Steve Wozniak on Steve Jobs Movie (opens in new tab)

Kid genius comes to America to work for his hero, but decides to strike out on his own to change the world after a disagreement over money. Ends up failing miserably and being crushed by his former hero and employer. Slowly goes insane and dies poor and largely forgotten.

I know, and mostly agree with your sentiment. But I think this one has been in the pipeline for a good while (four years [0]), and is probably the one I've been waiting for because of the Boyle/Sorkin collaboration. The others seemed rushed out just to cash in on Job's life.

That said I'm still particularly fond of "Pirates of Silicon Valley"[1], I thought Noah Wiley as a younger Jobs was a fairly good effort..

[0]: http://thenextweb.com/apple/2011/10/25/steve-jobs-movie-coul...

[1]: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0168122

I don't know a whole lot about Tesla's life, but those don't particularly strike me as elements of a great / saleable screenplay. Not that that necessarily matters, the established way around that is to just make shit up. I guess what I am saying is, be careful what you wish for.

btw in practice "big time visuals" means "spending a lot of money on a biography of somebody only a few nerds are interested in". It's not necessarily a selling point.

Edit: A Tesla / Edison feud movie in the style or Rocky or Frost/Nixon might work. You'd have to change the ending obviously.

Here is the thing, its not just about iPhones.

Apple products have, since the early Mac, had a oddly special place in media production.

I have seen a national broadcaster decide to standardize their production chain on Apple hardware and software, when the rest of the nation is basically in Microsoft's pocket.

Frankly i think Apple would have been long dead, and both the iPod and iPhone a massive flop, if this connection had not existed.

Because with it, the journalists and whatsnot end up keeping an extra keen eye on Apple because anything from there affects them directly. So when a new product shows up, even outlets that usually do not mention tech news ends up writing an article about it.

For sure, Woz would like to set some things straight and tell his perspective on things. I once stumbled about a comment from Woz regarding the Steve Jobs movie. He was not very pleased with the narrative of the Jobs film.

The comment is an interesting read, and it can be found at:

https://plus.google.com/+CarmsPerez/posts/GnVTvQNgvpf

One good one will do.

One good one I suppose. Made for TV movies and low budget cash-ins don't count. I love the 1980s tech era and would love to see more films handle that. Not sure if this film goes this far back but the rise of mobile is just as good of a story, and probably more relate-able to modern audiences.

>Why don't we have a decent Tesla movie?

Honestly, because it would be terrible. Tesla works as a backdrop to Edison's success but he's a bit player in almost every way. This is like asking why we don't have a Paul Allen movie. Sure, those would be interesting, but not $50m plus dollar investment interesting for a risk-averse Hollywood system.

Also, general audiences won't be too impressed with the guy who failed at a lot of things even though his technical achievements are impressive. Tesla is also a very unlikeable person from the writings we have of people who have met him. He doesn't have the Jobsian charm we're going to see in Apple movies. He doesn't have a Jobsian narrative. He was a stern and asocial weirdo and most likely would be somewhere on the autism spectrum today. It also doesn't help that his ideas went full wack-town towards the end. In a desperate attempt to make money things like death rays, perpetual energy, bullshit medical devices, etc became his norm. Not to mention his vision of wireless energy was ultimately a non-starter as it would pollute the spectrum enough to make things like TV or cell phones impossible.

On a related note, I think creatives struggled with telling Alan Turing's story, but at least with Turing we have all his influence, published papers, his victimhood, and his amazing WWII experiences. Even then, the Imitation Game wasn't very historically accurate. Tesla doesn't have any crowd-pleasing themes of overcoming adversity and his dark side is really dark - endless advocating eugenics, wanting to sterilize the poor, never having any sort of romance, becoming bitter, ultimately failing at his dreams, etc. He isn't this kindly grandfather type his fans make him out to be. He's a mess, honestly. A smart mess, but a mess nonetheless. I think any movie that makes him look relatable or a "hero" would ultimately be dishonest. By the business standards of the time, he was treated fairly. He just couldn't launch his own businesses successfully.

  Why don't we have a decent Tesla movie?

  Yet, where's the big time Hollywood treatment?