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And now back to the ongoing drama revolving around Where the Wild Things Are, Spike Jonze's reported $75 million adaptation of the classic Maurice Sendak picture book for Warner Bros. After some early test footage surfaced, a statement from the director qualified that the Wild Thing suit and child actor featured in the scene were both placeholders for what was to come. Still, Slashfilm floated rumors that early test screenings tanked with audiences, calling it "too adult and even too scary for children." (Translation: Probably genius.) Now CHUD.com reports twitchy suits are on the verge of pressing the panic buttons beneath their desks that would conveniently dispense with creator and floundering project through their office trapdoor:

We're on the verge of losing a movie.

If the entire film gets reshot you will hear that the decision came because of technical issues, specifically the animation of the Wild Things' mouths and facial features. The film uses people in huge Jim Henson Creature Shop suits, and the plan was to shoot the suits and animate the Wild Things' faces later. That has been proving to be more technically difficult than anyone had foreseen [...]

This is a bad situation, obviously, but one where some footage could be salvaged, meaning that a complete and total reshoot of the film wouldn't be necessary.

Yet I'm hearing that just such a massive reshoot is what is on the table right now. And it's not because of technical issues, unless you want to consider the lead kid actor and the script technical issues..

Sadly, when you agree to embark upon a major studio release—particularly one positioned as a family tentpole—marketability will always wind up trumping vision. Just ask the creators of Surf's Up, who had originally envisioned their CGI epic as an all-field-rodent Watership Down for the Iraq War generation, only to find it reprocessed into the virtually unrecognizable penguin surfing movie that made its way into theaters.