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Underground > Film, TV & Theatre >

Grant Morrison to pen the film Area 51

Elijah, Freelance Rabbi

15:35 / 04.04.07

Paramount Pictures has hired comicbook author Grant Morrison to pen the feature adaptation of vidgame franchise "Area 51."

The bad news is that it is a video game movie. The game, for those who don't know, was an arcade cabinet shooting game short on plot. This could work in the films favor since they get a semi clean slate to work from.

The question is, I suppose, if the film will feature a boggling underground train network.

15:40 / 04.04.07

Is that Area 51 the same as this one -

Area 51

It might be but I remember playing a demo for the one above and it didn't seem quite that cheesy.

Elijah, Freelance Rabbi

15:44 / 04.04.07

Ahh, ok.

What seems to have happened is that Midway made an Arcade game called Area 51 (which was ported to the original Playstation) and ALSO made a game for PS2 and XBOX by the same name, which seems closer to the plot the article describes.

15:47 / 04.04.07

Yeah I was just reading a review from that site above.

"First, this game has absolutely damn nothing to do with the old lightgun shooter of the same name"

Also from there -

"Mutants, aliens, Illuminati thugs, cyborgs, telepaths, ancient conspiracies"

Sounds more like a GM thing right?

Elijah, Freelance Rabbi

15:49 / 04.04.07

Indeed. My hopes are higher by a bit now.

16:19 / 04.04.07

I'm not holding my breath for this to be any good. Assuming it even happens the film industry doesn't exactly value writers, so I wouldn't go in expecting anything much like a Morrisonian vision.

16:23 / 04.04.07

That and I'd be surprised if he can script a movie even without studio interference.

17:33 / 04.04.07

Just heard the news in a game site.

I can only hope Morrison will do an unbelievable job so that in the future we'll have unaltered and unfiltered creativity from the man in films.

But seriously, doesn't this adaptation goes more along the lines of Resident Evil (with one step on Alone in the Dark adaptation)? Or does it means that they loved Grant's script for WE3 and they want the same solid goodness? (I can only imagine that a hollywood version of WE3 itself would be more in the lines of Resident Evil too)

And man, this guy can work 24-7 times a million...

18:18 / 04.04.07

That and I'd be surprised if he can script a movie even without studio interference.

Absolutely. But I guess Frank Miller managed that one time to be, at least, transcribed utterly (right?) faithfully.

18:33 / 04.04.07

'Alone in the Dark'

I feel compelled to mention that this film is the only film that I've ever felt the need to bleach my brain after watching, and I've seen some stupidly bad movies.

Using Alone in the Dark as a point of comparison is like using a black hole as a comparison to the rest of the universe; it's inescapable suckage.

Seriously. I'm going to stop before I get vehement.

18:42 / 04.04.07

"Alone in the dark", eh? I think I might have to rent that...

18:46 / 04.04.07

My reaction is "eh." Good for GM that he's pulling down some Hwood bucks, but less good for his comics output, which, for reasons I have no knowledge about, has been pretty spotty since SSoV began its schedule slide.

I'd rather see GM write lower budget movies where he could be granted more control over his work. if AREA 51 comes out, I doubt GM will be the sole screenwriter (although I hope that does happen).

18:49 / 04.04.07

The wise man mocks the man; the mocked man mocks the mocker.

(Shorthand; Don't. There is no plot, the special effects are dire, and unless you have a burning desire to see, in the accurate words of Somethingawful, "Tara Reid dry-humping Christian Slater" to the sound of "7 seconds" by Nenah Cherry (sp?) and Youssour N'Dour... Bollocks. The more I defend it, the more you're going to want to see it, aren't you?)

I can only say it this way; it's not so bad it's good, it's not even so bad it's bad, it's just really, really awful.

Threadrot temporarily over; so this is the PS2 area 51 rather than the somewhat shoddy light-gun shootemup? If I'm thinking of the right one, didn't the PS2 game have David Duchovny involved somewhere along the line?

I do also really apologise for sidetracking so, but Alone In The Dark really provokes such incredibly strong feelings of psychological revulsion that I had to say something.

19:20 / 04.04.07

well, Frank Miller's one time without studio interference must be Sin City, which was done pretty much under 'screw the studio sensibility' Robert Rodriguez (there's a reason his production company is called Troublemaker Studios!). It'll be interesting to hear Morrison's eventual tales of Hollywood insanity (as shown in Bendis' terrific humor book "Fortune & Glory" about writing for Hollywood).

19:29 / 04.04.07

Duchovny is the game hero I believe but this part stuck out from the game review :

"Area 51's other helping of Hollywood talent is Marilyn Manson. Marilyn portrays a fat, pulsating, fleshy, tele-pathetic, monstrous beast that oozes viral decay while encased in a jar of green sap."

Yeah! This will be the best movie ever made. You wait and see.

19:42 / 04.04.07

Actually, Feverfew, if there's one film that was made for a badass like Oddman, it's Alone in the Dark. A film that's all about GUNS shooting BULLETS into MONSTERS. For no reason!

