NEW 'WORLD' ORDER LACK OF DISTRIBUTION DEAL DIDN'T HALT BILLIONAIRE'S EXCURSION INTO FAMILY FILMMAKING.

Byline: Bob Strauss Film Writer

It isn't unusual for a big-budget film like ``Around the World in 80 Days'' to have problems. But the $110 million movie, which began filming in Thailand last year just as the SARS epidemic and the war in Iraq were getting under way, had another problem to overcome.

The effects-laden family adventure is believed to be the most expensive independent U.S. production to start shooting without a North American distribution deal.

Produced by Walden Media - which, like the Staples Center, the L.A. Kings and America's largest movie theater chain, Regal Entertainment, is owned by press-shy Colorado billionaire Philip Anschutz - the film was initially going to be released by Paramount Pictures. But that troubled studio pulled out of the deal two months before production started.

Anschutz's company - committed to the idea of creating family fare - went ahead anyway. (Anschutz's pockets are deep - his fortune is estimated at $4.9 billion.) After filming had been completed, Disney took on distribution duties last November. But the way many involved with ``80 Days,'' which hits screens Wednesday, see it, the uncertain situation couldn't have been more conducive to a happy, if harried, set.

``I like to see myself as a risk taker, and Philip Anschutz is a smart risk taker,'' says director Frank Coraci, whose previous features have been the hit - but far less ambitious - Adam Sandler comedies ``The Wedding Singer'' and ``The Waterboy.'' ``It was great because I saw eye-to-eye with Walden on the kind of movie we wanted to make, and I didn't have this whole layer of a big studio giving me all these different notes. So I'd wake up on the set and think that I was getting my independent filmmaker dream come true - times a lot!

``Of course, some days I'd wake up and go, boy, a lot's on my shoulder,'' Coraci admits. ``But it's always the same thing, more or less: I've got to make a good movie, whether it's for a studio or independently. But Walden was very trusting, which made my life easier.''

Coraci's version of the Jules Verne novel definitely takes some risks. (The 1956 adaptation won a best picture Oscar.) Jackie Chan - who turns the originally French servant Passepartout into an on-the-lam Chinese agent trying to return a jade Buddha to his home village - is a big international star, but only really sells tickets on this continent when he's teamed up with Chris Tucker. Phileas Fogg, the English gentleman who wagers he can circumnavigate the globe in the allotted time, has been changed into an oddball, but very Verne-like, visionary inventor. He's played by Steve Coogan, a popular British television comedian but hardly the internationally known commodity that David Niven was in 1956.

These aspects, along with an emphasis on the scientific, cultural and historical elements of the period, were assets in Walden's view. ``To be quite frank about it, I think we were blessed to be able to do it with an independent like Walden,'' says producer Bill Badalato, whose credits range from ``Hot Shots!'' to ``Broken Arrow'' to ``About Schmidt.'' ``I've worked for a number of studios, and I would not have wanted to do this picture with a couple of them. A lot of studios just want to film the budget. That's all they talk about. I went to a premiere recently and I wanted to compliment a studio executive on the picture. The first thing out of their mouth was, 'We made it for a price.' It isn't that way at Walden. Cary loves movies, his people love movies.''

``Cary'' would be Walden CEO Cary Granat, who left Miramax Films' Dimension label three years ago to devote himself to the culturally conservative Anschutz's agenda of creating family-friendly entertainment with strong educational elements.

``I think Phil and I share, mostly, the same vision of what we're looking for,'' says Granat, whose company also made the hit kids' film ``Holes'' and James Cameron's IMAX documentary ``Ghosts of the Abyss,'' and will soon start production on a live-action adaptation of C.S. Lewis' first ``Chronicles of Narnia'' novel, ``The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe,'' directed by ``Shrek''-meister Andrew Adamson. ``As the person who kind of runs point on that, I think this film completely satisfies the kind of exciting family vision that we're looking for. It's a real throwback to those classic kind of road movies.''

The ``Around the World'' road, Granat is quick to point out, was not fully paved with Anschutz money. The 11th-hour Paramount pullout hardly left the production partnerless.

``Sixty percent of the world was sold,'' Granat says. ``Other than in the United States and Canada, we had and still have one of the three biggest distributors in those territories. We had all of those deals in place before the film started shooting. When Paramount fell out initially, it wasn't like we were sitting there financing the entire movie at that time. We were literally just missing the North American piece, which many companies will often finance and then bring to a partner. It's been very mischaracterized in the press, as if we took on the entire movie. That was not the case.''

