Whether it's Doom or Super Mario Bros., video game movies have a bad rep. It's a mostly deserved rep. But Hollywood super producer Jerry Bruckheimer (The Rock, Pirates of the Carribean) doesn't think it's so cut and dried.
"It depends on who's involved with it and the approach they took," Bruckheimer told website website Gamasutra. Bruckheimer, one of Hollywood's most successful producers ever, has had a knack for churning out blockbusters. With the Pirates of the Carribean films, he was able to turn a Disney ride into a feature film franchise.
"We used the same skill, as far as storytellers, [for Prince of Persia] that we used on Pirates of the Caribbean on Prince of Persia," says Bruckheimer. The producer had never played Prince of Persia until the game was pitched to him. Six years passed, and voila! There's a movie.
"It always depends on story and character," says Bruckheimer. "With that, if you can create that, then you've got it. That's what it's about. We're storytellers. That's all we do. The more interesting the story and the characters, and the better the themes, chances are you're going to have a better movie, if you surround yourself with talented people."
Don't blame the movie or video game mediums themselves for failed adaptations. Blame the people who made the films.
Interview: Jerry Bruckheimer on Game Development, Prince of Persia, Why Movie Games Fail [Gamasutra]