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The Man Behind The Castlevania Movie

Posted Jun 27, 2006 at 12:43PM by Christopher C. Listed in: Nintendo DS, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 Tags: Super Mario, NES, Hollywood, zombie, Dracula, Paul W.S. Anderson
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Castlevania


Yes, there's going to be a Castlevania movie and yes, we'll let you know everything about the man behind it, but first we'll start with the news that prompted this little article. In a recent interview with horror movie enthusiast website Bloody Disgusting, the man at the helm of the planned Castlevania flick, Paul W.S. Anderson let the following be known about the films plot:

"It will integrate Dracula's origin story with the story of the Belmonts,[There are] a fair amount of references [to the original NES games]." He continues, "[This will be] a whole new spin to 'Castlevania'," and the best part, "The whip is still in it."

So at least we know Dracula's in the movie, and we know we'll see the Belmonts, and whip, calming stuff. What's a little alarming is where he Anderson remarks that "This will be a whole new spin to Castlevania." Without getting too worked up over a simple comment, it's always a scary proposition when a Hollywood filmmaker decides to put a new spin on cherished time honored material, Super Mario Bros. The Movie anyone?  Paul W.S. Anderson has made a career of directing videogame movie adaptations, and while he's hardly a remarkable film maker he's had some reasonable success... and his name doesn't end in Boll. With that said, let's have a look at Anderson's relevant filmography, judge how closely the movies followed the subject matter, decide how successful they were and see if we can map a course of prediction for Castlevania: The Movie, shall we?

Mortal Kombat: Ah Mortal Kombat, a movie just about any self respecting cinema-goer would go out of their way to avoid, butMortal Kombat back when int came out in 1995, gamers dragged their dads, mums, uncles, cousins, anyone they could convince to go see the stylishly shot action packed, real life incarnation of one of the worlds most violent videogames. Of course the movie had hardly any blood and it was rated "PG:13" instead of "R", but it was still highly faithful in many other ways. Sure it was goofy, hokey and had dodgy CG, but the martial arts were pretty darn amazing, costumes and characters for the most part matched those of their digital counterparts, and most importantly, Anderson respected the mythology enough to leave it largely intact.

Faithfulness To Source Material: [B+] Anderson went so far as to include sound bytes from the game in the scene where Reptile fights Liu Kang, and we get to hear Mortal Kombat co-creator Ed Boon yell "GET OVER HERE!" as the voice of Scorpion.

Movie Grade: [A-] (if you're a gamer). WTF? (if you're anything else)

Resident Evil: While in many ways a "better" movie than Mortal Kombat, it would appear that Anderson either didn't have as Resident Evilmuch faith in his source material this time around, or he was under studio pressure to make the movie appeal to a broader audience. Whatever the case, the move worked in some ways and not in others. Genre fans and the general movie going populace seemed satisfied, but most gamers are irked that the film takes a number of liberties, most noticeably by starring a lead protagonist that doesn't feature in any of the games. Listening to the commentary on the DVD reveals the fact that Anderson's actually a really huge geek, he just doesn't seem to be all that talented, either that or there's far too much interference from the studios putting up the cash. In the end it's probably a little bit of both. That Resident Evil goes down as one of the better videogame movie adaptations speaks well of neither the film nor the entire sub-genre. For what it's worth, the sequel's more fun, mainly because you don't have high hopes and that long haired dude from the Mummy movies is in it.

Faithfulness To Source Material: [C+] The movie eschews the creepy, haunted house-esque environments found in the games in favor of a cleaner more sterile lab facility which is decidedly non-threatening. Jill? Chris? Where are you? Oh, that's right, you don't show up till the sequel, which Anderson wrote but didn't direct. Bonus points for including the zombie dogs and the Licker though.

Movie Grade: [C+] Quite simply this movie had very little ambition, and subsequently didn't get very far. It's extremely by the numbers stuff, and very middle of the road. However, it is mildly entertaining and it's always good to see some of your favorite monsters from the game pop up here and there.

Aliens VS Predator: This movie gets panned a whole lot, mainly because of the iconic status of the Alien and Predator series AVPrespectively. For me it lies somewhere between Alien 3 and the horrible, horrible Predator 2. Anderson, as noted earlier is a huge geek, and he loves both mythologies so it comes as no surprise that this is probably his best work (Event Horizon was sorta nifty though). Based more on the Dark Horse comic of the same name than the moody first person shooters, AVP (since all movies and videogames become acronyms sooner rather than later) was destined to not be a great movie from the start. The theory of seeing the two greatest hunters in the known worlds going at each other is one to get the geek adrenal glands a gushin', but in practice it turns into a somewhat crappy CG/Man In Suit bore-a-thon.

