Chad Staheski seems anxious to respect the original work, works with the developers of the game to offer the most faithful adaptation possible.
Whenever a movie based on a video game is announced, fans of both arts have good reason to shake. In recent years, we’ve seen a plethora of unscrupulous directors blooming into real turnips that tended to completely distort the core work, in addition to being really bad movies. But there may be reason to hope for better with the future adaptation of Ghost of Tsuhima.
For those who missed out on this summer 2020 phenomenon, this is an epic saga that follows the story of Jin Sakai, a samurai forced to twirl his katana to defend feudal Japan against the invader. Mongolian. Director Chad Staheski, who must adapt this superb game on the big screen after working on John Wicks, has just declared that he intends to stick as much as possible to the original narrative.
“Take our time and do it well”
Thanks to its swirling and enjoyable fights, its very well written narrative and its particularly immersive atmosphere, the game was generally very well received by the public and by the critics. Even if the title of “Game of the Year” escaped him in favor of the excellent The Last of Us, GoT nonetheless won the most prestigious award for the best artistic direction.
Suffice to say that Staheski is attacking a sacred piece; we therefore hope that this adaptation will not suffer from the famous “Resident Evil syndrome”, a mythical franchise that has regularly been dragged through the mud by the directors. But he was able to find the right words to give the public a little hope.
We just want to do it right. You know how video game adaptations can turn out… So we’re going to take our time and do this right. We work closely with the game developers to make sure we stick to what makes the game so good.
-Chad Staheski
A director who speaks openly about the deplorable state of adaptations and who works directly with developers ? It’s rare enough to be underlined, and we have to admit that it does bite us a corner. Because collaborations of this type are far from systematic. However, they seem essential to capture the soul of the base material; but paradoxically they are very rare, often for two different reasons.
Avoid the “Resident Evil syndrome”
Most of the time, these projects are put together by studios that want to ride the popularity of a franchise. They therefore tend to hire mercenary directors who have no knowledge or love for the original material. The other scenario that we often find is that of a director who appreciates a game, but who offers an interpretation that completely misses the mark.
Either way, this often results in headless films that reek of smelly fan service from miles away; the perfect recipe for to disgust both moviegoers and video game lovers. But based on these statements, Staheski does not seem to fall into either of these two categories. And that’s great news.
But the will to do well is not enough. The adaptation of video games remains a extremely dangerous juggling exercise, even for a director aware of the potential pitfalls. We therefore can’t wait to see if Stahelski will be able to pay homage to the nugget of Sucker Punch, and how he intends to go about presenting us his vision of this sumptuous feudal saga.
