# Will they have the guts to film "Princess of Mars" all-nude, as Burroughs intended? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 21, 2006, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604 "2006-05-21T03:28:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/1 "2006-05-21T03:28:25Z")
I’m reading Burroughs’ _Princess of Mars_ for the first time, and there’s a striking detail: Neither the green Martians nor the red Martians, male nor female, ever wear clothing. Not even a loincloth or _cache-sex._ They wear metallic armbands and such, and when it gets cold they drape a fur or silk wrap over their shoulders. Otherwise, it’s all bareass all the time. (Burroughs assumed Barsoom to have a climate similar to Earth’s only milder, with no strong winds and never any rain. Whaddaya want, the guy never even visited Africa, let alone Mars.) A detail I’ve never seen faithfully rendered in comic-book adaptations. Assuming the movie ever gets made, will they have the guts to be authentic in that regard? ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/2 "2006-05-21T03:35:20Z")
Never going to happen, if for no other reason than most of Hollywood (or the rest of us for that matter) look really stupid naked. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/3 "2006-05-21T03:45:23Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > Never going to happen, if for no other reason than most of Hollywood (or the rest of us for that matter) look really stupid naked. Nor has there ever been a human culture, however primitive, AFAIK, that did not wear crotch-covering clothing in some form. Yet that’s how Burroughs wrote the story. (In comix and illustrations, however, Carter is always wearing some kinda pants and Dejah Thoris some kinda metallic bikini.) ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/4 "2006-05-21T04:16:08Z")
Did Burroughs ever mention male Martian equipment? Kinda silly to have your junk dangling in the breeze when someone is swinging a sword at you. And aren’t females on Mars ovipositors? That has to affect the design of the nether regions somehow. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/5 "2006-05-21T04:50:33Z")
Nude? NUDE? We’ll be damn lucky if the outfits are even SKIMPY! ---
**Author:** ![Triskadecamus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b19c9b/32.png) [@Triskadecamus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Triskadecamus)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 5:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/6 "2006-05-21T05:31:55Z")
Hey, no culture anywhere primitive or otherwise had chicks running around in chainmail bikinis either. So what? Hollywood will strip Deja Thoris down to a hard R, and then edit it into market specific versions. The guys will wear pants. Long pants on the old farts, most likely. And I for one am glad about it. Tris Tris ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 6:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/7 "2006-05-21T06:26:51Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Nor has there ever been a human culture, however primitive, AFAIK, that did not wear crotch-covering clothing in some form. Yet that’s how Burroughs wrote the story. (In comix and illustrations, however, Carter is always wearing some kinda pants and Dejah Thoris some kinda metallic bikini.) There are some tribes in South America and New Guinea that only wear a string belt. Also most Australian Aborignes went completely naked (except for a belt). Honestly I wish they’d film the Martian nude, blur out the bits the MPAA objects too, and release an unrated DVD. Never gonna happen and it’d look totally bizarre on the big screen. ---
**Author:** ![chrisk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@chrisk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chrisk)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 11:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/8 "2006-05-21T11:44:38Z")
I have to say, I’ve wondered the same thing about a screen adaptation that will never ever happen: Piers Anthony’s “apprentica adept” books. Frankly, I’m not sure in that case it it’d even be a good thing to be so faithful to the books. The author had a lot of worthwhile stuff he was trying to say, using nakedness as a metaphor and so on, but it’s one thing to read about the characters being naked and another to see them - western society has plenty of hangups of its own about nudity that it’d be impossible to break them out of. Slap the proton serfs in some kind of futuristic, silvery-jumpsuit type uniforms and have done with the whole mess is my advice - and then start figuring out who you can cast as Sheen and how much money you can spend on the FX. 😃 Oh, and getting the script adaptation right too, of course, that’s very important. Not sure if any of the same stuff applies to ‘princess of mars’, but I felt like I had to share. ---
