, and so infused with Frazetta’s art and style that it might as well be called Frazetta: The Movie? I’m guardedly excited. Read all about it here.

In the wake of Miguel’s amazing scoop on the new pictures of Jason Momoa as “Conan,” Lionsgate really have to up their game before even more blurry photographs from camera phones and film festivals predicate official releases. In the meantime, Stephen Lang spoke to MTV about the film.*

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When my father was a ten-year-old boy, he lurked around the Huntington Park set of Errol Flynn’s The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938), watching stuntmen take arrows to their padded torsos and fall off their horses.

He won’t recognize the 2010 version of Robin Hood.

The Ridley Scott epic is — thankfully — no romp in Sherwood Forest. It is a violent, somber depiction of the origins of the outlaw legend. That may actually hurt the film at the box office. If audiences are expecting wisecracks and derring-do, they will be disappointed. The film makers are telling a serious story, and mostly they succeed.

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Here, to my knowledge, are the latest leaked pictures of Jason Momoa as Conan, or to be more accurate what you can contemplate are photos of photos taken at Cannes. The Film Festival started yesterday in that seaside city of Southern France, which hosts numerous screenings, market discussions and the like in addition to the official competition.

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Generally, first shots make an important impact in the buzz for a film. Be they tantalizing glimpses of the set, blurry images of actors in costume, or even a prop lying around, early shots do a lot to generate excitement about a project. Of course, the reverse can also be true: sometimes early pictures can be underwhelming, laughable, or scandalous.

The first photos from the set of “Conan” are out, as well as the first pictures of Jason Momoa (pictured above with an ecstatic fan) as our favourite Cimmerian. What can they tell us about the direction of the film?

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