Col­lider had the chance to meet with Michael De Luca (writer of Judge Dredd, pro­ducer on Blade II, Zathura, Ghost Rider) at ShoW­est and dis­cuss, amongst other things, the Metal Gear movie adap­ta­tion. I’ve picked out the rel­e­vant MGS related con­tent from the inter­view for you. De Luca dis­cusses the aim of the adap­ta­tion and achiev­ing an inde­pen­dent cin­e­matic aura whilst stay­ing true to the fran­chise, he also clar­i­fies his pre­vi­ous com­ment on Kurt Wim­mer — he is not direct­ing, he isn’t even hired yet — he is cur­rently involved in the adap­ta­tion writ­ing process. Though this doesn’t rule him out for a direct­ing role in the future.

Col­lider: So this is the ques­tion that every fan…I’m ask­ing this for every fan…what are you going to do to finally make a kick-ass video game movie?

Mike De Luca: I mean, hope­fully not screw it up.  For me adapt­ing a video game is just like adapt­ing a book or a play or any other…whenever you’re adapt­ing from another medium for film you try to take into account what you need to do to make it a movie. 

With books it’s how you com­pen­sate for not being inside a character’s head and with video games I think what you have to com­pen­sate for is the loss of inter­ac­tiv­ity, you know.  What makes video games fun is that you get to be the char­ac­ter and you’re sit­ting there rul­ing the uni­verse and it’s a really first per­son inter­ac­tive expe­ri­ence.  When you’re in your the­atre seat, you’re stuck with these sub­jec­tive ver­sions of the story and the game from a direc­tor or the writer’s point of view.  You can’t inter­act with what’s going on so what­ever turns you on about the game, you’re imme­di­ately disadvantaged […]

So I think the bar is higher and I think in the past, peo­ple haven’t real­ized that they set the bar low for video game movies think­ing that oh, there’s a built in audi­ence and we don’t need to go crazy with this movie. […] [In Metal Gear Solid] the Cain and Able story between Solid Snake and Liq­uid Snake and their rela­tion­ship with their father and the sto­ry­line of Metal Gear Solid 4 has the mak­ings….there’s so much story in Metal Gear as opposed to other video games that I think it’s going to be a chal­lenge but it’s an upscale prob­lem to have so much the­matic sub­texts and story mate­r­ial to draw from, so I think we have a leg up already. It’s such a rich uni­verse and Kojima is like George Lucas in terms of cre­at­ing this uni­verse so what it says about war by proxy in this kind of future where war has been out­sourced to pri­vate com­pa­nies I think can be almost very top­i­cal and also kind of satir­i­cal in like a “Robo­cop” kind of way, so I think if we can get a script that hon­ors the sto­ry­line of all 4 games, but that also has a cin­e­matic aes­thetic you know the kind of aes­thetic Ver­ho­even brought to “Robo­cop” or the kind of aes­thetic the Wachowski’s brought to “The Matrix”.  If there’s a cin­e­matic iden­tity to the piece that exists on its own, it doesn’t con­flict with the DNA of the game, you know that’s our goal is to pull off those 2 things.  Not mess with the DNA of the game but pro­vide a movie that is an adap­ta­tion but that has it’s own cin­e­matic iden­tity so even if you don’t play the game you know, you’ll come out of that movie feel­ing like you did at the end of “The Matrix” or the end of “Robo­cop”.  That’s our goal anyway.

Col­lider: I guess that being said, have you thought […] $100 mil­lion movie—this is a sum­mer block­buster or this is going to be one of these mid-range kind of things?

Mike De Luca: No, they know it’s big.  I mean, we don’t want it to be crazy big but they know it’s big on the big­ger side of things.

[…] This writer Kurt Wim­mer is one of the peo­ple we’re look­ing at to talk to about pitch­ing on it.
[…] Kurt is like one of many peo­ple we’re talk­ing to about pitch­ing us back a take on adapt­ing the fran­chise. He hasn’t been hired or anything.

I thought I would split out the Har­vey Dent related viral news to a new post, save every­thing from get­ting too con­gested as the news keeps com­ing. It seems that those signed up to par­tic­i­pate in the cam­paign have started to receive their rewards in the post,

SHH User Anita18 received a Gotham City voter’s card in the post:

Oth­ers have received the lat­est issue of The Gotham Times. A lucky few have also had some inter­est­ing Har­vey Dent pro­mo­tion but­tons, with one side melted or burnt away (alas Two Face) — sent via the Con­cerned Cit­i­zens For A Bet­ter Gotham (pic­tures thanks to Marvel152):

We’ve had some more viral news sub­mit­ted to us in the past 24 hours, let’s see what else we have…

Joseph Can­do­loro

First up, emails that were sent to Mr Joseph Can­do­loro were met with this reply,

Your busi­ness is impor­tant to us. Mr. Can­do­loro sees the law as some­thing that should work FOR peo­ple, not against them. We’re excited about talk­ing to you about how we can help you, so please call our offices dur­ing reg­u­lar busi­ness hours.

Con­tin­u­ing with this theme, from the record found at St Swith­uns, Mr. Can­do­loro mar­ried one Angela Rossi, Bryan Gray has pointed out that enter­ing “Al Rossi” or “Ran­dolfo Rossi” into the record search leads us to Albert Rossi’s (a wit­ness at the mar­riage) Bap­tism cer­tifi­cate. (Ran­dolfo Rossi is the father of Albert Rossi).

Through some clever detec­tive work the Rossi trend con­tin­ues. Rossi’s Deli which was the orig­i­nal meet­ing place of the “Cit­i­zens for Bat­man”, Dark­xXxPixie at unfo­rums found the web­site, Rossi’s Del­i­catessen — www​.rossis​del​i​catessen​.com:

Gotham City Clerk

Pierre has also informed me of Gotham City Clerk web­site — www​.gotham​c​i​ty​clerk​.com, which bears some infor­ma­tional mes­sages but most impor­tantly a web­site for another DA candidate.

Please excuse the incon­ve­nience, as we are cur­rently rebuild­ing our web­site and file sys­tem after server dam­age due to the recent Orange Line destruc­tion. We hope to be back online serv­ing Gotham City very soon.

Forms and appli­ca­tions for the fol­low­ing ser­vices are still avail­able at our N. 6th St. offices: Park­ing per­mits, busi­ness licenses, dog licenses, festival/block party/raffle/bazaar per­mits, night­club licenses, oath of office forms, oper­a­tor licenses, retail licenses, liquor licenses, street ven­dor licenses, med­ical reg­is­tra­tion forms, notice of claim forms, and garage sale permits.

The Gotham City Clerk announces approval for exten­sive absen­tee voter sup­port in the upcom­ing munic­i­pal elec­tion. Once the sys­tem is in place, we will post details and pro­ce­dures for both online and mail-in absen­tee balloting.

Trust Garcetti

That can­di­date is Roger Garcetti and his cam­paign web­site is — www​.trust​garcetti​.com. This comes with some new pro­mo­tional but­tons to pro­mote Mr Garcetti, an email address to vol­un­teer — “volunteers@​trustgarcetti.​com” and under the Who is Garcetti we find this — what are the chances that these lead to fur­ther sites?

The Gotham Fra­ter­nal Order of Police says, “Garcetti has the
expe­ri­ence, and part­ners with police to stop crime.”

The Gotham Police Union says “Roger Garcetti has the integrity,
the tough­ness, and the judge­ment to lead and win the war against crime.”

The Ital­ian Her­itage Soci­ety of Gotham says, “Roger Garcetti’s
ded­i­ca­tion and loy­alty make him the can­di­date to trust.”

3/30 BREAKING NEWS: ACTING DISTRICT ATTORNEY ROGER GARCETTI

ISSUES STATEMENT ON CHARGES AGAINST HARVEY DENT

“The charges made by some of Gotham’s finest police offi­cers against Har­vey Dent are extremely seri­ous. These brave men in blue have stood up against Har­vey Dent’s intim­i­da­tions and the tsunami of pos­i­tive press Har­vey Dent has been reap­ing to tell their story. It is an astound­ing act of courage, and I com­mend them all for hav­ing the guts to tell the truth to the Gotham pub­lic. I salute each and every one of them.

These police offi­cers are some of the finest we have. Many have received medals for brav­ery on duty. All of them place their lives at risk every day to pro­tect you and me.

It was always obvi­ous that Har­vey Dent’s mad lust for power was cor­rupt­ing his pros­e­cu­tions. Now, we have proof. Affi­davits and tes­ti­mony by police offi­cers that Har­vey Dent threat­ened and bribed police offi­cers to entice them to tes­tify against their inno­cent broth­ers on the force.

