Movie Moment: Video Game Movies

A while back I borrowed a book from my sister, “The Ultimate History of Video Games.” It was a very interesting inside look at a diversion that has grown into a multi-billion dollar industry. I was particularly intrigued by the cooperation and/or outright warfare between the artistic side of creating the games and the cutthroat capitalist side of the business.

There were occasional snippets in the book about video games that have been adapted into movies. And as I noticed them, I realized something: all the movies based on video games have been terrible movies. I am not including Japanese animated films – that is a genre that is too megalithic for me to even get perspective on. I think there are 11 Pokemon movies, for instance. 11!

I’m talking about Hollywood live-action adaptations of video games, from the 80s to today.

Take a gander at the list:
“Super Mario Bros.”

The horror. The horror.

“Double Dragon”
“Street Fighter” – Wherefore art thou, Jean-Claude Van Damme?
“Mortal Kombat” and the sequel
“Wing Commander”
“Lara Croft: Tomb Raider” and “Cradle of Life”
“Resident Evil” and “Apocalypse” and “Extinction”
“House of the Dead”
“Alone in the Dark”
“Doom”
“Bloodrayne” and “II”
“Silent Hill”
“Dead or Alive”
“Hitman”
“In The Name of the King”
“Postal”
“Max Payne”

Wow. A spectacle of grandeur.

Now, there are a couple of things we can tell from this list:
1) Hollywood wouldn’t make these things if they didn’t make money. All of the movies in the list involve fighting or killing or both. This means the people who play fighting and killing games go see movies about fighting and killing, and vice versa.
2) Of this list, five have been directed by Uwe Boll, who is widely regarded to be the worst director who keeps getting regular work.
3) Some talented people have appeared in video-game based movies: Radha Mitchell, Sean Bean (!), Ben Kingsley, Raul Julia, Angleina Jolie (she can act – see “Girl, Interrupted”), Jon Voight (Angleina’s dad!), Djimon Honsou, and Mark Wahlberg. This fact also tells us that significant amounts of money are involved.

None of this changes one incontrovertible fact: movies based on video games are a bad idea. The whole point of a video game is to be able to control the actions of the character on screen. Watching a movie based on a video game is (at best) like watching someone else play a video game. I grew up in a house with three siblings and one Nintendo Entertainment System, and I can tell you that playing a video game is a LOT more fun than watching someone else play a video game.

For further illustration, compare the list of video games that have been made into movies with the list of movies that have been made into video games. After seeing “Iron Man” the movie, you can play “Iron Man” the video game – for the chance to control the character yourself. The video game expands the possibilities of the movie – a movie necessarily contracts the possibilities of a video game.

Theoretically, a video game could have such a compelling storyline that it might not be able to be contained in the dozens or hundreds of hours of playing time you would invest in it. But if that is the case, you don’t make a movie about it – you make a sequel to the game.

Or, the concept of the game could be enhanced with the near-limitless budget of Hollywood. This must have been the idea behind the (maybe?) upcoming “Halo” movie. Interestingly, the (former?) director has stated that the Master Chief character from Halo did not make a very good movie protagonist because of his face-lessness. The thing that makes him a bad movie protagonist makes him a perfect video game protagonist – because anybody can vicariously be Master Chief. In the movie, only one person can be Master Chief - whoever is actually playing him on-screen.

On the other hand there are movies about video games:
“Tron”

Yeah, no school like the old school!

“WarGames”
“The Last Starfighter”
“Cloak and Dagger”
“The Wizard”
“eXistenZ”
“Avalon”

Still, not exactly a “must-see” list, but be honest – which would you rather see again – “Tron” or “Mortal Kombat?” “WarGames” or “Bloodrayne?”

A movie about video games I would really like to see: “The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters” a documentary about one man’s quest to achieve the highest score ever on “Donkey Kong” – in the year 2007.

Finally, I would like to make some suggestions to Hollywood. If you MUST make movies based on video games, let’s use the strengths of the medium you’re working in. Tell the untold stories! My recommendations are a little retro:

“Mike Tyson’s Punchout!” – Little Mac (Zach Braff) takes on the world’s toughest boxers in a one-of-a kind tournament! He must face the likes of Glass Joe (Steve Buscemi), the corpulent King Hippo (John Goodman), and a variety of ethnic stereotypes for a chance to face the world’s toughest, craziest boxer, Mike Tyson (Himself)!

“Asteroid” – It’s been a while since we’ve had a movie with asteroids in it. Set it in the future, and it’s “Top Gun” for the 21st century – and beyond!

“Tetris” – Set in 1991, a pair of Russian custodians find themselves inspired to fantastic feats of organizing in the Kremlin’s cavernous storerooms. But when they helpfully reorganize the closets of the KGB and the Politburo, they set off a wacky chain of events that ends with the dissolution of the USSR!

Hop to it Hollywood! Speaking of hopping – let’s have a Q*Bert movie!


He's saying, "I'm ready for my closeup!"

