Gears of War film coming in 2010

By Ellie Gibson Published 31 March, 2008

Script and director almost sorted.

The film based on hit Xbox 360 shooter Gears of War is due to hit cinemas in just over two years' time.

That's according to ComingSoon.net, which spoke to Wyck Godfrey of Temple Hill Entertainment. New Line Cinema owns the film rights to GOW but Temple Hill is set to produce.

"We've got our script and a director we're about to attach," Godfrey said. "We'll hopefully make that early next year for the summer of 2010."

As previously reported the movie's script is being written by Stuart Beattie (Collateral, Pirates of the Caribbean). Epic's Cliff Bleszinkski helped develop the treatment and will provide input throughout the production process.

According to Beattie, the Gears of War film will probably be shot entirely on green screen in the same way 300 was. "There's no way to build that world any other way, really," he observed.

Picture of Ellie.

About Ellie Gibson

Since joining Eurogamer in the mid 2000s, Ellie has written about subjects as diverse as the fall of Gizmondo, the rise of Hollyoaks actresses in Red Alert games and the noise a bear makes under NSFW circumstances.

Read more articles from Ellie by visiting the Ellie Gibson archive page.

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Comments (27) Latest comment 4 years ago

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

  • Skooch #1 4 years ago

    Could be good, likely to be bad.

  • captainrentboy #2 4 years ago

    I agree with the first comment.
    I mean it could be good, in a fun shitty type of way, if they actually stick by its roots and make the film an R rated one.
    But if there's one thing those greedy US film execs like to do as of late it's take what should be a violent and Gory film, pussify it considerably, and then chuck it out with the oh so wonderful PG13 rating attached.
    And I still say Dominic Purcell needs to be signed on as Marcus. Who in the hell else could it be? The guy is basically Marcus in the real world.

  • THEGREATMADMAN #3 4 years ago

    Better not be Uwe Bole...

  • the_dudefather #4 4 years ago

    there are strapping slabs of beef onto the actors as we speak

  • captainrentboy #5 4 years ago

    I read somewhere that it was supposed to be Len Wiseman directing, and that aint too bad, if there's one thing that can guy can do it's direct an action scene. Ohh and get to boink Kate Beckinsale every night.
    Bastard.

  • DanWhitehead #6 4 years ago

    New Line no longer exists in any meaningful way, having been fully absorbed into Warner Bros after failing to produce a single hit since LOTR, so this could all change depending on how the execs at WB view the project...and its price tag.

  • bad09 #7 4 years ago

    It' ll star The Rock, be aimed at teens younger than the people who play the game and be utter crap....

  • space_ace #8 4 years ago

    finally, the craved collaboration between vin diesel and the rock?

  • Zander #9 4 years ago

    "It' ll star The Rock, be aimed at teens younger than the people who play the game and be utter crap...."

    Argh! How annoying would that be! No splatter of blood on the screen!?

    I think its def more suitable to screen conversion than most action games "as is" where the player is usually the only persistent character. Gears always had you in a squad which means dialog (something games don't really need) doesn't have to be written in by adding annoying wise-cracking teenagers.

  • Olemak #10 4 years ago

    Hah! This will be a crap movie even if it delivers on every scrap of potential the game has to offer. No matter how they spin it, it's a story about beefcakes shooting up giant bugs, and that's just not a very strong concept for a movie.

    I very much doubt they'll even come close to being as good as Starship Troopers, which I guess it the prime example of the genre. I'm guessing at something more in line vith Tremors: Aftershock.

    Good game does not translate to an even half-way interesting movie.
    Are gamers at all interested in watching games they've played?
    In my experience - no. So why make this?

    I'm betting they'll delay (or rush) GoW 2 in order to make it coincide with the relase of this "Major Motion Picture".

  • bad09 #11 4 years ago

    @ Olemak

    "Are gamers at all interested in watching games they've played?"

    I think they are (or were) but the problem is hollywood and how they destroy story for profit and impliment them so badly no one is really that interested anymore. Look at Resi, alone in the dark even Street Fighter. everyone was really excited about these movies at first...then we all saw them!

    Games can make superb movies, the problem is hollywood rarely does these days.....

  • britscott #12 4 years ago

    Olemak.
    I'm betting they'll delay (or rush) GoW 2 in order to make it coincide with the relase of this "Major Motion Picture".
    The movie's due 2010 the game (gow2) is due end of this year I can see it coinciding with gow 3.

  • gizmo #13 4 years ago

    One question. Why?

