Metal Gear Solid the Movie

Snake? Snake? SNAAAAKE !!

Lets kick things off with a quote from Mr Metal Gear Himself:
"Metal Gear Solid was developed specifically to become a game. ...If it were to be made into a movie it would have to be something completely new. I wouldn't use my current scripts. I think I'd have to get somebody to get a new script and somebody else to direct it as a movie."

-Hideo Kojima (March 17, 2012)

Now as a big fan of the Metal Gear Solid games (and after falling out of lve with cinema), I for one would be happy if there was never a movie made of the tactical espionage videogame. "Have you gone mad?" I hear some of you ask. Well no I haven't, at least not madder than usual *chuckles*
To my mind, Metal Gear Solid doesn't need a movie, it does very well standing alone as a game thank you very much. As every game fan knows, turning a popular game into a film is hardly ever a success. From Streetfighter and Kylie Minogue through to the very average (at best) Tomb Raider movie, games very rarely transfer well onto celliuloid. I will concede that the Resident Evil movies are brilliant fun but still, the games rock even more. The difference is huge and to go from 'being' the character in Hitman on Playstation, to then be reduced to mere 'watcher' in the cinema or on dvd can come as a shock, even be frustrating.
Gamers will each have their own different experiences from playing through sections of Metal Gear Solid, we will all have personal victories and defeats but movies are not able to do that. It felt immense to personally battle and eventually beat three Metal Gears in MGS: Sons Of Liberty, but watching some actor do it on a Netflix rent would be quite dull in comparison.
Alas im only another gamer fan and as much as I want the franchise left in this form, time and money will decide if Metal Gear Solid the Movie ever becomes a reality. But if Hideo is smart (and I believe he is), he should be very careful when it comes to making it. I will say this however; as loyal fans of MGS who have bought every game, we certainly deserve more than getting people like the awful Nicholas Cage and Lindsay Lohan involved. Please Kojima san, anything but those two. And this is part of the problem of course, everyone has a different idea on who should play Solid Snake. The character was based on Snake Plissken from John Carpenter's Escape from New York, so logically Kurt Russell would be ideal but Russell is getting on a bit these days and unless Metal Gear Solid the Movie is going to focus on the espionage antics of Pensioner Snake, this rules him out.
Jason Statham sounds about right but when I picture him in my minds eye, dressed in Snake's stealth gear, sneaking through a creaky air vent in an abandoned military site, he doesn't look right. Ditto Colin Farrell. And its not just Solid Snake to be considered, all characters in Metal Gear Solid have been larger than life, the series is famed for it. Liquid Snake, Otagon, Col. Roy Campbell, Meryl. Each of these roles would need filling by actors capable of making those big personalities shine, and I just cannot see a script or studio pulling it off with any success. You can see from The Expendables that having a load of big names on screen at the same time doesn't necessarily mean pure gold. And in Metal Gear Solid its the characters who are the big names and thats not your average big either. Think a brilliantly, colourful, bizarre, mad, over the top kind of big.
To sum up then; making a good Metal Gear Solid movie will need everything clicking into place like a jigsaw dipped in olive oil. This is a much loved franchise and whereas fans might excuse a shoddy Tomb Raider or average Hitman, we wont be so forgiving when it comes to Solid Snake and company. And lets face it, when you look at the jaw dropping trailer below of the new Metal Gear Solid game, well who needs film?


Stunning!