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22 years ago, 20th Century Fox honcho Tom Rothman indulged himself by launching “Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World” from the harbor. Drawn from the Napoleonic Wars-set novels of Patrick O’Brien, this ocean-bound epic, budgeted at $150 million, was far from a commercial slam dunk. Mainstream audiences were developing a taste for zippy superhero flicks, and still preferred their action movies to be loud and stupid; very, very<\/em> few people were clamoring for a movie in which lumbering frigates exchanged cannon fire on the high seas.<\/p>\n Rothman, a fan of O’Brien’s work<\/a>, didn’t care. He astutely identified Peter Weir as the ideal director for the gig, and bought himself some movie star insurance by casting Russell Crowe and Paul Bettany as, respectively, Captain Jack Aubrey and ship’s surgeon Stephen Maturin. Rothman was also quite aware that Weir could shoot the majority of the film quite realistically at the Baja Studios tank built for James Cameron’s “Titanic.” It was a risk, but Rothman had a hunch he’d assembled the right creative team to bring O’Brien’s eminently readable books to life.<\/p>\n “Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World” grossed an okay $212 million worldwide, and earned 10 Academy Award nominations (winning two for Best Cinematography and Best Sound Editing). Russell Crowe was gung-ho about playing Aubrey again, but the film was very clearly a one-and-done endeavor. Fans of O’Brien were lucky to have it, but there was a limited appetite for this kind of material.<\/p>\n In 2025, Weir’s masterpiece is a beloved dad movie. It’s a wildly popular streaming title, sold out rapidly when it his 4K earlier this year<\/a>, and, for the oldsters among us, it’s the perfect collapse-on-the-couch-and-watch-dudes-be-awesome flick. All these years later, is a sequel possible?<\/p>\n