Here’s something I never expected to be typing- it looks like Takashi Miike is following up the incredible critical success of his Kurosawa-esque 13 Assassins with a Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney film.
Those who have thus far avoided the fun and quite realistic (ahem) Nintendo DS game need only know that it follows the career of a pointy-haired defense attorney that also works as detective, helping to find evidence that will help his client get proven innocent. It’s a point and click adventure game that lets you yell “OBJECTION!” at the little DS mic and foil shifty prosecuting attorneys, and it’s fantastic.
Miike hasn’t officially revealed the film yet but he’s dropped enough hints that we know what’s going. At Cannes recently he told people that his next project doesn’t have much blood.
“It is a very light comedy that I am filming now, a court drama, based on a video game, the Nintendo game DS.“, Miike stated, which doesn’t really leave any other possibilities.
There have also been some pictures taken from the set of the film (via this Japanese blog) which only further confirms that it’s a Phoenix Wright adaptation- check out the Steel Samurai in the picture above.
We know Miike as the brilliant mind behind insanely violent and bizarre films like Ichi the Killer, Audition and Visitor Q (our NSFW Bodily Function Junction article about that film), but the prolific director has of course done lighter fare before in his staggering body of work. There’s the recent Yatterman, a kid’s movie, and The Bird People of China, which is almost a straight-up fairy tale. Even this wouldn’t be his first foray into videogames, as he shot a 40 minute prequel to Sega’s Yakuza series a few years ago.
But a feature-length live action Phoenix Wright by Miike… could it end up being the first truly good videogame adaptation? No objections here.
More on Wright-
Phoenix Wright: And Justice For All review
Phoenix Wright: Trials And Tribulations review
Also, this is coming out soon for the 3DS.
6 comments
I’m not a big Miike fan (I find his stuff plodding a lot of the time), however; a Phoenix Wright game is a must-see for me.
Those who still believe there’s never been a good movie based on a video game clearly haven’t seen enough of them, because there are so many by now that it’s inevitable that you’ll find at least one to enjoy.
That is a bizarre rationale. There are a couple of fun adaptations but none I’d label as actual great films.
I think that’s reasonable. “Fun” is good enough, to me, for something of this type. I don’t know what it’d take for one to be a “GREAT FILM” – these are, after all, largely action/adventure-type stories so far; not exactly the kind of thing that lends itself to top-quality Oscar-caliber cinema. We’d likely have to translate something a little more outside of the box.
Raiders of the Lost Ark is a goddamn GREAT FILM and it’s an action adventure. If they could make a video game adaptation as good as that I’d call it the first great one. But so far video game adaptations have all been kind of dumb. I think Ace Attorney could be it, though!
Love the Miike. God Bless any of his ventures.
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