Mike Newell, best known for the Harry Potter series and Four Weddings and a Funeral, doesn't like videogames. He can't play them, he thinks they're vapid, and talking about them "bores the arse" off him. Didn't stop him from making a Prince of Persia movie, of course.
"I'm entirely incompetent at playing videogames," admits Newell. "In the Prince Of Persia game, you have to run across walls -- I could never get more than three feet without falling into the revolving knives. I was hopeless. And yet I knew I had to satisfy the gamers with the Prince Of Persia movie. It's an important audience and it's a very vocal audience. If they don't like something, you're going to hear. I didn't want that to happen."
Newell believes the Prince of Persia movie is good because it didn't try to copy the games themselves, which he says lack human drama: "You can't do it without the human drama. And the videogame cannot do that. The videogame can do all sorts of face-pulling, all sorts of: 'I am a bad man, I have a mean jagged sword,', but it can't do any more than that.
"... Don't get me wrong -- I watched the game and took many things from it. But I haven't had the experience of feeling in a game. The one thing I do not do when I watch my son mow down Brazilians by the regiment - nor when I watched my assistants playing Prince Of Persia -- I don't feel anything, which is why I hate my son doing it."
The general message appears to be that videogames are good for Hollywood to pilfer as templates, but that it takes a movie to breathe life into the concepts, something that games cannot do themselves. I can't say I fully agree with Newell, especially as I've gotten more emotional impact from games than from most movies made over the past five years, but that's just me. What do you think? Can games ever capture human drama, and more importantly ... was the Prince of Persia film more engaging than the game?
'Video games bore the arse off me' [CVG]
Contest:
12:20 PM on 07.28.2010
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All videogames are stupid.
I make a lot of judgments.
All my judgments are stupid.
What a twat.
Go play Shadow of the Colossus and get back to me.
Why the hell would you make a movie about something you don't care about?
At least, he didn't say that he is the only true genius in the business or anything equally delusional.
Regardless I don't think this is a terribly awful thing to say. I mean you don't have to feel emotionally impacted by a videogame. That's not the point. The point is enjoyment. Emotional impact can happen but that's not to say it should or it needs to happen. The gameplay takes precedence first and foremost.
He's not making movies because it means the world to him or to rock anyone else's world but for that thing that makes the world go round.
Is anybody going to put Euro symbols into his name now?
The movie was decent enough, so he did a good job considering he can't play games.
You don't hear about viewers marrying their porn DVD's. Dating sim videogames? Much more successful. There's human drama.
"I knew I had to satisfy the gamers with the Prince Of Persia movie. It's an important audience and it's a very vocal audience. If they don't like something, you're going to hear."
That guy probably doesn't realise how right he is about us
I'd take any game over that movie any day.
Someone send this man the Team ICO collection when it releases.
Why the hell did this guy make a frickin' movie about Prince of Persia if he "didn't feel anything" from that game?
Way to go, douche dad.
This is just really sad news.
This guy is getting flamed because he truthfully shared his opinion, an opinion that he was asked to share I might add. His words aren't bullshit, they are his opinion
@killrig
My daughter enjoys chewing a bath sponge, am I a bad father because I don't like it?
Largely, games are largely lacking in the story telling department.
Yes, there are examples like RDR and say, BioShock, but a large majority of games aren't RDR or BioShock. Prince of Persia games largely suck when it comes to story telling. Suuuuuuuck.
Of course, games give you control, so that's something. You'd think more developers might fucking use it.