BioShock Movie Still Possible, Says Ken Levine

Logan Westbrook

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Feb 21, 2008
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BioShock Movie Still Possible, Says Ken Levine

As long as the conditions were right, BioShock could make a great movie, says the game's creator.

Irrational Games' creative director Ken Levine says that neither he, nor his studio, has given up on the idea of a BioShock movie. While the first attempt at adapting the objectivist-flavored, undersea dystopia for the big screen seems to have fizzled away to nothing, Levine says that it's something that he's still talking to people about.

Take Two first announced [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/83749-Take-Two-Signs-BioShock-Movie-Deal] a BioShock movie deal in 2008, with Gladiator writer John Logan handling the script, and Pirates of the Caribbean director Gore Verbinski helming the project. Unfortunately, concerns [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/91240-Rapture-Delayed] over the movie's budget delayed the project, and Verbinski eventually dropped out [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/94122-Gore-Verbinski-Drops-Out-of-BioShock-Film] in 2009. The movie got a new director, in the form of 28 Weeks Later's Juan Carlos Fresnadillo, but problems with the budget continued to stall the production [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/101820-Budget-Battles-Baffle-BioShock-Blockbuster].

Levine doesn't think that these problems are insurmountable though, and seems confident that BioShock could one day be adapted into movie form. "There's a version of BioShock that makes a great game," he said, "And there's probably a version of BioShock that makes a great movie." He said that, while it didn't need to, Irrational would still like to see a movie get off the ground, but that everything would have to be just right before that could happen, and that trying anything else was just a recipe for failure. "It's hard enough to get a movie made when all the right pieces are in place." He said. "If you don't start with the right pieces, you don't have a prayer."

When asked about the idea of turning Irrational's new game, BioShock Infinite into a movie, Levine was a little more hesitant, saying that his focus was first and foremost on getting the game done. He said that once that he had BioShock Infinite's story properly mapped out, then he might be more willing to think about its movie potential.

Source: Industry Gamers [http://www.industrygamers.com/news/bioshock-movie-definitely-still-in-the-conversation-says-levine-exclusive/]


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Lt. Vinciti

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Nov 5, 2009
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Bioshock...Yes

Bioshock 2...No

Dont allow it to be beaten and busted down by Hollywood...full on CGI if you have to...

make it shine make it last...like Bioshock 1 did for me...
 

z3rostr1fe

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I hope it will be an R18 or something, don't want to destroy the beauty of Bioshock by cutting out stuff for a much lower rating.
 

Legion

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Oct 2, 2008
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Bioshock could make an excellent movie as long as the director didn't decide to be "creative" and make up a load of crap to draw in the crowds who don't like complexity, and it would have to be an 18/Mature/Equivalent or it couldn't be as dark as it is supposed to be.
 

Gladion

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I guess it all depends on how successful Infinite is going to be... Bioshock sure has the potential of being made into a great film, there's just two rules to be kept in mind:

a) Don't rush it
b) Don't make too many compromises to be able to apply to non-fans
 

archvile93

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Sep 2, 2009
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It'd probably make a better movie than game. The developers focused entirely on the plot and atmosphere while completely disregarding the actual gameplay, so just throwing the interactive part out the window entirely seems like a good idea to me.
 

Cowabungaa

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Feb 10, 2008
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As long as they don't try to re-create the game on the big screen it could turn out to be a really good film. I'd prefer a film focussing on the rise and fall of Rapture, and the rivalry between Ryan and Fontaine. I'd love to see Rapture in it's full glory.
Legion said:
Bioshock could make an excellent movie as long as the director didn't decide to be "creative" and make up a load of crap to draw in the crowds who don't like complexity, and it would have to be an 18/Mature/Equivalent or it couldn't be as dark as it is supposed to be.
And that too. The BioShock-verse has plenty of good material of it's own, I think plenty that also appeals to people who are not familiar with the game.

I reckon M is good enough though. It's not that disturbing that it needs an 18+ rating. The first half or so of the film, provided they focus on the rise and fall of Rapture, can be of a T level really. Only when splicing starts going haywire, that's when the M stuff starts.
 

stuhacking

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z3rostr1fe said:
I hope it will be an R18 or something, don't want to destroy the beauty of Bioshock by cutting out stuff for a much lower rating.
Legion said:
Bioshock could make an excellent movie as long as the director didn't decide to be "creative" and make up a load of crap to draw in the crowds who don't like complexity, and it would have to be an 18/Mature/Equivalent or it couldn't be as dark as it is supposed to be.
Completely disagree on this principle.

Movies need Mature certificates to contain adult content. A great, dark story could be envisioned without the need for gratuitous violence, gore, porn. Ratings boards are a lot more lenient about content when it is only there to back up a great story. I pretty much see certificates as an early warning of a bad film nowadays.

There's a lot of stuff to work with before throwing in the regular helping of mindless shock content: The Laissez-faire capitalism angle, the origin of Rapture, What went wrong, The science of Gene Splicing.

I'd much rather see a mature story than a mature certificate.
 

lostlambda

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May 19, 2011
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i could see this if it was a prequel to the games somthing we had never seen before. Like the downfall of rapture or the atlus fontane war. Just not a retread of the story the game covered and will most likely have to keep an R rating. Witch as far a movie corporation go nowadays will most likely kill the movie
 

Cowabungaa

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stuhacking said:
I'd much rather see a mature story than a mature certificate.
It's both really. I mean, I doubt splicers will be rated T no matter how good of a story there is behind it, and honestly the film does need splicers.

And if they'd include Doctor Steinman... Yeah.
 

BoredDragon

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Feb 9, 2011
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I say no to the entire thing. Hollywood has shown it is totally unable to adapt a perfectly good game to the big screen. The Prince of Persia movie proved that quite nicely.
 

Assassin Xaero

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Jul 23, 2008
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A new Chronicles of Riddick movie and going back to making the BioShock movie? Please:
Make. These. Movies.
 

Lionsfan

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Jan 29, 2010
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Well it can work....just as easily as it can be a giant flaming ball of turd. I guess we would need more info about the project, it'll probably be trash though
 

mexicola

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Feb 10, 2010
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In my opinion it would not make a great, or even good, movie so I'm not all that shaken their first attempt fell through. But good luck to them in their efforts to try and make it work. God knows we need something to complain about on these forums. amirite?
 

XT inc

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Jul 29, 2009
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I don't really care about it if they continue doing what they are doing. Last time I checked they were turning an M rated game into like a pg-pg 13 movie so they could get more sales.

There is nothing worse to me, than the censoring and retooling of mature things for kiddies, for more profit. It's like all those revenge of the Nerds sequels that went into a lower rating and did terrible if I recall. Same with Conan.

Maybe they should build their own metropolis somewhere under the sea where creativity rules and the whoring for the dollar falls by the wayside.
 

CLEVERSLEAZOID

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Mar 4, 2009
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I'd pay to go see a Bioshock movie.

Although I have to say we have seen plenty of underwater horror movies. Might be an idea to wait until Bioshock Infinite comes out, and if it turns out to have a decent plot line, maybe that could be workable into a movie. It would be pretty awesome to have a film set on a city in the sky with a dark secret.

But thats just me x)

Captcha: winds. rckingie

rofl, even the Captcha is hinting to the skies with winds :D