Death is not the end...

OK, after writing about Michael Jackson's ridiculous posthumous record deal a few weeks ago, I've seen two more stories about posthumously adding to peoples legacies, and they are both as dumb as each other.

First is this, a sequel to Treasure Island. Now, I don't see a point in writing such a sequel, but I'm not going to complain about that - each to their own. However, I'm astonished to see that a sequel written by "the former Poet Laureate Sir Andrew Motion" has apparently resorted to a plotline that sounds like it would have been used in a Disney direct-to-DVD sequel for a classic film (and we can all agree that they're rubbish can't we? I mean, obviously, except the Aladdin ones... :P )

"In Return to Treasure Island, Jim Hawkins lives with his son, Jim Junior, in a pub on the Thames outside London. Jim Junior is visited by a woman who turns out to be Long John Silver's daughter. She convinces Jim Junior to steal the original map of Treasure Island from his father and go on a trip organised by Silver so they can find the rest of the treasure."

OK. Firstly, Return to Treasure Island? I know it's hard thinking of titles for things, but really? Not only is that an amazingly obvious title, but that title has already been used by several sequels (as proved by this search page on Amazon). Why wouldn't a man with such a prestigious background come up with a title that hasn't been used before in that franchise?

Secondly - not only is he going with the whole "children of the old main characters decide to almost exactly replay the plot of the original novel" trope, but he hasn't even bothered to come up with a decent name for Jim Hawkins' son, instead calling him Jim Junior! Seriously, this is majorly lazy. Anyone would think he was dashing this novel off quickly to earn a bit of money... except it's not even likely he'll make a great deal, judging from the lack of success of most posthumous sequels (the exception being, of course, the Bond books).

Did he really think that this was a story worth writing? A story he was invested in? Or was he just offered a big advance cheque?

"Dan Franklin, publisher at Jonathan Cape, said Motion's sequel was a work of "literary ventriloquism"."

Well if he's managing to write it as R.L. Stevenson would have done, and he's basically re-hashing the original's plot (except, I am sure, for adding a romance subplot where love blossoms between those two main characters (and no, I don't have inside information, I'm just guessing)) then surely it'd be a more rewarding experience for all concerned to just READ THE ORIGINAL AGAIN!

And then, yesterday, I saw this. Now, I do believe Kubrick was a master film-maker, and having only seen a couple of his films, there are many of them on my mental "list of films I really ought to watch sometime." However, to claim that this is Kubrick's lost film is, frankly, MENTAL.

Look at the story - "It was a few years' back now that Stanley Kubrick's son-in-law, Philip Hobbs, discovered the work for a film called Lunatic At Large in amongst the masses of paperwork the director left behind after his death. Hobbs told the New York Times in 2006 that his father-in-law was "always saying he wished he knew where it was, because it was such a great idea". It wasn't so much a screenplay, to be fair, that Hobbs put his hands on, rather a treatment that was written by Jim Thompson. Kubrick had commissioned that treatment in the late 1950s."

OK. So Kubrick commissioned the treatment. So he didn't write it. (He may have had the original idea for the film, it's hard to tell from the limited information in the news story). And he obviously won't direct it, seeing as he's dead! And since Kubrick was a writer/director/editor/producer then he will have done NONE of these jobs on the film - so how is it his film??

I mean, don't get me wrong - even A.I. (which incidentally is a much better film if you stop it as the robot boy (who's name I forget) drowns, and you ignore all the alien stuff at the end) was at least assembled from "the various drafts and notes left by Kubrick and his writers " (And yes, I did just quote the Wikipedia Stanley Kubrick page - I know Wikipedia is often not a reliable source, but I remember seeing this elsewhere at the time), so I can see why it was thought of as an unmade Kubrick film - but surely just commissioning this treatment for Lunatic at Large doesn't make it his lost film??

Look, if I were ever to be famous and to die leaving lots of half-written things on my computer (which would be likely, as my computer is ALWAYS full of half-written things), then any of those being developed could be credited as a lost Michael Braunton film - but if it was based on me asking someone to write a plot for an idea I'd had - then it wouldn't belong to me - it belongs to the writer...

What's worse is I have a horrible suspicion this "lost Kubrick film" will end up with a generic director and be average - thus tarnishing Kubrick's record (which both A.I. and Eyes Wide Shut have already done to an extent...), whereas at least with this Treasure Island sequel, the only name to be tarnished will be that of the author, because no-ones claiming it's based on an idea R.L. Stevenson had.. thankfully.

What do you think? Are there any posthumous films/books/albums that you think add to the artist's legacy rather than tarnish it?