It is time to end the sorry chap­ter that Har­vey Dent has forced upon the Gotham peo­ple. I expect his res­ig­na­tion from his job and his with­drawal from the race, if he has any honor at all left.”

Act­ing Dis­trict Attor­ney Roger Garcetti

Trust Garcetti 

We stand at a cross­roads in Gotham. Ours is a city of great char­ac­ter, with unlim­ited poten­tial and a cre­ative, diverse, and hard-working families.

But Gotham faces a crit­i­cal prob­lem — grow­ing crime. To take on the prob­lem of crime, we need expe­ri­enced lead­ers that tar­get mob­sters, thugs, and killers — not the peo­ple who are sworn to pro­tect us. If I’m elected Dis­trict Attor­ney, I’ll give the police the tools they need to fight crime — because that’s how we’re going to make our streets safe.

Every day I work hand in hand with the real heros of Gotham — our brave men in blue. Gotham cops are some of the finest men I’ve ever had the honor to know. Every day, they put their life on the line to pro­tect this city. They risk their lives because they believe in jus­tice, in law, in order.

And that’s why the Gotham Police Union has endorsed me, Roger Garcetti. They’ve come to know me very well in my time in Gotham. I’ve always sup­ported the police in every way pos­si­ble. And now, when they are under attack by a “run­away pros­e­cu­tor,” they’ve turned to me once again. In their endorse­ment, they said, “Roger Garcetti has the integrity, the tough­ness, and the judge­ment to lead and win the war against crime. He is the best friend police have ever had, and we endorse him strongly.”

I am hon­ored to have the sup­port of Gotham police offi­cers. They are the best peo­ple to answer the ques­tion, “Who will make our city safer?” And the answer is me, Roger Garcetti.

Vote for me, and I will pro­tect all the peo­ple of Gotham.

Thank you.

In an inter­view with Bloomberg,  Hans Zim­mer spoker about his work on The Dark Knight, along­side James New­ton Howard,

Oscar-winning com­poser Hans Zim­mer was strug­gling to find the right music to rep­re­sent the Joker in “The Dark Knight,” the new Bat­man movie sched­uled for release this summer.

Zim­mer, who wrote the scores for “The Lion King,” “Glad­i­a­tor” and more than 100 other films, had already com­posed a two-note sig­na­ture for the fiendish char­ac­ter, played by the late Heath Ledger. But he wanted to expand that sound to sym­bol­ize the Joker’s pen­chant for anarchy.

“I’ve been sit­ting here all night try­ing to find out what else to do with those two notes,” Zim­mer said dur­ing an inter­view last month at his Santa Mon­ica, Cal­i­for­nia, studio.

Zim­mer, who col­lab­o­rated on the score with James New­ton Howard, said Ledger’s death from an acci­den­tal drug over­dose in Jan­u­ary wouldn’t change his musi­cal approach to the Joker. The com­poser said the best trib­ute would be an accu­rate reflec­tion of Ledger’s portrayal.

“The worst thing I can do is stray from that course and not be rig­or­ous about his per­for­mance,” the tall, bald­ing com­poser said in a Ger­man accent that reflects his native country.

At last, we have some big juicy news to get our hun­gry chain­saws plunged into. Wyck God­frey, (pro­ducer of Eragon, AVP, I Robot), has spo­ken out about the Gears adap­ta­tion for the big screen:

“We’ve got our script on and a direc­tor we’re about to attach. We’ll hope­fully make [the Gears of War movie] early next year for the sum­mer of 2010.”

Thanks Elias, Com­ing Soon

The game is online, click this link to fol­low it as it unfolds

Here’s the new Joker viral web­site we’ve been wait­ing for — now we await the fool’s day puz­zles:

Clown Travel Agency — www​.clown​trav​e​la​gency​.com

Thanks Agent ONeal

(this comes from the ana­gram we posted earlier)

IBelieveIn​Har​vey​Dent​.com has updated with an “urgent announce­ment” con­cern­ing slan­der­ous remarks. Many elec­tion cam­paign par­tic­i­pants have had a phone call alert­ing them to this.

3/30 Urgent Announcement

Har­vey Dent rejects the slan­der­ous charges made by a shad­owy group of unknowns call­ing them­selves “Con­cerned Cit­i­zens for a Bet­ter Gotham.”

Har­vey Dent has always been truth­ful and upright in his pros­e­cu­tion of cor­rupt cops.

