Gears film future uncertain

By Robert Purchese Published 5 October, 2007

New Line worried about budget.

The Gears of War film may be going too far over budget for studio New Line Cinema to stick with it.

Hollywood rumblings were first picked up by film-focused site IESB.net, which confirmed with an "inside source" that a spanner may be in the works.

However, script writer Stuart Beattie (Collateral, Pirates of the Caribbean) is still optimistic, and revealed in a recent interview that the film will likely be shot entirely on green screen - with backgrounds added later.

"[300] was shot completely on green screen, which is amazing when you actually see the film. It's probably how we're going to do Gears of War," Beattie told GamePro. "There's no way to build that world any other way, really."

Beattie also restated that he would be persistently checking details with Gears of War creator Cliff "CliffyB" Bleszinski, who is acting as a creative go-between for Epic.

Microsoft was unavailable to comment at the time of writing, but did recently reveal that Gears of War on PC will be released on 9th November.

The Gears of War film is expected some time in 2009.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (30) Latest comment 4 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • rhinoxious #1 4 years ago

    Can't see this being nearly as good as 300.

  • souljacker2000 #2 4 years ago

    Dont ruin gears of war for me pleased, played it through once, loved it dont ruin it... actually i just dont think im gona bother watching it if it comes out.

  • rhinoxious #3 4 years ago

    Unless they invent a whole lot of plot that was missing from the game

  • L42yB #4 4 years ago

    Was there a story in Gears??? I obviously wasn't paying attention when I played it... thought it was just a generic Man vs Underground mutants thing...

  • Dizzy #5 4 years ago

    I do not really want a Gears movie. Seriously. Great game.. probably crap movie.

  • gallow #6 4 years ago

    All they need is some muscular men, baby lotion and a few joey's.

  • Fab4 #7 4 years ago

    I heard they are concerned about the cost of conveying 'host advantage' through the medium of cinema.

  • HolyJebus #8 4 years ago

    "It also heard that Len Wiseman of Die Hard 4.0 fame would be leaving his directorial post and be replaced by Brett Ratner, responsible for X-Men 3: The Last Stand."

    I think you'll find that Wiseman left the Escape From New York remake to have more focus on the Gears of War film. Brett Ratner took over from him for the Escape From New York remake, not GOW. The End.

  • Bertie Verified Senior Staff Writer, Eurogamer.net #9 4 years ago

    Hello sorry, Len Wiseman is still directing for now - I made a cockup writing the story.

  • Gojira #10 4 years ago

    Either way neither will be any good or should be made under any circumstances.

  • some1 #11 4 years ago

    If the film is true to the game it will be a 90 minute film of some oversterioded soldiers ass

    ChocNut

  • HolyJebus #12 4 years ago

    I agree, they'll both suck giant monkey balls.... and not in a good way.

  • bengray66 #13 4 years ago

    Escape from new york, great film, and perhaps the first appearance of Solid Snake ;-)

  • lambtron #14 4 years ago

    "I agree, they'll both suck giant monkey balls.... and not in a good way."

    Its possible to suck giant monkey balls in a good way? 0_0

  • Darren #15 4 years ago

    I see Gears of War turning out as "good" as that awful Doom movie, mainly because the game doesn't have a great story anyway (in fact, I'm not even sure it had one!); it's cliched, illogical and unoriginal, and the characters aren't particularly interesting or endearing. Had the game had a rich, detailed story and intriguing, memorable characters then I'd have been more excited about it but I just can't help thinking this will be a huge disappointment when it comes out. Gears of War is all brawn and no brains and they don't make for entertaining movies, just watch Doom for proof.

    The trouble with game-licensed movies (wooh, that's sounds odd when you read it), is that they only really appeal to people who played the game and no-one else. They're also usually crap so as soon as people cotton on to the fact that it's based on a video game, they do their utmost to avoid it assuming it must be crap!

    Well you name me ONE good movie-of-a-game then... Silent Hill was decent-ish (and confusing!) but other than that they've all been complete poop!

  • lambtron #16 4 years ago

    SMB - The Movie...

    ;)

  • Wite_Noiz #17 4 years ago

    @Darren
    Resident Evil? 1, at least; and 3 (Apocalypse) is supposed to be pretty decent.

    Apart from that, I agree ;)

    Doom wasn't the worst though; what about Street Fighter?

  • Britesparc Verified Creative, ITV #18 4 years ago

    I won't hear a bad word said about Street Fighter. That's one of the funniest films ever made.

    "Electromagnetism... now it levitates... MEEEEEEEEE!!!!!"

    Ab. So. Lute. Nuts.
    Edited by 1 at 05/10/07 @ 15:37

  • Bumhug360 #19 4 years ago

    Same thing that happend to the Halo movie then. Guess as the movie studio dont own the rights to the IP when it comes to merchendise they dont make any money from the lucrative toy market and the McDom burgers and so a big budget means it has to do very well at the box office which is a huge gamble. Maybe MS should dig into their deep pockets and take on Sony at making movies as well

  • skillian #20 4 years ago

    Postal actually looks pretty funny, and I heard good things from someone who saw a preview.

    Hard to believe it tho.

  • captainrentboy #21 4 years ago

    I think this could turn out pretty good, with a nice big budget, and Wiseman attached, script wise it'll be no Oscar contender, but as a generic, balls to the wall, Action film, I can see it working.
    Wiseman isn't the greatest out there, but he does ''Big badda Booms'' pretty well, and I liked what he did with Die Hard 4. (It's just a shame it was edited to fuck)
    And I've said it before, and I'll say it again, Dominic Purcell for Fenix please!!
    Whilst on the topic of the greatest Video game to film adaptations, I'd like to nominate Mortal Kombat for the prize, a flick that I'm quite happy to watch even nowadays, there were some sweet fight scenes in that flick. And Goro's make up job was incredible....

  • Rirekon #22 4 years ago

    "Its possible to suck giant monkey balls in a good way? 0_0"
    Depends if you're a monkey...

  • Nallen #23 4 years ago

    Is this starring The Rock?

  • The-Bodybuilder #24 4 years ago

    >"Can't see this being nearly as good as 300. "

    As action movies go, very few films touch 300 IMO.

    Imagine markus kicking some locust into a hole, screaming "THIS IS SIERA".

  • captainrentboy #25 4 years ago

    I think I could be the only male movie fan on Earth that found 300 ever so slightly ''Meeeehhhhh''.
    Don't get me wrong, it was cool enough, but it was definitely one of those ''You've seen the trailer, you've seen it all'' type movies. And I definitely didn't see it as one of the greatest action flicks of all time, I mean it took like 40mins to get to that first ''This is where we fiiight, this is where they die!!!'' action scene.
    There was a lot of terrible dialogue and awful hunchback exposition in between the good bits.

  • BarrettBonden #26 4 years ago

    300 was a pile of steaming poo. And ethically dubious to boot. All this talk of "submission" from the bad guys. Islam anyone?

  • VMerken #27 4 years ago

    With the amount of homo-eroticism going on in 300, I seriously doubt it.

  • Bezzy #28 4 years ago

    Easy solution to the budget problems:

    Just outsource to some dutch company, promising next to no money. Instead offer the honor of working with Epic, and then when it's all wrapped up, don't even include them in the credits.

    Then snort coke off hookers all day.

  • asphaltcowboy #29 4 years ago

    The film will probably be rubbish, but I can't wait to see one of the chainsaw sequences! ;)

  • TonyCocaCola #30 4 years ago

    Dont Make Films Based On Computer Games

  • Fitzmogwai #31 4 years ago

    Don't tell me that New Line have spent all that money they made from the Lord of the Rings films already?