BARBARELLA 2000 SOMETHING

Italian super-producer Dino De Laurentiis has decided to go ahead and start pre-production on a remake of his own 1968 film Barbarella. This project has been in the works for a while -- filmmaker Robert Rodriguez had been slated to direct for Universal Studios -- but De Laurentiis has taken over the property and is shopping around for complete financing.

While the 41 year-old film, which starred intersteller hottie Jane Fonda, would be considered more a cult item, there appears to be a need for a new version. Trivia: Barbarella was rereleased to theatres not long after Star Wars became a hot item in the spring and summer of 1977. Like a lot of folk, when I saw the tv spots for Barbarella, I thought it was a new film, made to cash in on Star Wars.

December 1976; yes, I saw the same producer's remake of the classic 1933 film King Kong. With great fanfare, De Laurentiis, with his usual aplomb, made sure every living thing new that he was going ahead with his take on the big ape -- making a film which was derided by many but seen by more than a few. (His King Kong ran for a month at my local small-town cinema; it had a plum spot in the biggest house.)

While King Kong 1976 became a victim of its own pre-publicity (we knew when Jessica Lange was cast, we knew when the full sized mechanical ape was transported across the U.S., and we knew when the production shot around the World Trade Center towers) by under-performing a little considering what kind of money was at stake. But we saw Dino De Laurentiis' name emblazoned on the movie posters... his name was as familiar at that time as super-producer Irwin Allen's. It was the end of the era of real movie showmen.

What this means for the new Barbarella is anybody's guess. But we will know everything about it before it even hits the screens -- which is par for the course, these days.