Yes, we’ve all had this discussion. “Oh my god, that would be an amazing film”, then you actually watch Street Fighter, Super Mario Bros, or anything by Uwe Boll and suddenly you blame video games for all that’s bad in the world. Maybe they’re picking the wrong games, or maybe they just don’t care as they know people will watch it anyway, who knows? But here’s five games they haven’t done yet, which I think could work, our reason for doing this? I dunno, can we blame it on Hardcore Henry basically being a FPS?
1. Eternal Darkness
Hot damn I love this game. Scary, beautiful and with a fantastic story. It’s a horror that spans a thousand years and just four locations. We get to see the places in different stages throughout time, for example we see the Amiens Cathedral during the medieval years, and again when it serves as a hospital during the first world war. All the stories are connected by one common theme: mankind fighting the ancients. Because of this I feel it would work as an anthology film, six 10 minute segments each with their own director, with an overarching theme directed by David Robert Mitchell, the director of It Follows. There’s not many anthology films, which is a shame as they can be fantastic when done well. Horror serves the format well as there’s more than one kind of way to do horror, there’s the “blood and guts torture porn”, the “no deaths but lots of shadows” etc. That’s why I feel they should each have their own director, that way each segment has its own unique style. It will be odd if one person enjoyed every segment, but the diverse styles should mean that there’s at least one section that they’d like.
2. Turok
It’s a man fighting dinosaurs. If you make that Tom Hardy and make sure it’s directed by George Miller then this will basically be Mad Max only with dinosaurs instead of cars. Not as long as the previous entry, but it’s Tom Hardy shooting dinosaurs, do you really need anything else?
3. LA Noire
Because there’s a distinct lack of noire lately. The closest we’ve had have been films like The Pledge, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and Sin City. Which is a shame as it’s a good genre with a unique style and stories that draw the viewer in and holds them round the throat and refuses to let go.
4. The Secret Of Monkey Island
This has to be made on one condition: it HAS to be animated. Not realistic pixar animation either, we’re talking the almost elastic-looking animation. The kind where characters bodies stretch in unnatural ways and they look frankly ridiculous running. Also, it has to be funny. Very very funny. Have someone like Bill Hader as the voice of Guybrush Threepwood (who wants to be a pirate), and a good script and you’ll have an awesome movie.
5. Zombies Ate My Neighbours
As anyone who saw Goosebumps can testify, there’s definitely a market out there for horror movies aimed at kids. And this could be it. The original game was a fun cartooney and really really silly game where your main weapons were water pistols and cans of soda. Translate this to a modern film, keep the references to obscure b-movies in to placate the nerds (such as me) and you’ve got a hit. Or a noble failure.
Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is one of my favourite films (I know, another one!). It’s also, technically, a Christmas film (like EVERY Shane Black film), so by that logic it must also be my favourite Christmas film….Okay no its not, as it’s not a film I associate strongly with Christmas, like Home Alone or Die Hard. But it is an underrated classic, it is Christmassy enough, and it’s a film I can ramble on about its awesomeness for a post. So here I go.
Now the film itself is a pulpy Neo-noir mystery, which follows a petty crook played by a pre Iron Man Robert Downy Jr, and a badass gay Private-eye played by post Batman and relevance Val Kilmer, who are forced to work together to solve a classic and very compelling murder mystery in LA.
mn fine double feature) and it is also gleefully Meta. It turns the classic hard boiled narration into a rambling fourth wall demolishing spiel delivered by whom else but Downy, who spends much of the film deconstructing film narrative and murder mystery tropes, in an enjoyably if sometimes too smugly, nit-picky and self-referential way.
But the heart of the film, what really makes it tick, is the razor sharp, character driven, machine gun dialogue. In a world, of Tarantino and Brother’s Coen, this is one of the sharpest scripts in cinema. There is not a minute that goes by, where a clever bit of word play or a visual gag or a marriage of both isn’t being pulled off. And it’s not just a series of funny but generic one-liners that could be said by anyone in anything, the comedy is pulled from its characters, from their plight and problems, and walks of life. To laugh with them and at them, is to get to know them.
And there are characters beyond Downy and Kilmer…well character. With most of the cast ranging from two note Hench-men and campy as hell villains, the only other big character is Michelle Monaghan (one of the most drop dead gorgeous women ever). The fem fatale of the film, who really isn’t in anyway, but is actually the ditsy heart of the flick, adding the much needed warmth and tonal levity to this dark and funny tale of murder and sexual abuse….yup. Whose dynamite chemistry with Downy not only helps ground both characters and gets the plot moving, but will make you wish she’d pop up in a Marvel film just so you can see them bounce off each other again.
y and Monaghan are…this is Kilmer’s film. He is pitch perfect as the aforementioned badass gay Private-eye, known as, what else, Gay Perry. Now this is a 2005 film, so the handling of his gay character isn’t perfect, my biggest issue being how other characters overreact a bit too much to his gayness (though in funny ways). But his 
character itself is one of the best in fiction; because despite the name, it doesn’t define him. He’s a tough, foul mouthed, no nonsense talking, gun toting, sassily witted, motherfucking pimp, who also happens to be gay. And it’s not just shoved to the side either; it’s just one part of a whole character, who steals scenes like Robert Downy Jr steals hearts.
But It’s movies like this along with other Downy classics like, Wonder Boys, A Scanner Darkly, Zodiac, and the very good A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints, that still have me convinced that Robert Downy Jr did his best work pre Iron Man (not to knock it), when he was exiled from Hollywood (you know because of drugs), and was trying to crawl his way back in. And I wish he would go back to doing smaller more interesting films, than just the Marvel flicks; hell just films more interesting than The Judge. But I doubt he ever will, with everything Marvel still happening, the piles of money just his goatee is worth, and his recent comments about his hatred towards indie films. So I won’t hold my breath.
Troubled Productions 