All of that noted, it wasn't like the production could throw money away. Although producer Mike Todd's widescreen '56 production sold its lavishness - it filmed on as many international locations as it could and included dozens of cameo appearances by superstars of the time - the exponentially more expensive new version needed to opt for more practical production strategies.

``We had to be clever, determine how to give this picture a broad look without going to 1,000 countries,'' producer Badalato notes. ``So we did some serious scouting.''

Which led to the decision to shoot the film's India and China sequences in Thailand, and its scenes in Victorian-era London, Paris, New York and the Turkish Ottoman Empire in, of all places, Berlin. The ultra-modern German capital actually provided more convincing 19th-century squares and edifices than could be comfortably filmed in contemporary London.

``That was bombed in the war,'' Coraci says of the Karl Frederick Schinkel-designed opera house that stands in for the British Royal Academy of Science. ``The East Germans rebuilt it in '72, and part of why the (Berlin) wall went down, supposedly, is because they bankrupted themselves by spending so much to rebuild this building. So, I had the most expensive set ever! It was ironic.''

Small units were dispatched to capture footage of several authentic locations for the movie, such as the Great Wall of China and the California desert, where Fogg has an improbable meeting with kindred inventing spirits the Wright brothers. They're played by Luke and Owen Wilson, who along with fellow cameo players Arnold Schwarzenegger (yes, the governor has a role), Kathy Bates, Sammo Hung, Rob Schneider and John Cleese help to echo the first film's formidable guest star roster.

``Once a budget is established, if I stay within the constraints of the budget, then there's no reason to pull back on anything,'' Coraci explains. ``And what was good was, this had very confident financing; it was coming from a very wealthy source. I had a lot of money to make the movie, which as a filmmaker gives you lots of toys to play with.''

Bob Strauss, [phone]

bob.strauss(at)dailynews.com

Moral of the story: Make a family film

When a money source has a distinct moral viewpoint like Philip Anschutz's Walden Media, which has a culturally conservative agenda, does it interfere with creativity?

Apparently not much in the case of ``Around the World in 80 Days.'' The movie has more than its fair share of murderous plotting and martial-arts action (though no blood is displayed). Perhaps more surprising, there's a healthy dose of crotch gags and innuendo. This reaches its peak in Arnold Schwarzenegger's portrayal of an amorous Turkish prince, whose antics could well rekindle memories of the Gropenator charges leveled during his gubernatorial campaign.

``I just wanted to make a movie that made me laugh,'' says director Frank Coraci - who, after all, makes Adam Sandler movies. ``And I think any age can laugh at it. I don't think it exposes anybody to anything bad. It was all in good fun.''

Coraci says he didn't intend it to be a kids' movie. ``But it felt like the right way to tell the story, And when I looked at the script, I felt like there was no reason why it couldn't be rated PG. It never was really discussed, but when it came down to it, they said it would really be great if it could be rated PG. But it never was a mandate from the beginning.''

And Walden CEO Cary Granat, who at Dimension oversaw the bloody, vulgar likes of ``Scream'' and ``Scary Movie,'' expressed no concerns over ``Around the World's'' comparatively subliminal stabs at naughtiness.

``It's a wonderful, noncynical, highly entertaining movie that is safe for everybody in the family to go and see, and has great values,'' Granat says. But before anyone confuses it with church camp, he adds, ``Overall, the big theme is progress and innovation vs. a very conservative mindset. The notion is for kids today to try to think more out-of-the-box, to try and be more innovative and make more discoveries. One of the biggest reasons why our company exists is to ignite a sense of curiosity and help them rediscover a sense of imagination.''

- B.S.

CAPTION(S):

3 photos, box

Photo:

(1 -- cover -- color) Up in the air

Gambling that America wants family films, Philip Anschutz's group spent $110 million on `Around the World in 80 Days' without a U.S. deal

(2) The $110 million effects-laden ``Around the World in 80 Days'' is thought to be the most costly independent U.S. production to start shooting without a North American distributor.

(3) Jackie Chan, left, and director Frank Coraci consult on the set of ``80 Days.''

Box:

Moral of the story: Make a family film (see text)