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EXCLUSIVE: Josh Trank has signed with Sony Pictures to develop to direct Shadow Of The Colossus, a big-scale live-action adaptation of the bestselling Sony video game. The film is being produced by Kevin Misher. The studio is 
interviewing writers to work with Trank, who after directing the $13 million sleeper hit Chronicle has become the go-to guy for big popcorn pictures. Trank takes on a Fumito Ueda-created game that has a strong narrative arc, along with the obligatory creature quotient to get the visual effects crowd excited.
The protagonist is a young man who thinks his lover has died. Desperate to bring her back, he heads into a forbidden land, and summons a demon who can wake the dead. The price for bringing back his girl: slay 16 colossi that dominate this mystical place. These are skyscraper-sized giants that rise from the ground, fly through the air and come from the water. As the young man works through his quest on horseback, he begins to wonder if he is on a noble pursuit to bring back his lover, or perhaps has made a deal with the devil and is being used. Trank has been a fan of the game since it launched in 2005, and sought out the job.
Trank is separately developing two Marvel superhero franchises in Fantastic Four for Fox and the Spider-Man spinoff Venom for Sony Pictures, and he’s also aligned to the Warner Bros comic book adaptation Red Star. He’s repped by WME and Management 360. Misher is separately prepping MGM’s remake of Carrie, and Misher Film execs Andy Berman and Kevin Chang are overseeing Shadow Of The Colossus. WME reps Trank.
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This sounds like one of the single worst adaptation ideas ever.
It works as a game. It is one of the few games that works solely as a game. To turn this into a movie….? Makes me feel like someone is pulling down their pants and s**ting all over my childhood.
Nice one, Sony!
Nice one, Josh Trank!
Nice one, Hollywood!
I do hope we can see more sequels, remakes, requels, semakes, continuations, reboots, “reimaginings” and Tim Burton movies in the future. Because apparently no one wants anything original anymore. Ever.
If this thing is part of your childhood, you are still a child. Don’t worry, Trank is super-smart, he won’t ruin your precious 7-year-old videogame. This is actually one of the few game properties that makes sense for an adaptation because it has plot but not too much, and it’s incredibly cinematic. Would be excited to see it spiked with some of the edge and character in Game of Thrones.
Your comment itself is less original than the movies you decry.
This could be sweet. Glad the game is going to be opened up to a more mainstream audience.
This will work well it’s better than Battleship or John Carter.
This sounds like one of the single best adaptation ideas ever.
It works as a game. It is one of the few games that doesn’t work solely as a game. To turn this into a movie…? Makes me feel like someone is putting on their shoes and skipping all over with my childhood.
Nice one, Sony!
Nice one, Josh Trank!
Nice one, Hollywood!
I do hope we can see more remakes, adaptations, continuations, reboots, “reimaginings” and Tim Burton movies in the future. Because apparently there are so many great ideas out there.
Fans of the franchise won’t touch it, and those who do won’t be numerous enough to uphold the numbers necessary to make the film’s budget worthwhile… and those who aren’t familiar with the title will assume that it’s too “gamey” for their tastes. Proving this assumption wrong will be a challenge…
This can either be amazing or horrible. I love the idea but if you don’t capture the love between the boy and Aero then I truly believe the people who played the game will not enjoy the movie. Good luck
No this cannot and won’t under any circumstances be good. The revelation that dawns on the player slowly throughout the game, and that is revealed to the so-called protagonist at end-game is dark devastating. Hollywood doesn’t often go for dark and devastating, especially when it involves seeing the hero turn into to a villain. This will turn into a CGI action spectacle, the colossi will lose their sympathetic qualities, the ending will be changed to offer the hero redemption, and the audience the chance to leave feeling “uplifted”. Fail. And shame on every idiot who thinks this is a good idea. As someone else said, how about developing original scripts instead of mining and subsequently ruining every last thing published in every other country and medium.
Once people start attending the “original” films being produced, maybe Hollywood will shift its methods. But for now, all consumers watch are the remakes and the sequels, etc. Don’t hypocritically complain about Hollywood delivering exactly what consumers ask for.
That said, I can’t see this as a great adaptation. I loved the game, and I agree that a lot will be lost in translation. But how an adaptation (or sequel, or anything) can “ruin someones childhood” is beside me. The game will forever be great, and that’s all that matters. If you’re so afraid that Trank and Sony will butcher it, just don’t watch it. Remember the game for what it was and move on.
You’re an idiot. Ever heard of Inception? Or nearly anything produced by Pixar? Audiences do go out to see original titles. The problem is Hollywood isn’t greenlighting original scripts because they feel endless parades of sequels and remakes are “safer”. Don’t post if you have no real knowledge how the industry works.
It’s POSs like you that blindly justify Hollywood’s behavior that keeps the system running the way it does. Congratulations.
