This week's movie is a real treat and I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. The order of the day is the independent British film Minecraft. For those of you who haven't been playing videogames for a while, Minecraft is the virtual equivalent of legos. Created by Swedish programmer Markus Alexej Persson, Minecraft is a sandbox game that places you, the player, in control of an entire world ripe for the picking. This isn't like Second Life where you are given godlike powers of creation and destruction. Imagine being shrunk down to the size of a lego person and being placed in an entire world made of legos, trees, caves, wild pigs, and all and being able to build anything as long as you can find the right blocks. The game is very simple in that there is no objective at all, just go forth and build. The game focuses on a few styles of gameplay. First is "the grind". Grind is that part of a game where you have to go and collect items you will need later and is mostly busywork. Second is "the build". After "mining" the items you need out of the ground, trees, animals, etc... you can begin to construct anything you want out of the blocks you have obtained, each measuring about 2 meters on a side in virtual space. Third comes "the combat". Not only is this a creative building game, it is also a survival game. The game world is set on a 10 minute day/night cycle and monsters appear at night, stressing the building element of the game to build bunkers to hide from the monsters, or create weapons to defend yourself with. Minecraft has been incredibly popular and recently reached over one million copies sold. So it was only a matter of time before some joker made a movie about it.
I'm no stranger to the genera of video game movies. Typically they are atrocious and grossly unfaithful adaptations of their source material if the film maker has any knowledge of the game at all. Some of the more well known travesties against the gaming community include Super Mario Bros., In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale, and Doom. Originally the problem was how to translate the bizarre visuals from video games into a movie. This was approached with a strategy of reimagining with lots of references to prove the film makers had at least heard of the appropriate vocabulary associated with whatever game they were butchering. This set a bad precedent of relying on name recognition to sell movie tickets and screw the content and fans. Sadly this is a business strategy that works all too often. More recently, Disney tried their hand at this with Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. While reviews panned it as another poor adaptation of a game, there were several who saw the merit that it was so far not as offensive to fans as previous films. This may truly have been the case since Minecraft can truly be said to be the first good video game movie.
One of the primary problems film makers have when approaching video game movies is what story to tell. There is the option to retell the story of the game, but often the story is not good enough on its own and it was the addition of gameplay that made the original game a success. There is also the unrealistic quality of videogames that would make a straight adaptation appear more like a bad wire-fu movie that most film makers shy away from. This would also include direct references to gameplay such as the first person shooting scene at the end of Doom. Interestingly both of these problems were embraced by Minecraft. Since the original game has no plot there was immense freedom in creating an plot. This erased the problem of offending diehard fans or trying to follow an already lacking plot line. Visually this was probably the best adaptation I have ever seen especially given the Minecraft world which is built out of cubes. The choice to film on site in Hammerland, Finland was a gutsy one but paid off in the end. The peculiar geological formations and ecology, the cube like geography and large population of wild pigs, there inspired Persson to make the video game in the first place. British director Pete Curran, rather than express the setting for the film as a cheap digital effect, chose to film Minecraft on the tiny island of Aland to better capture the feel of the game.
Plot wise this film is very much like the 1960's television series The Prisoner. With no explanation whatsoever, our protagonist, Pete, played by the director, is whisked away to an unknown island with his wife Gemma. The rest of the plot is a psychological thriller/drama as the pair deal with their new lives on the island and their quest to discover why they are there. While a reference to The Prisoner is shaky at first, I was so happy to hear the Rover roar the first time Pete encounters a monster in his mineshaft.
If you have played the game you know that mining one block at a time is a tedious process, yet Curran deftly handled this part of the film. Instead of an intense mining montage like most film makers would do, the film transitions into Pete's day dreams in a clear reference to The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. Curran's love of older cinema shines through in these daydreams as Pete daydreams about playing chess with a creeper (The Seventh Seal), crossing the desert (Laurence of Arabia), and fighting zombies (Night of the Living Dead). All the while keeping with the gamelike visuals.
For those who haven't played the game, there is no tutorial and players typically figure out how the game works by trial and error. This fit perfectly with Pete's experience on the island. Not only is he utterly confused as to how or why he is there, but his confusion at this new world echoes the audience's wonder at his surreal surroundings. It did at times fall into the old habit of having the characters ogle the special effects as if to say "hey you, audience, you should be impressed with that effect!" a la Star Trek the Motion Picture. It wasn't as bad but there were shades of a bad habit in there.
For the most part though the digital effects were down played in favor of more traditional special effects, very uncommon now a days especially for a low budget film. A definite plus for all you monster fans out there, Doug Jones came back to the big screen to play the creepers. Jones is well known for his many roles as movie monsters, especially in Guillermo del Toro films such as Hellboy and Pan's Labyrinth. This however was his first time working as a stuntman as the creepers attack Pete and Gemma by blowing themselves up. For some reason the choice was made that Jones was perfect to portray all the creepers and this was one of the instances where digital effects were used to show Jones on screen in costume several times at once. This is reminiscent of Multiplicity with Michael Keeton, with Jones interacting with himself in several scenes. Jones' inexperience as a stuntman however nearly killed the film, and himself, several times as he was unprepared for the trauma of packing his green creeper suit full of TNT like a true stuntman. In this regard Director Curran probably made a bad call which stalled development for eight months as Jones was admitted to the local Hammerland Hospital of Odin's Wrath six times. Jones however was a great team player. Jackie Chan has almost killed himself with death defying stunts uncountable times and in the same fashion Doug Jones distinguished himself as an artist of the highest order risking life and limb for his art and the final product was well worth the effort.
Curran was somehow able to negotiate a phenomenal supporting cast including Mark Hamill, Laurence Fishburne, and Laurence Olivier. Laurence Olivier has had a very slow career since Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow bombed at the box office so the Shakespearian actor was probably easy to win over. The choices of Mark Hamill and Laurence Fishburne are both interesting casting choices as inhabitants of the island. Both actors have been featured in film roles based on game performances. Hamill was a major character in the full motion video (FMV) game Wing Commander III: Heart of the Tiger. Laurence Fishburne played the crazed survivor in Predators, which while technically was part of the Predator series, was a spiritual sequel to the Alien Vs. Predator films. Incidentally Fishburne reprises almost the same role except he hides in a mineshaft and not a crashed spaceship. Apparently his character, Cubes, was originally intended to be played by Samuel L. Jackson who was more than happy to play the part, however after he was told there was no place in the film for a purple lightsaber he left the project.
The tension between the characters really heart-wrenching as the characters turn on each other in a fight for resources on the island. The supporting cast performed beautifully as a web of lies and intrigue grows to engulf Pete and Gemma. The eccentric and emotional character personalities are as close to being caricatures without crossing the line into comedy as they could get. I won't reveal the twist ending but I will say that because of the strong ties the audience makes with Pete, the ending is worthy of Hitchcock. This film has slowly been making its way across the international market and is being released in the US today, April 1st. I encourage everyone to see this film and support director Pete Curran in his mad quest to bring honor to the until now humiliated video game movie genera. Since this is a small international film you may not be able to find it in your local theater but keep looking I'm sure you'll find it eventually.
Films Referenced:
2011-Minecraft
2010-Predators
2010-Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
2007-In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale
2006-Pan's Labyrinth
2005-Doom
2004-Alien Vs. Predator
2004-Hellboy
2004-Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow
1996-Multiplicity
1993-Super Mario Bros.
1987-Predator
1979-Star Trek the Motion Picture
1968-Night of the Living Dead
1967-(TV)The Prisoner
1962-Laurence of Arabia
1957-The Seventh Seal
1947-The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
