NEWS
by Mark Barley
Ken Levine explains how the 'BioShock' film was killed
Irrational Games boss man Ken Levine killed the BioShock film that was set to happen with Gore Verbinski directing, and he explains why.
Speaking in a BAFTA interview yesterday, reported by Eurogamer, Levine stated that the film was set to start production at Universal with The Pirates of the Caribbean director Verbinski at the helm in 2009. Then Watchmen was released and did not fare well at the box office, which gave Universal cold feet.
“The studio then got cold feet about making an R-rated $200 million film, and they said what if it was a $80 million film – and Gore didn’t want to make a $80 million film,” Levine said.
“They brought another director in, and I didn’t really see the match there – and 2K’s one of these companies that puts a lot of creative trust in people. So they said if you want to kill it, kill it. And I killed it.”
While $200M is a LOT of money to put towards a video game adaptation, Verbinski is a very good director. So the fact that Universal didn't want to spend the money tells you a little something about the state of video game adaptations and perhaps the working relationship the production company had with Irrational and 2K. “They brought another director in, and I didn’t really see the match there – and 2K’s one of these companies that puts a lot of creative trust in people. So they said if you want to kill it, kill it. And I killed it.”
Watch the interview here: