Filmmaker Brandon Laatsch is raising funds to produce a Minecraft movie that he hopes will impress fans and stay true to its roots.
Video game movies tend to suck. It’s not that they’re all abjectly horrible, it’s more that the people making them just don’t seem to get the source material. A PG-13 Mortal Kombat, for instance, can still be fun but it’s doomed by default to miss the point of the games. That said, there are some who still believe in the idea of a great video game film. Brandon Laatsch is one of them and he intends to make it.
The question that comes out of that, of course, is which game does he want to adapt? The short answer is Minecraft. “To me Minecraft is the perfect video game to adapt to a film,” he said, in a video accompanying his Kickstarter. His reasoning is that without a set story or characters he and his team will be free to faithfully recreate the unique world of Minecraft without tripping over the toes of an established canon. “Our plan is to tell an epic fantasy story that would stand alone on its own merit and set that story in the world of Minecraft for its visual appeal and the unique physical rules within the world.”
To make the film, which will be named Birth of Man, Laatsch and his team are seeking $600,000 in funds. While it’s an arguably lofty goal, Laatsch would point out that it’s significantly less than Hollywood fare which “typically [spends] 100 times this much on a VFX heavy epic.” Whether that will be enough to convince backers to part with their money is something we’ll have to wait and see. That said, it’s very much possible that Minecraft‘s popularity might be enough on its own to help the campaign reach its goal. Case in point, Nearly 800 backers have already given more than $54,000 to the campaign. With 29 days left to go there’s still plenty of time to raise to the rest.
Update: The Kickstarter for Birth of Man has apparently been cancelled by its creator. While we’ve reached out to the project for a comment, it’d be fair to say, based on recent Tweets, that Minecraft‘s makers didn’t tale too kindly to the film going forward without permission.
Source: Kickstarter