**Author:** ![LiveOnAPlane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/3d9bf3/32.png) [@LiveOnAPlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LiveOnAPlane)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/9 "2006-05-21T12:16:51Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > I’m reading Burroughs’ _Princess of Mars_ for the first time, and there’s a striking detail: Neither the green Martians nor the red Martians, male nor female, ever wear clothing. Not even a loincloth or _cache-sex._ They wear metallic armbands and such, and when it gets cold they drape a fur or silk wrap over their shoulders. Otherwise, it’s all bareass all the time. (Burroughs assumed Barsoom to have a climate similar to Earth’s only milder, with no strong winds and never any rain. Whaddaya want, the guy never even visited Africa, let alone Mars.) A detail I’ve never seen faithfully rendered in comic-book adaptations. Assuming the movie ever gets made, will they have the guts to be authentic in that regard? I hate prefacing a post with a lot of disclaimers, but I have to in this case. Even though this was the very _first_ real book I ever read, and even though I subsequently read every one of his Mars (Barsoom) books, I just not not remember how the Martians were exactly described. I think they could probably be portrayed without external genetalia, but I don’t know/remember about how, or even if, the female breasts were described. And, since I started this at about 7 years old, I certainly don’t think I’d have been titillated enough by descriptions of female beasts to pick up on that if they were there. Basic Answer: I dunno. Secondary Answer: Look at the remake of War Of The Worlds with Tom Cruise. Once you get past the “Will they have the guts” to do this, I sadly think one is left with just “Is it even possible that Hollywood would even come close to the look and feel of the original…would they even come CLOSE?” I just don’t think so, though I would love to see a movie that faithfully brought this to the Silver Screen. ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Clam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3bc359/32.png) [@Happy\_Clam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Clam)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/10 "2006-05-21T12:29:13Z")
I’m particuarly curious about this because it could serve as a test case for the long-rumoured film of _Paradise Lost_, the screenplay for which is being worked on by a trans-atlantic friend of mine. Essentially, Adam and Eve’s nakedness is essential for the plot- but a substantial portion of the market share would be fundies, meaning that there’s some…tensions there. Thoughts? ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/11 "2006-05-21T12:32:45Z")
> [@LiveOnAPlane](#): > > I hate prefacing a post with a lot of disclaimers, but I have to in this case. > > Even though this was the very _first_ real book I ever read, and even though I subsequently read every one of his Mars (Barsoom) books, I just not not remember how the Martians were exactly described. I think they could probably be portrayed without external genetalia, but I don’t know/remember about how, or even if, the female breasts were described. > > And, since I started this at about 7 years old, I certainly don’t think I’d have been titillated enough by descriptions of female beasts to pick up on that if they were there. > > Basic Answer: I dunno. > Secondary Answer: Look at the remake of War Of The Worlds with Tom Cruise. Once you get past the “Will they have the guts” to do this, I sadly think one is left with just “Is it even possible that Hollywood would even come close to the look and feel of the original…would they even come CLOSE?” > > I just don’t think so, though I would love to see a movie that faithfully brought this to the Silver Screen. Try _The Maltese Falcon_. It’s pretty good, as they basically just bought a copy of the book, & used a razor blade to cut & paste the script together. Anyway, what wrong with metal bikinis? Carrie Fisher wore one, & she taught a generation of Geeks to regularly change their bedsheets. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/12 "2006-05-21T14:07:17Z")
I just reread HGttG. At one point, 500 nude female parachutists appear thanks to the Improbability Drive. That didn’t appear in the movie. Stuff happens, even less so in Hollywood. ---
**Author:** ![Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otto)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/13 "2006-05-21T14:32:32Z")
> [@Happy Clam](#): > > I’m particuarly curious about this because it could serve as a test case for the long-rumoured film of _Paradise Lost_, the screenplay for which is being worked on by a trans-atlantic friend of mine. Essentially, Adam and Eve’s nakedness is essential for the plot- but a substantial portion of the market share would be fundies, meaning that there’s some…tensions there. Thoughts? In John Huston’s _The Bible_ there’s an extended nude scene of Adam and Eve, including per IMDB full frontal of each. This was in 1966 and apparently the Republic survived. The real reason why it wouldn’t be filmed with nude actors is that many/most name actors won’t do nude scenes, and with what will undoubtedly be the expense of a film adaptation of a Barsoom novel the producers are going to want names in the lead roles to try to guarantee some box office. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/14 "2006-05-21T15:07:41Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > Did Burroughs ever mention male Martian equipment? Kinda silly to have your junk dangling in the breeze when someone is swinging a sword at you. And aren’t females on Mars ovipositors? That has to affect the design of the nether regions somehow. Well, there’s two intelligent species in _PoM_ (I understand Burroughs introduces more in the sequels, which I haven’t got to yet): Green Martians, who are 10-15 feet tall with four arms, tusks protructing from their mouths, and eyes set laterally on their heads like a chameleon’s; and red Martians, who look exactly like _Homo sapiens_ with red skin. The book (written in 1911) describes the genital equipment of neither. But Dejah Thoris is close enough to human that John Carter can not only fall in love with her but sire a child on her. (Actually, she lays an egg, which takes five years to hatch, which is the normal reproductive cycle for both races). Understand, we’re not talking hard SF here. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 3:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/15 "2006-05-21T15:12:50Z")
This site – [http://www.erbzine.com/mag13/1351.html](http://www.erbzine.com/mag13/1351.html) – includes galleries of various artists’ conceptions of the Barsoomians. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/16 "2006-05-21T15:42:11Z")
Update: Apparently the working title for the film has been changed to _John Carter of Mars._[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John\_Carter\_of\_Mars\_(film)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Carter_of_Mars_%28film%29) ---
**Author:** ![chrisk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@chrisk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chrisk)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/17 "2006-05-21T15:57:41Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > I just reread HGttG. At one point, 500 nude female parachutists appear thanks to the Improbability Drive. > > That didn’t appear in the movie. > > Stuff happens, even less so in Hollywood. To be fair, that was a very minor throwaway joke in the book, not even a plot point. So it’s not a very fair comparison with what’s being discussed in the rest of this thread. Also… just what is that last line supposed to mean? It would seem that MORE stuff happens in hollywood than most places… not much of it good. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![CapnPitt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/edb3f5/32.png) [@CapnPitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CapnPitt)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/18 "2006-05-21T15:58:49Z")
> [@Otto](#): > > The real reason why it wouldn’t be filmed with nude actors is that many/most name actors won’t do nude scenes, and with what will undoubtedly be the expense of a film adaptation of a Barsoom novel the producers are going to want names in the lead roles to try to guarantee some box office. Which leaves you with Harvey Keitel as Adam. ---
**Author:** ![Sattua](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sattua/32/11906_2.png) [@Sattua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sattua)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/19 "2006-05-21T16:02:27Z")
Seems like they could put them in bodysuits and somehow erase the seams and cuffs, eh? ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2006, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604/20 "2006-05-21T16:43:52Z")
Well, the books do say that men wear belts and harnesses on which to hang tools and weapons, and women wear various forms of ornamentation. It wouldn’t be too much of a departure to add a loincloth or jock strap to a weapon belt, and I’ve seen many artist’s conceptions of Barsoomian women that include some sort of filigreed wire jewelry over the breasts which just barely covers the nipples. If they go with something like that, I think it’d be tolerably acceptable to both the censors and the fans. They could also go for the comedy staple of having the characters naked, but there’s always something coincidental in the scene conveniently blocking the view of any naughty bits. But that’d be very hard to keep up for two hours, and would probably be a very bad idea. **LiveOnAPlane** , I’m pretty sure that extensive mention is made of Deejah Thoris’ perfect breasts, but that may just be my brain playing tricks on me and filling in details. And don’t make too much of the fact that John Carter and Deejah Thoris are interfertile, since I’m pretty well convinced that Carter isn’t human, either. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-they-have-the-guts-to-film-princess-of-mars-all-nude-as-burroughs-intended/357604.md?page=2)