19:48 / 04.04.07

No, I think this could more in the lines of Miller traumatic experience with Robocop, which made Rodriguez goes to the deeps of hell to finally convince Miller come back to try films again.

I agree that Morrison should make some more low-budget with his scifi 'Abra Los Ojos' Kaufman-esque approach, instead of going after what could be a Snakes on a Plane without the satire bit (or a Resident Evil with no fan-following).

But I really hope he'll make the best out of it, have his first draft to be mind-blowingly solid, be the only writer and somehow have a good solid film out of it. I can only assume people called him to do the script after seeing his WE3 script. I hope he'll do good and that he knows what he's doing.

12:02 / 05.04.07

Fucking awesome. About damn time he got a chance to work on a film. Congrats Grant!

16:35 / 05.04.07

That and I'd be surprised if he can script a movie even without studio interference.

Very few people can.

What does it say about the current film market that Frank Miller's stuff is getting through pretty much unscathed?

MattShepherd: I WEDDED KALI!

17:25 / 05.04.07

That the people calling the shots are now people of about our age who grew up with "sophisticated" comics that adapt readily to the big screen? That's just a guess, but there was a certain jump up in maturity/narrative in the late '70s and through the '80s in comics; people involved in the film industry now often grew up reading comics; special effects can now actually keep up with the mind-blowing things that you used to only be able to do in funnybooks.

17:51 / 05.04.07

does seem to be the case - it used to be only the odd actor who "admitted" to liking comics - nowadays every director seems to be into them. Plus, we are all just a little more media savy.

20:50 / 05.04.07

Dorothy Parker's thing about how admitting to liking comics was tantamount to admitting a twelve year heroin addiction?

There is a certain late-seventies/eighties vibe that come off some film/TV vocal comics fans, but I don't think it's true across the board. I am wondering who started the ball rolling. From Tim - I read comics at CalArts but everyone knows I don't read comics - Burton or the disdain some people had for, y'know, the first Supes movie, to a point where there's a ton of actors, directors, and screenwriters who're totally upfront about their interest in comics.

Of course, the press did seem to be pretty down on Nic Cage for doing 'Ghostrider' for being too good to do a comics movie or something. But they didn't have a problem with the 'Wicker Man' remake.

Tom Hanks and his 'I didn't know they still made comics' statement, around the time of 'Road to Perdition' was just annoying, though. Because try as I may I can't read that statement as honest ignorance; it seems bleeds smarmy and insulting in a way I hope it wasn't intended.

08:03 / 06.04.07

having watched Tom Hanks on inside the actors studio - I think it was probably pure smarm.

08:22 / 06.04.07

If it's anything like his current run on The Authority we'll get ten good minutes and then the film'll go on hiatus for an unknown amount of time.

Still, it'd be interesting to see how his writing skills translate into a live action setting.

08:22 / 06.04.07

Mozzer obviously. Not Tom Hanks.

He's too busy writing Nightstalkers.

08:47 / 06.04.07

I so want a comicbook movie with a filler issue dropped in the middle of the storyline, with a cute promise to get back to the regular story next month.

I'd almost forgotten about the 'We3' film. There's a shot-for-shot adaptation.

09:02 / 06.04.07

I so want a comicbook movie with a filler issue dropped in the middle

that's pretty much how I view the Schumacher batman's and Superman IV.

Keith, like a scientist

12:26 / 08.04.07

Maybe he'll just Black Science 1 up there on the screen for us. Hell yeah!

19:53 / 16.05.07

An interview with GM about the film is up at Wired. Sounds like it's going to be mostly original GM material, which is good, and I particularly like how he couldn't get past level one of the game. Either way, I'm excited to see a GM story up on the cinema screen.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

13:40 / 17.05.07

I particularly like how he couldn't get past level one of the game

I guess it shows how far video games still have to go to be taken seriously when we can simultaneously express disdain for people in film knowing nothing about comics and find it laudable that someone (even someone who is imho a great writer) feels qualified to write an adaptation of a game they haven't even completed...

Essential Dazzler

13:52 / 17.05.07

WN: How important is it for the filmmakers to play or understand the game's source material to succeed in this type of translation?

Morrison: I think it's always important to honor the source of one's material and only by playing games can a filmmaker know what makes them tick and how best to translate game effects into the very different language of Hollywood drama.

Gave up on level one.

How important? Very important. Only by playing games can...

Is he saying that he's played enough other games to be able to adapt Area 51 properly? Or just playing 10 minutes of Area 51 was enough to adapt it properly? Or is he suggesting that he doesn't need to because the rest of the crew will have and he's only script monkey.

Mysterious Transfer Student

14:01 / 17.05.07

A 'just level one' adaptation of a videogame could be interestingly nihilistic, if it involved the sudden violent deaths of the supposedly omnicapable protagonists after they'd spent several minutes wandering around aimlessly trying to figure how to run and shoot at the same time.

This reminds me of seeing the Tomb Raider movie with my GF and her remark that it was a faithful adaptation in that it was just like her experience of the game - confusing, repetitive, no clearly defined goals, running around and around and getting increasingly bored and frustrated with the whole affair.