This made my day. Not only is SotC one of my favorite games, it will be treated the way a movie adaptation should be by Trank.
My hopes for this venture are low. The beauty of the game was that it was so vague. There was never anything in the game that told you that the colossi didn’t deserve death. The player only realized it after ruthlessly murdering a few of the more peaceful ones (the sky-snake is the main example). Unless a movie were an intensely un-traditional artsy film, it would fall short of this beauty. If it appeals to the masses of moviegoers, if it’s a box office hit, then it would be an insult to the purity of the game.
One question: WHY?
It boggles my mind that people want to make a movie out this so badly. To be honest, it wasn’t that good a game anyway.
I don’t understand this adaptation: the original game is deliberately devoid of characters, and the plot is extremely sparse. It makes an asset of this by delivering an experience that’s completely about the isolation and lack of direction. Adding to it by grafting on new characters or additional grittiness works against the original work. There’s also the disadvantage that the audience they’re trying to attract to the cinema, those who’ve played the game and love it, are for the most part reacting violently to the very concept of a film adaptation. If they do it wrong, word of mouth will sink them as it has so many other game adaptations. If they do it right, audiences will be bored. It doesn’t make sense.
They might be able to turn it around with a really exceptional preview at Comicon or something, but it’s probably a better use of their time to either create an original property based on the idea that’s more suited to film, or adapt something that has more in common with film.
Im intrigued by the idea of the film as shadow of the collosus is a piece of gaming art. Although I really don’t see how a movie can be made. They will have to edit the story lots to make it work, firstly by decreasing the number of collosi. The fact is Hollywood will turn into a cliche love story with big set pieces and a happy ending. If Trank steps up and comes up with a good story and harneces the emotion of the game, then maybe the film will be great.
All you game buffs are too smart for this movie. We don’t care about the game. All we care about are giant monsters as big as Transformers. They are not Transformers they are something we own and they attack the world and we can put Channing Tatum in this to kill the giant monsters and save the world from the awful colossussussess. That’s all we want on this. We have to sell it so we make money on it.
Channing Tatum going around the world killing ancient giant mythological monsters that we don’t have to pay any rights to since it’s based on a game we own. Channing Tatum. Giant Monsters. Video Game. Franchise. Synergy. Stop criticizing our strategy. We’re smart. You’re dumb. We know what audiences want to see. You only know what gamers want to play. Now leave us alone.
You really think insulting the gamers and the game that you’re basing your money-making movie off of is a good idea? You’ve obviously shown your not smart. Strategy? Audiences want to see the movie portray the game with the same gravity of emotion that was given in 2005. No happy endings, stick to the game’s plot and don’t alter it. And keep the soundtrack.
It sounds like it would make a better tv series, most likely animated. Each Colossus is an episode plus one or two for the set up, another one for the finale with one or two stretched out into two parters. There’s a 22 episode season right there
Trank is obviously a brave man to want to convert a narrative of such high calibre and complexity to the big screen, and on the experience of only one surprise performer at the booths at that.
Personally, being a huge fan of the franchise, I would like to see this venture perform well and improve the reputation of game-to-film conversions. But by God, he and the rest of the team have got their work cut out for them. If the plan is to follow, live and breathe the original story to the letter, it’s not going to be easy in any measurable sense: let’s hope Fumito Ueda’s guidance helps the project run smoothly. But to be frank – as many fellow fans will vouch for – I’ll be lukewarm on the idea and won’t be surprised if it ends up under-performing.
I’m trying as hard as I can to avoid snap judgements at this stage. I’ll hold out for previews and TV spots before making firmer opinions.
Whoa, lots of negativity and “fear” in these post. A decent director wants to tackle a cool beautiful “franchise” and everyone slams the idea. While Hollywood is cranking out BS like battleship, mirror mirror, transformers, clash of the titans etc finally a young talented director wants to do something special and gets shot down before any script is wriiten or inch of film is shot. Be happy we are getting something like this period!you might be pleasantly surprised at the results. Wait for the canvas to be painted before criticizing the art.
what the horse fucking fuck do you mean by “it wasn’t that good a game”?!
Did you actually play through Shadow of the Colossus? It’s an unmitigated work of interactive art.
that aside,
I feel that one my larger problems with this becoming a film is how Trank plans to make the girl Wander’s lover outright, when in the game the nature of their relation to one another was ambiguous, even at the end of the game, we never saw anything to say they definitely were in love or if he was just righting a wrong. Also, the loss of interactivity may play into a direct loss of emotion tied to slaying the massive beasts.
This is such a god awful idea. I agree that it is a great concept for a video game, but for all you morons that feel it will work are living in some fantasy world. I mean most likely the movie will have dialogue, who is he going to talk to his horse? It was a simple game, made with a great artistic value. To recreate the game into a movie, is honestly a waste. Come up with a real idea for a movie, instead of stealing the plot off video games. Also Chronicle sucked.