PIXELS might not be setting the world on fire at the box-office (it’s not going to top it’s $88 mil budget domestically), but someone’s been making money off it: Nintendo.
As a reward for letting Sandler and co. use their characters (including their Golden Goose, Mario), they’ve reportedly had an increase in sales, and on Friday, Shigeru Miyamoto told Fortune that the company may be showing an increased willingness to cross-brand their franchises with further feature films.
“We’ve had, over the years, a number of people who have come to us and said ‘Why don’t we make a movie together—or we make a movie and you make a game and we’ll release them at the same time?’ Because games and movies seem like similar mediums, people’s natural expectation is we want to take our games and turn them into movies. … I’ve always felt video games, being an interactive medium, and movies, being a passive medium, mean the two are quite different.
As we look more broadly at what is Nintendo’s role as an entertainment company, we’re starting to think more and more about how movies can fit in with that—and we’ll potentially be looking at things like movies in the future.”
He doesn’t sound like he’s jumping feet first; like the rest of us, he’s fully aware of the disaster that was the production and release of SUPER MARIO BROS. (which Nintendo was fairly hands-on with, and which you can read about in detail in this piece), as well as the lukewarm critical and audience reception of PIXELS.
But the fan love and public awareness of these franchises, including Donkey Kong, Mario, Zelda, Kirby, and Metroid, is undeniable. It’s been a long time since SMB stunk up the box-office; if HITMAN can get a follow-up within a decade, is it really likely that millennials will call back to that flick when the potential for a big-screen Mario flick is on the table?
My concern, primarily due to that film, will always be tone. Though I was young, I remember with distinct clarity the way my mind lit up when I first saw a spot for SUPER MARIO BROS. on TV. The potential for crazy action and mind-bending visuals in that world is absolutely limitless. But then you see the movie, and how they PG-13ed it up (though it was inexplicably PG), throwing filth, grime, and a wholly inappropriate urban dystopia where polka-dotted mushrooms and magic-powered animal suits were supposed to be. You think we’re seeing less of that these post-Nolan times, where everything is SOMBER and SERIOUS and INCEPTION-WHOMPED? Do we really need to see Dane DeHaan glaring as a broody, conflicted Link, or a Kirby who deals with identity problems due to his power-swallowing?
Our own Monty Cristo proposed that their best bet would be to adapt to animation, and the success of stuff like BIG HERO 6 and the Nintendo-supported WRECK-IT-RALPH would certainly indicate that the notion is intriguing. There, you could do all the crazy, wacky shit Nintendo’s characters/worlds are known for without the fear of making it all look “silly” or “goofy”, and with whatever filmic tone they felt like going for. But the idea of them making another live-action film (or series, like they were rumored to be considering for Zelda) does nothing for this lifelong fan of these characters.
…and I kinda like SUPER MARIO BROS.