Faithfulness To Source: [B+] I'm not an aficionado on either of the mythologies in question, all I know is what I've seen in the movies and the videogames and it seemed to me that Anderson stuck pretty close to what makes up the creatures mythologies.

Movie Grade: [B-] I know I said it was his best work and yet it's rated lower than Mortal Kombat, but that's because while it may be a better movie, it is by no means more fun than MK.

The Prognosis for Castlevania: Surprisingly good. We aren't going to be getting Lord of The Rings, but if history is indeed a good teacher we can expect something reasonably close to the source material. At a guess I'd say it'll probably fall in somewhere between Resident Evil and Mortal Kombat in terms of it's faithfulness. As far as quality goes, Anderson's still a young director, and the quality of his work has been steadily creeping upward, so lets cross our fingers and hope for the best, it could be worse.

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15 Comments


Sort by:
   by xcvxdfg (Unregistered) - 2006-06-27
 » sfggsrd
c'mon dude mario bros movie wasn't bad

ok it WAS bad but it was still good.

   by ho (Unregistered) - 2006-06-27
 » ho
hohhohooh

   by .p0p5ux. - 2006-06-27
 » Im just...yeah..
Castlevania rules!!!
....kinda

   by The Hawk (Unregistered) - 2006-06-27
 » Listen here.
I'm actually thinking Uwe Bol may do a better job with something like this he did not do a bad job with Blood Rayne; he created some dark Blood Omen feel to that movie especially with the human cattle that sit there chained up draining blood. And the Vampire lords castle was pretty sweet.

My minds eye picture of Castlevania is INSANE and to me its the best vision of any vampire anything ever. I know the movie cannot live up to that idea in my head unless by divine intervention. I will likely hate this movie.

   by Jx1 - 2006-06-27
 » O__o nice!
this just might come out to be good.
hey, he's got experience in movies, not the best, but experience in the end. lol

Ok.. I fear he might ruin the whole concept of Castlevania I have, though not an avid Castle. gamer.

   by Bernard (Unregistered) - 2006-06-27
 » It can be worse..It could be Paul Thomas Anderson.
There has another half-way decent director that would take on this script other than this tool. His movies are all *****, and Konami approved? Castlevania deserves better than another summer movie cash-in with cheap thrills. :(
And you need to admit..Older video game adaptations had some grade A camp value. Super Mario Bros. being the best. (A large black woman in a spikey rubber suit portraying an enemy fish from SMB3? Genius.)

   by hush404 - 2006-06-27
 » at least
boll isn't doing it :)

   by Drippy Dog Fizzlewinks (Unregistered) - 2006-06-27
 » No...
No...Super Mario Bros. The Movie pretty much sucked.

   by Advertising -
   by Bernard (Unregistered) - 2006-06-27
 » 9
"Sucked"? Blashpemy. I've never laughed so hard sitting in a theater in my entire life.
It even had Bomb-ombs. BOMB-OMBS!

   by Drippy Dog Fizzlewinks (Unregistered) - 2006-06-27
 » Bomb-ombs
Bomb-ombs with Nike shoes. :)

   by Annony - 2006-06-27
 » One bat... Two bats... Three!! Ah-ah-ah!!
If I see something even reminescent of 'Helsing' (the bad one, not 'Hellsing') I'm going to cry...

I'm not getting my hopes up for this at all. I got my hopes up for Silent Hill (which was good, but didn't enduce eye-orgasms), so I'm not going to end up disappointing myself.

Though, Mortal Kombat and Resident Evil were pretty tight movies (for game adaptions).

   by Kris (Unregistered) - 2006-06-29
 » Blood Rayne Suxs
Blood Rayne Suxs its like low budget the effects the plot it really sux i hope castlevania would end up like this movie

   by Bocom (Unregistered) - 2006-06-30
 » No SotN? Damn. :(
I'd SO watch a movie, if Alucard was in it. SotN is one of my favourite PS1 games. That'd kick ass... hopefully.

   by D (Unregistered) - 2006-06-30
 » Metal Gear
They made a Silent Hill movie the Castlevania how about Metal Gear are they gonna make one?

   by infinitysend - 2006-06-30
 » If, and only if
if i had to choose between the guy that filmed the first MK movie over Uwe Boll, I'd choose Mr. Anderson any day. AvP sucked, however, Event Horizon is one of my favorite movies... I truly hope this guy just gets Iga aboard, if only for creative consulting....



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