There is no truth to any of the charges put forth by the oper­a­tives behind this shame­less group.

Don’t lis­ten to the lies and innu­en­dos of the peo­ple who want to keep Gotham the way it is!

If you want real change in Gotham, join our move­ment to take Gotham back

News:

• Meet Har­vey Dent! Har­vey Dent will be at a Town­hall Meet­ing to answer all
your ques­tions about how to take Gotham back! 3pm, April 1, Gotham
Com­mu­nity Cen­ter #12, Gainley

• Har­vey Dent accepted the endorse­ment of the Gotham Fire­fight­ers Asso­ci­a­tion
March 27. Thank you Gotham firefighters!

• The 100th new vol­un­teer at Har­vey Dent Head­quar­ters this week will receive
a free din­ner with Har­vey Dent him­self! So come on down!

This comes in response to the Con­cerned Cit­i­zens for a Bet­ter Gotham web­site, www​.ccfabg​.org. It is very much an anti Har­vey Dent cam­paign, with peti­tion (down­load) and video advert.

Ad text:

I know Har­vey Dent.
I worked with Har­vey Dent.
I did case after case with Har­vey Dent.
Har­vey Dent is no hero.
Har­vey Dent has not been hon­est
about the Gotham Police Depart­ment
Har­vey Dent lied to the court.
I know, I was there, I saw the whole thing.
Har­vey Dent is lynch­ing good cops
For head­lines and poll num­bers
He’s using money, threats, and black­mail
To get good men locked up.
Har­vey Dent is fram­ing good cops
for his own polit­i­cal pur­poses.
Har­vey Dent betrayed those cops.
He betrayed his office.
He dis­hon­ored this city, he most cer­tainly did.
Har­vey Dent can­not be trusted.
Paid for by Con­cerned Cit­i­zens for a Bet­ter Gotham

Update from the Joker

The Joker phones that came in the cakes have been ring­ing again, this comes from one of the “clowns left in” Vlkers54 via Hol­ly­wood Chicago:

“Hey clown, ready to get to work? (I replied “yes”.) Ok, good. You are 1 of 17 clowns still left in the game (remem­ber, there were 22 phones intially) I have a let­ter for you. Here is your secret letter..are you ready for it? Your secret let­ter is “L” as in “Laugh”. Can you remem­ber that? Good. Now get to work and tell all of your goons. We’ll be in touch soon.”

The let­ters cur­rently stand at:
W-E-Y-R-V-T-A-N-C-A-L-C-E-G — looks like it may include the word “Har­vey Dent”

Ini­tial heads up via Adam

Joseph Can­do­loro

I just noticed this name at the very bot­tom of the Con­cerned Cit­i­zens website,

“Joseph Can­do­loro, Esquire, is the founder of Con­cerned Cit­i­zens for a Bet­ter Gotham.”

Try­ing out the name yields this inter­est­ing web­site: www​.joseph​can​do​loro​.com –peo­ple may want to try out that email address and tele­phone number:

Joseph Can­do­loro and his asso­ciates pro­vide legal rep­re­sen­ta­tion in fam­ily law cases in Gotham. Our ser­vices are highly indi­vid­u­al­ized to address our clients’ par­tic­u­lar situations.

Fam­ily law lit­i­ga­tion is com­pli­cated by ties of blood and emo­tion, but we have devel­oped an arse­nal of tech­niques to cut through com­pli­ca­tions with sur­gi­cal pre­ci­sion, an approach that while it seems ruth­less, we feel causes the least long term dam­age. Our approach includes a per­son­al­ized attorney-client rela­tion­ship, based upon each client’s indi­vid­ual cir­cum­stances. We strive to be the voice of rea­son dur­ing a highly emo­tional time, and we work hard to set­tle mat­ters with­out lit­i­ga­tion when­ever possible.

When lit­i­ga­tion is unavoid­able, we are for­mi­da­ble advo­cates for the clients of our firm.

Con­tact infor­ma­tion:
Joseph Can­do­loro & Asso­ciates
101 East 11th Avenue
Gotham City

JCA@​JosephCandoloro.​com
1866 626 8049

He also turns up at St Swith­uns record search:

With the new issues of The Gotham Times, comes a new Joker defac­ing, with the famil­iar black eyes and wide-eyed bloody red grin. “Now there’s a smile”.

The Ha Ha Times: www​.the​ha​ha​ha​times​.com

Thanks Keith!