Movie Moment - The Other Comic Book Movies

The recent death of Paul Newman made me start thinking back on great movies I had seen him in (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, The Sting), and ones I haven’t seen and really need to (Cool Hand Luke). I also remembered the last movie I saw him in was the excellent Road to Perdition, with Tom Hanks and Jude Law. And that led to the recollection that Road to Perdition was originally a comic book.

I have resisted writing about comic books in the past because, well, most people think comic books are dumb. Guys tend to have a more nostalgic attachment to them due to things like Halloween costumes, Underoos, and the Superfriends cartoon which translates into a mild to medium appreciation as adults. But most girls tend to think comic books are dumb. At least, the girl I am married to does.

I’ll probably attempt to explain why I like comic books later, in a very long post in which I will reveal waaaaay too much about myself. Hollywood, at least, is very much in a comic book mood lately – with the highest grossing blockbusters this summer being based directly on comic book characters or on conventions found in them (Iron Man, The Dark Knight, Hancock). But Hollywood has also realized something for a while now that the general population has not – there are more kinds of comic books than superhero comics. It’s just that in general when we think comic books, we think Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, but since the beginning of comic books they have encompassed multiple genres, from Westerns to horror to romance to biography.

So, in the interest of broadening horizons and deepening knowledge – some notable movies based on comic books, arranged by genre, with brief commentary.

The Supernatural:
30 Days of Night – vampires in Alaska!
Constantine – Theology, horror, and superheroes meet at last!
The Crow

More Traditional, But Not As Famous, Super-Heroics:
The Mask – A fine film!
Men In Black
Mystery Men
The Rocketeer – An underrated film, I feel.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Timecop – Van Damme! at the top of his game.

Crime Drama:
Art School Confidential – Art school murder mystery.
From Hell – Johnny Depp, Jack the Ripper, and based on the comic book by Alan Moore, who may be the best comic book writer ever.
A History of Violence – Viggo Mortensen. Be warned – we were expecting the violence – it’s in the title. We weren’t expecting all the sex.
Road to Perdition
Sin City
Wanted – In the original work (which features way too much of – well, everything – the characters are supervillain assassins – you know, with powers and stuff).

Miscellaneous:
300 – Pectoral muscles feature much less strongly in the source material. Both this and Sin City were by Frank Miller, whose "Batman:Year One" was a major influence on Batman Begins.
American Splendor
Ghost World – Scarlett Johanson and Steve Buscemi. Suburban teenage drama.
Persepolis - Academy-award nominated animated movie of the autobiography of an Iranian immigrant.
V for Vendetta – Jeni really liked this one – another Alan Moore piece.

Ones to Look Out For In ’09:
Whiteout – Antarctic murder mystery.
Watchmen – Maybe the best work by the best comic book writer. We’ll see how the movie matches up.

Of course, these are only the English-language movies. There is a whole world of Japanese and European comic books, and comic book movies, that is too vast for me to even try to comprehend. These are also only the movies based on comic books, as opposed to comic strips - like The Addams Family (snap, snap).

Movie Moment - The Summer of Kevin Peter Hall

Earlier this year I did something I have wanted to do for a long time. I watched "Predator." The 1987 original, mind you. I had seen the end on TBS or something a long time ago, and now, in its full unfettered glory, I saw Arnold, Jesse Ventura, and Carl Weathers in their prime, kind of.

21 Years Too Late Spoiler Alert: The best moment is still when Arnold realizes the Predator only kills people it considers a threat, and encourages the movie's token woman not to pick up the gun, but "Get to the Choppa!!" (That's "chopper" for those who don't speak heavily Austrian-accented English.)

I did a little wiki-research on "Predator" (film), and discovered that none other than Jean-Claude Van Damme was originally cast as the Predator. Depending on whose story you believe, he left because 1) he didn't like that you couldn't see his face, and that he couldn't see at all in the monster make-up, or 2) the producers realized the 5'8'' Van Damme against the 6'2'' Schwarzenegger looked a little mis-matched.

Anyway, in steps the 7'2'' Kevin Peter Hall, fresh off his turn filling the Bigfeet in "Harry and the Hendersons." Sasquatch and Predator in the same summer.

But it gets better.


My friend Matt is a youth minister in town, we get together on a regular basis for prayer and mutual encouragement. One day we were encouraging each other by talking about how awesome "Predator" was, and he told me this story:

His dad was going to take the kid out to the movies, and really wanted to see "Predator." Matt's mom did not want 9-year old Matt to see "Predator." So Matt's dad took him to a different, PG rated movie...and then stayed in the same seat and watched the next movie, which was "Predator."

The best part - the PG movie they actually paid to see was
- "Harry and the Hendersons."

Young Matt, though he did not know it at the time, got a double feature of Kevin Peter Hall.

Young Matt was not too traumatized by "Predator." He remembers liking it better than "Harry and the Hendersons."

Sadly, Hall died in 1991 at the age of 35, after contracting AIDS from a blood transfusion.

But through the wonderful medium of film, you can still see Hall really freak out on John Lithgow, flash-fry Jesse Ventura, arm wrestle Carl Weathers, and beat the tar out of Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Well done, Kevin. Well done.