  • CreepinJesus #14 4 years ago

    Paaaaahahahahaha

  • agparrot #15 4 years ago

    I anticipate a scenario where bunny rabbits and small children have been taken captive by Locust forces, and only by working together as a Team and understanding the value of friendship can the heroes save these poor hapless souls. Yes, even the little boy who repeatedly gets the line "Gee Marcus, I want to be just like you, I've got your back!" in high nasal tones.

  • Darren #16 4 years ago

    Considering how Gears of War the game had virtually no plot and no interesting or even remotely likeable characters, I can see this movie being average at best, plenty of action hopefully but ultimately two dimensional and unfulfilling like Doom was.

  • NthSimulachum #17 4 years ago

    So...they want to make a FILM ( a narrative-led medium) about Gears of War (whose narrative was understated, uninvolving and clichéd). Do film studios even care about narrative anymore? Or do they just see *ESTABLISHED FRANCHISE* printed over the screenplay in magical neon letters?

    And I bet the Locust will look crappy. And Seann William Scott will be involved somehow.

  • krudster #18 4 years ago

    I hope So Macho is the theme tune.

  • Rash' #19 4 years ago

    Gears may be a good game but plot, narrative, dialogue and compelling characters was never it's forte. Why does film need this??? Another cynical attempt to cash on the success of good game (which it has to be said I don't rate because of it's lack of compelling narrative depth). A frat boy film from a frat boy game aimed at the frat boy crowd.

  • Rash' #20 4 years ago

    Olemak, I don't agree that good games don't make good films. God of War would make a good hollywood blockbuster. Of course it would need good talent to make it happen.

  • Dan_LXIX #21 4 years ago

    So they couldn't get Halo made, which would have been a film based on a superb back story, in a well thought out universe with characters you can really like, but they can get this made!!!

    It will be crap.

  • kissthestick #22 4 years ago

    coooooooooole traaaaaaaaain :)

  • Vaxadrin #23 4 years ago

    "Okay, then in this scene, something blows up & Marcus says 'Fuck.'"
    "Yeah...and then Dom can shout 'Shit.'"
    *takes notes*
    "Yeah, that's perfect. Then they should cut a guy in half and blood goes everywhere."
    "Oooh, what if one of them says 'Nice.'"
    "I like the way you think."

    2 years later

    $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

    Thanks, gamers.

  • Olemak #24 4 years ago

    Rash:
    Olemak, I don't agree that good games don't make good films. God of War would make a good hollywood blockbuster. Of course it would need good talent to make it happen.

    Maybe so, but it hasn't happened yet and I don't see it happening any time soon.
    For a game to be any good, it has to use the potential of the gaming genre. A good game has to have good gameplay fist.
    Stuff like story, athmosphere and characteres are secondary. Just the way it is. Unless the gameplay's right, nothing else matters.

    For movies, it's the other way around. Many great movies are based on great books focussing on just that: characters, story, athmosphere. Some (very few) games take the setting, story and characters of a good movie and add good gameplay, and get good games. I can't really think of any examples, but I am sure it is theoretically possible.

    Turning a good game into a good movie means stripping the game of it's defining characteresitic (the gameplay) and get by on the trimmings. That's hard. Games where the story, the characters and the setting would work without the gameplay is extremely rare. I can't think of any examples here either. What I find interesting about God Of War as a game, does not really interest me a lot as a topic for a film, but maybe that is just me.

    Gears of War is a brutalisitic exercise in homoerotic machismo, and while that is a fun backdrop for the very engaging and rewarding gameplay we all know and mostly love, I don't see it as anything to base a movie on. The cut-scences and dialogue in GoW is, in my opinion, so horribly clichéd it made me cringe. The game is alomst a parody of itself - and I guess the movie has the potential to be an even better parody of the game.

    The spoof trailer for "Mine Sweeper - the movie" was pretty good, tho. I think that's the best example of a movie-based-on-game I can think of.

  • Darren #25 4 years ago

    In order to turn Gears of War into a good movie, it would have to be completely different from the game outside of the action sequences and then it wouldn't be Gears of War anymore. As a game, it doesn't need a compelling narrative or strong characters to be enjoyable but they're prerequisites for a movie unless it wants to end up as a straight-to-DVD piece of mediocrity. Besides, hasn't this game already been done (kind of) with Starship Troopers?

  • adamamosa #26 4 years ago

    Ahhh. . . just in time for Gears 3 then

  • Skurmedel #27 4 years ago

    I bet my money it's going to be shite.