There are rumors floating around that the Tom Hanks owned Playtone production company may be discussing the possibilities of turning Green Day's American Idiot (the musical) into a movie. This is, without a doubt, the worst possible news we could feasibly imagine. We're picturing a kind of Garden State meets Avril Lavigne in a skate park with an anti-Limbaugh bumper sticker type of thing, which sounds about as good as the American Idiot performance at the Grammys (terrible). Either way, there are a lot of concept or themed albums out there that are far more ripe for conversion to film. Here's five we think would make kick ass movies.
5. Godspeed You Black Emperor! - F# A# Infinity: Okay, so this isn't necessarily a concept album, but the fact the second track, "East Hastings" has already been used in 28 Days Later to the degree of awesome, we think the rest of the album would make an excellent springboard for a film. The opening tracks lays out the narrative, with the shaman-sounding dude going on and on about the world ending and what not. Duncan Jones? Are you listening? Hey, make this into a film. Do it now, get Sam Rockwell and have him wander around a wasteland or something with the sky being on fire.
4. Deltron 3030 - 3030: There's no hiding the fact that a couple of us here are complete and utter science fiction geeks. Combine that together with the dream team of Del the Funkee Homosapien, Dan the Automator and Kid Koala making an album entirely reliant on futurisms and new world orders and simply imagining a film based on this is making us froth at the mouth. We're picturing something by Pixar, with vibrant 3D effects of Del's super virus reverting us all back to papyrus.
3. Bruce Haack - The Electric Lucifer: The Electric Lucifer stands tall on it's own for being one of the greatest (and only) electronic concept albums ever released. The weird, anti-war, pro-love strangeness conveyed by the electronic music innovator is sure to rattle some feathers by its name alone. We're not entirely certain why, but we picture Guillermo del Toro heading this effort and turning Haack's epic battle between heaven and hell something far more interesting than most Hollywood hacks could do.
2. Marvin Gaye - Here, My Dear: This is a goddamn Oscar nominated film that doesn't even exist yet. Guaranteed if you turned Marvin Gaye's spiteful letter of resentment to his ex-wife into a movie it would earn billions. If the album's premise isn't enough for the Hollywood exec's, consider this: get yourself a bearded Jamie Foxx, get yourself Mo'Nique, put them into this plotline. Boom, Oscar winner.
1. The Kinks - Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire): You want to know why this is number one? Because it was specifically designed and written as a television show. The plot line was actually well formed, with the protagonist, Arthur, deciding to move to Australia after World War II. The album itself doesn't stray too far away from the plot, which adds all the more fuel to fire of this being a potentially fully realized film. We're imagining the Kinks-loving Wes Anderson to healm the camera for this one, with a cast full of grimy Brits, or at least Jason Schwartzman dressed up and with an accent.
