The first John Carter movie in history could have been written by a French!

The ficklepants.com website has published an astounding article, whose link you will find below, about another little-known try at adaptating A Princess of Mars, and with French authors!

In 1973, Peter Brown, former manager of the Beatles, buys the European rights for John Carter, and hires to write the script a French, a Roland Arrabal, author of short stories and plays, among those « Sept Péchés », which impressed Brown.

Should we be sorry that this adaptation never saw the light of day? I'll let you decide. But personaly, it would be a resounding "Not really"!

http://ficklepants.com/john-carter-of-mars/

The least we can say first of all is that Roland Arrabal has a very peculiar opinion about the work of Burroughs, who seems to be for him an avid promoter of white race imperialism. That Carter originates from Virginie is enough for him to call the hero, more concept than man, as a stealer of land, a killer of natives, and a first-rate oppressor! It didn't escape the author's notice that the first letter of the John Carter name recall another famous J.C., no, not John Carpenter, but Jesus Christ, whose teachings served as oppression weapons for 2000 years... Catholics will appreciate... According to him, Carter is a vicious oppressor, who in the novel doesn't learn from his mistakes and uses his capacities to colonize and conquer Mars. I wonder which book Arrabal read... The author doesn't hesitate to state than they (him and his partners of the movie) will "improve" Burroughs, and use his celebration of war to open a new form of consciousness!

Carter as written by Arrabal is an asshole, a real scumbag. The first scene depicts him, during  the Civil War, buried to the feet, and then to the hip, in a hill of cadavers, killing the last soldier alive and tasting his blood like a nectar! He then sees two brothers still alive. He only has one bulllet left in his gun and let them choose which one will live. Each of the brother wants the other to live, so Carter makes the choice instead and kills ont of them. Then he goes away, laughing. Now that's a hero!

He then learns his side has surrendered. Disgusted, while his comrades soldiers go whoring, he goes west. We see him later in Arizona with an unnamed partner (in the novel it's Powell). Carter isn't even interested in gold, he just wants to conquere what's before him. He's only partner with the man because he needs him, and he already said to him that he will have to kill hime some day! As in the novel, "Powell" is captured by Indians, and then scalped. Carter races to the Indians, not to recover his partner's body, but to mercy-killing him and take what's left of his gold! Chased by the Indians, stroke to death by arrows, a knife and a hatchet, Carter seeks shelter in a cave and falls. The Indians follow him, and see that from his wound drips not blood but milk! They run away.

Carter, wakes up on Mars. A Mother of Mars, a six-breasted creature, whith babies hanging from the breasts, is pouring milk on him. Carter grabs his sword, has a brief discussion where he learns where he is, and savagely slaughter women and children. He runs away from the cave, with huge leaps, and rejoices in having a whole planet to bring to its knees. He encounters another creature with hanging breasts, and attacks it. But this one ends up striking back and stuns Carter (scene corresponding to the drawing below). He's found by still other creatures and brought to a city, where the queen (unnamed), a huge creature with big breasts and large hips, orders him to be healed. It's at this moment that Carter begins to realize that he can treat others with kindness too.

He falls in love with the princess. Next is a hellish copulation act, very very detailed, which seems to use up every possibility of a human dealing with a creature two or three times as tall as he!

During this time, the creature who fought and vainquished Carter has come back to its own, and teaches them what it learned on this occasion, the way of violence. Until now, every creature on Mars was living in peace and harmony, and Carter's arrival destroyed this balance! The attack the forteress where  Carter and the princess got maried. Carter tries to defend with his Martians allaies, to no avail. The city is taken and Carter is crucified. He waked up in the cave in Arizona. He goes to the nearest town and tries to explain that peace and harmony are the only possible ways for mankind. It happens that the town's sherif is the brother Carter spared at the beginning. He hits Carter, then shoots him in the groin, asking him if he still feels being a pacifist. Carter answers to him "I love you". Pissed of, the sherif orders Carter to be lynched. He dies.

Meanwhile, the princess, now a slave, gives birth to... John Carter himself. Radiant, he goes pleading his cause to the new queen, the very creature he had fought. It reveals that other corrupted creatures has been sent all over Mars. Furious, Carter kills it and its followers, and puts again the princess on her throne. She asks him to stay with her, but he answers that it's impossible, because he must track down the corrupted creatures and destroy them. Then he will end his own life, which is the only way to go back to Mars the peaceful, as it was before he came.

As we see, at first glance, there's not much left of the novel, transformed here in what seems purely and simply a celebration of sex and gore. And yet, apart from the provocative stuff, all is not necessarily uninteresting and irrelevant. Andrew Stanton himself made of John Carter at the beginning somebody unpleasant, almost unsympathetic, he also in a quest for redemption. The message of Arrabal seems to be to accept the difference, which is also Burroughs'! Of course, John Carter won't become a convinced pacifist in the novels, but he will be the catalyst which brought some stability to Barsoom nonetheless.

Anyway, it was a surprising project, and we can only wonder how far it would have gone, and if the Burroughs estate would have let it go all the way!