MovieChat Forums > Cannery Row (1982) Discussion > How Screwed Up Are the Rights to This Mo...

How Screwed Up Are the Rights to This Movie?


They must be a mess. It never really got a decent release to video with strong studio support. The soundtrack, which is one of the best in film history (IMHO), is and has been nowhere to be seen. 30 years later and there is still no effort, apparently, to get this back before the public with a top notch release that it deserves! That's just wrong.

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You have to write to Thom Stienbeck care of his agent or publisher. He withdrew all film permissions for his father's books. He's also upset HBO turned down his Travels With Charley script.

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Yes, the music in this film is wonderful. I also love John Houston's narration.

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Houston's part was too distracting..if only his lines were from the books more often. He should have directed the film instead of David Ward. Ward rarely ever directed any films before at all. The movie was easier to follow without a narrator to ruin the mood. Jack Niezche's music was too jazzy and modern for the setting. The Seer, who the hell is a seer? No one can relate to inanimate objects for characters.

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In Steinbeck's novel "Sweet Thursday" (which most of the film was based on), the seer was NOT a former baseball player injured by Doc.
And Doc himself was not an ex-baseball player, either. The screenwriters added this dark backstory to give Doc a blemished and troubled past. In the novel, he was an intelligent and amazing biologist, admired by all, who falls in love with Suzy. Perhaps they felt he was TOO upbeat and normal, so they fabricated a painful past experience for him.

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