It will not shock anyone to say that Hollywood productions that adapt video games are passable at best, but often mediocre. Few films have managed to transcribe well what they adapt to such an extent that we now breathe a sigh of discouragement at each cinema adaptation announcement, feeling failure coming from afar. As a movie buff, Hideo Kojima is well aware of this and wants at all costs to avoid making the same mistakes as others with the film death stranding.
A film against the grain of modern adaptations
Just announced, the film death stranding already talked about him. In a long interview with IGN, Kojima returns to this announcement by stating that this adaptation will not be a blockbusterand that’s why he chose the production company Hammerstone Studios (directed by Alex Lebovici), who is not used to directing big budget films.
He explains :
” I got a lot of offers, but my intention from the start was never to make it a blockbuster. Alex Lebovici from Hammerstone Studios shares my take on this. There were a lot of pitches to make a full-scale movie with famous actors and explosions, but what would explosions be for in Death Stranding? Making money isn’t something I focus on at all either. I’m aiming for an arthouse approach, and the only person who suggested I make a film like that was Alex Lebovici.which makes me think that it is a rather atypical type. »
We must therefore expect a film which should respect the artistic work of Kojima and which will not fall into the codes of the modern blockbuster.
A casting still uncertain
Even in terms of the casting, we should not necessarily expect big headliners since Kojima says he doesn’t know yet if Norman Reedus will reprise his role :
” We haven’t quite decided yet […] I made Death Stranding as a game, and games are games. There’s no real need to turn them into movies. So in a way the movie Death Stranding takes a direction that no one has tried before with a movie adaptation of a game. I think what I need to do is something that will inspire some of the people who watch it to become creators in 10 or 20 years. »
The ambition is there, the execution remains to be seen. The film death stranding should not be released for several years.