Battleship steams into movie theatres this week, giving international audiences the first chance to decide whether a board game-based movie is sea-worthy.
The Hasbro Inc search-and-destroy game was once a way for kids to while away a summer afternoon. But Battleship the movie has become a potential franchise, sporting Michael Bay-inspired special effects, aliens invading Earth, a bikini-model actress, superstar Rihanna and, of course, lots of guns.
Whether the movie symbolises Hollywood's lack of new ideas or its brilliance in adapting old ones, Comcast Corp's Universal Pictures is betting big that it's the latter. With a reported production budget of $200 million (Dh734 million), observers say it will need to reap at least $500 million at box offices worldwide to pay off.
Hollywood's love of the sequel, the prequel, the reboot and the adapted novel all originate from the same premise: Moviegoers are more likely to buy a ticket if they are already familiar with the story.
But not since Clue bombed in 1985 has Tinseltown gambled on adapting a popular board game with no apparent storyline.
The idea of turning board games into movies has gained new traction in part because of the huge success of Transformers, and to a lesser extent G.I. Joe, which are both based on toys from toymaker Hasbro Inc. The three Transformers movies have grossed more than $2.6 billion worldwide, helping lift Transformers toys to become Hasbro's top-selling brand last year, exceeding 11 per cent of its $4.3 billion in annual revenue.
For Hasbro, the movie is a way to get a globally marketed boost for its games business, which Sterne Agee analyst Margaret Whitfield called "stagnant" and lacking innovation. Turning that stagnation around is a goal of Brian Goldner, Hasbro's CEO since 2008. He told investors in February "we're going to reignite our games business".
If it succeeds, Battleship will be the advance guard of a whole fleet of planned adaptations of Hasbro games including Ouija, also being developed by Universal for release in 2013, as well as Risk and Candy Land, which are both in the works at Sony Corp. Stretch Armstrong, a movie based on the glutinous-armed toy from Hasbro, is set for 2014 release by Relativity Media.
On paper, Battleship scores high on the checklist for blockbuster success: a hero in a life-or-death struggle against incomparable odds, a steamy love interest, a star-studded cast that includes Liam Neeson, and a whole lot of destruction and mayhem.
gulfnews : Battleship to explode in movie theatres Thursday
Re: Battleship (Alien Invasion 2012)
Reply With Quote
Posting Permissions
