http://monsterkidclassichorrorforum.yuk ... ply-290515

Dracula: Lugosi's Dracula film takes place in contemporary times, based on the presence of cars. Dracula's Daughter cements this. Son of Dracula muddies things a bit by saying it took place in the 19th Century, but Dracula's Daughter takes place just after the end of Dracula. Hammer set Dracula in the Victorian Era specifically

Sherlock Holmes: except for the first two Rathbone films, no SH films set specifically in the Victorian Era till Lejeune TV adaptations and Hammer Hound

Dick Tracy: Ralph Byrd films set in contemporary times, Beatty done as a period piece

The Shadow: adaptations up to Bourbon Street Shadows contemporary, Baldwin film done as a period piece

Philip Marlowe: done as contemporary up to Altman directed version, first Mitchum a period piece, second Mitchum in contemporary times

Phantom: serial and tv pilot done contemporary, Zane version period piece; TV mini-series contemporary or future

Coffin Ed and the Grave Digger: Davis films done as contemporary, Rage in Harlem as a period piece

Leatherface: remakes as period piece, upcoming Henckel project contemporary

I forgot to add Tom Ripley to the mix, as all films up to The American Friend were done as contemporary, not period pieces.

Ellery Queen was contemporary until Jim Hutton.

Also, Nero Wolfe's William Conrad tv show was done contemporary, but the Maury Chaykin series was done as a period piece.

Tarzan: not done as a period piece until 1981-mostly done as a period piece since, with exceptions such as the Leighton Meester version

King Kong: Godzilla Vs. King Kong contemporary; all others contemporary up to Peter Jackson

The Flash Gordon movie with Sam Jones took place in contemporary times (based on the design of Flash's t-shirt). The Filmation cartoon, which started earlier, took place in the 1930's, though we did not find this out until the TV movie The Greatest Adventure of Them All.

Oddly enough, the early episodes of Lynda Carter's Wonder Woman took place during World War II, but the later ones took place in contemporary times (did they explain that as an Amazon she would not undergo normal aging?). I find this interesting as other adaptations of other MVL and DC characters, no matter how many decades they came out since the property debuted in print, have taken place in contemporary times.

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Two properties that have consistently resisted appearing as period pieces:

Mike Hammer: Stacy Keach lasted played the private eye 50 years after Hammer's debut in I, the Jury, but the series has never appeared as a period piece.

Leslie Charteris' The Saint Film and TV versions of the Saint have never appeared as period pieces. The Roger Moore version took place in the then-contemporary 1960's. Post-Roger Moore TV versions such as those with Simon Dutton, Andrew Clarke, and Ian Ogilvy also eschewed the period piece approach. The 1997 Val Kilmer film, though released almost 70 years since the Saint's first appearance in print in 1928, took place in then contemporary times.

Godzilla: Toho has never remade the original film, and even found a way to incorporate the 1998, contemporary set US film. The Godzilla films actually do not even follow a sliding timescale, since most human characters in the Showa and Heisei films who have returned were portrayed by the same people. Raymond Burr returned as Steve Martin in Godzilla 1985. Momoko Kouchi, also in the first film, reprised Emiko Yamane in Godzilla vs. Destoroyah in 1995, and Hiroshi Koizumi resumed the role of Professor Shin'ichi Chujo from Mothra (1961) (which did not actually feature Godzilla) in 2003's Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S. The films have recast the Shobijin with younger actresses, however. Kenji Sahara played someone named Segawa in both The Terror of Mechagodzilla and his Heisei era films, but since The Terror of Mechagodzilla does not form part of the continuity of the Heisei series, it is unclear whether it involves the same personage.

On a related note, Hiroshi Koizumi plays a character named Professor Miura in both Godzilla vs. the Thing and Ghidrah the Three-Headed Monster, but there's nothing beyond the name to suggest that the two Professor Miuras are the same person-- which is rendered doubly odd by the fact that the tabloid TV show for which one of the other characters works fairly obviously is the program of the same name that figures in the otherwise unconnected Varan the Unbelievable.

Well... Godzilla goes the other way, and has several of the Showa films go forward instead of back. In Destroy All Monsters they set the date as 1999, over 20 years from when it came out.

Also, "Tom Ripley" is from Talented Mr. Ripley right? I thought there were only two films...

Since in DAM they also mention that Monster Land started twenty years ago, I do not consider that quite a setting update. I consider that more of a future story, along the lines of Highlander II: The Quickening (which largely took place in the future), Jason X (largely took place in the future), Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare (which took place "ten years from now") or Hellraiser: Bloodline (though Hellraiser: Bloodline did not, in fact, largely take place in the future). So far, all Godzilla films have kept as part of their backstory that the first Godzilla attack on Japan happened in 1954. Perhaps a separate thread about franchises which have had entries set in the future would help? We would, of course, have to exclude series that involve time travel or the future as part of the central premise.

Ripley has appeared in five films. Ripley debuted in print in 1955. The first two films had contemporary settings. The third, Talented Mr. Ripley, took place in the 1950's. Its two follow-up films include Ripley's Game and Ripley Under Water. Ripley's Game remains relatively easy to find, but Ripley Under Water seems stuck in release problems. However, I did see Ripley's Game's first few scenes, and it seems to take place in contemporary times (a microwave oven in a kitchen). If you took that film as a sequel to Talented Mr. Ripley, that would make Ripley 70 or 80 years old, but John Malkovich, who played Ripley, has only reached his 50's.

There being, of course, absolutely no truth to the rumor that John Malkovich is in fact a 3000-year-old vampire king.

Damn!

On Godzilla: Now this is confusing me, since I always assumed each section of Godzilla to have a pretty straightforward timeline.

So... I guess Destroy All Monsters takes place after the remaining Showa films? But since Monster Island existed before Destroy All Monsters takes place, it's okay that there's still a Monster Island in Godzilla's Revenge/Godzilla vs Gigan/Mechagodzilla.

The Malkovich Ripley was from another production company and was not a "sequel" but a separate adaptation of a separate Ripley title. They're only connected by being made from books in the same series, they're not intended to be connected to each other.