For those who may be unaware, Max Landis is the screenwriter behind Chronicle and American Ultra.
He's also penned - or at least claimed to have penned - a number of screenplays for well-known films that were ultimately dropped by their respective studios. For example, Landis apparently wrote an early draft of what became 2014's Fantastic Four and, more recently, Landis was hired to write the screenplay for the Power Rangers reboot.
As we reported over the weekend, the first trailer for the Power Rangers reboot landed online and seemed to be met with widespread optimism. However, for Landis, he wasn't all that impressed. In fact, Landis was talking plagiarism.
I wrote a silly, fun, goofy retro teen action adventure movie.
They fired me, and five or so writers later, it appears they made Chronicle.
— Max Landis (@Uptomyknees) October 9, 2016
So, what's going on here? Most likely it's Max Landis getting pissy that a film he had a hand is getting some traction online. Evidently, Landis had a vision in mind for what the Power Rangers movie should look like and Lionsgate decided it wasn't for them. That's the nature of the game.
What's aggravating him is that their vision is so close to Chronicle, but let's be honest here - Chronicle wasn't some daring, unique vision or anything. It was pretty much Akira with American teenagers. Sure, the found-footage thing was a bit of a departure from previous comic-book and sci-fi films, but so what? It's quite obvious watching Chronicle that the found-footage thing was a way of masking the fact that the film was made for $12 million.
Moreover, it's just under three minutes of footage - can you really say with all certainty that the Power Rangers reboot is a rip-off of Chronicle? Of course not. Granted, there are similarities between the two - teenagers chosen by destiny to have superpowers, etc. - but there are dozens of films like that.
If anything, Power Rangers looked more like The Breakfast Club than anything else.
Via Twitter
