More Game To Movie Translations In Progress

Thanks to Yahoo/Hollywood Reporter for their article discussing the latest batch of videogame-to-movie adaptations in progress, which focuses on a completely different set of films to yesterday's article on Dungeon Siege. This time, Impact Pictures, who "which wrapped principal photography of its $40 million-range 'Resident Evil: Apocalypse' sequel Friday in Toronto", is profiled, and they discuss forthcoming movies from the company, helmed by Mortal Kombat director Paul W.S. Anderson, including "a $50 million adaptation of Atari's best-selling 'Driver' game", and, weirdly, a "big-screen version of Tecmo's blockbuster 'Dead or Alive' fighting game... [which] will provide some PG-13 fighting action and humor, devised by screenwriter J.F. Lawton ('Pretty Woman')."

Comments

Um yea

[quantax]

I failing to understand why they are picking these games for conversion. Dungeon Seige for 1.5 hours, what the hell? What about Morrowind or some other classic D&D quest with a real plot. But Dungeon Seige is good compared to Dead or Alive or Driver; DoA has zero plot to develop from, so I think we can expect another street fighter here. And as far as Driver, what the hell? Theres plenty of good car-chase movies without making one about a game about car-chases. Hollywood must be sadly misinformed or something, since I can think of plenty of video games which offer far more possibilities based on existing plots. Resident Evil atleast has a plot, though its not terribly original, its there and its something, so I can give them that, but DoA the movie sounds weak.

Re:Um yea

[Acidic_Diarrhea]

My guess would be that there are a couple of things at work here. First of all, say you're a movie producer and you own the rights to this somewhat poor script for generic movie Y. Now during the course of reading the script for Y, you notice that some scenes match a hit video game that has sold very well on a multitude of platforms. Well golly - let's slap that license on there and make some easy money! Now I don't know if more people are familiar with Dungeon Siege or Morrowind or Driver or DoA. My guess would be that the most people are familiar with DoA but I've got no numbers to back that up so feel free to disagree and correct me. Second of all, I'd guess that an already established plot like Morrowind apparently has is dangerous territory because, if you mess with that established universe, you're going to piss off some of the core of your target a lot. Who knows how those kooks out in Hollywood think though...

Boy I can't wait...

[NanoGator]

...until Tetris comes out.

Oh boy

[NanoGator]

I just finished watching Hulk like half an hour ago. You can probably imagine, I didn't find this artice exciting.

My main problem with video game/comicbook/cartoon adaptions is that live-action movies are not the right medium for it. Video games and cartoons are very single-dimensional when it comes to personality. How do you adapt human depth to a character without destroying it? Spiderman comes to mind. Remember the villain in that movie? Who can imagine a guy really turning into that?

What's the solution? I wish they'd think about what this medium is strong at and focus on its strengths. Live action is great for human interaction, it stucks as a superhero medium. Wanna use live action? Okay, at least be kind enough to make the experience worthwhile. X-Men comes to mind. Don't want your movie to be like that? Okay, at LEAST consider an animated film. You have an enitrely different range of advantages with animation.

I really wish movies were made to be entertained instead of to draw money.