Kojima doesn't want the Death Stranding movie to be a blockbuster adaptation
Kojima has spoken about the forthcoming Death Stranding movie, and he doesn't even care if it makes money or not
➡️ The Shortcut Skinny: Death Stranding movie
📢 Hideo Kojima has spoken about the forthcoming Death Stranding movie
❌ The legendary video game director wants to avoid making a “blockbuster film”
🎭 He’s pitching it more as an “arthouse” piece
🤔 It’s currently undecided if actor Norman Reedus will return for the project
Hideo Kojima has spoken about his plans for the Death Stranding movie, suggesting he wants to veer away from the usual Hollywood blockbuster formula.
After Death Stranding 2 was announced at The Game Awards 2022, it was revealed a movie adaptation of Kojima's hit post-apocalyptic courier game was in development through a partnership between Kojima Productions and Hammerstone Studios.
Speaking to IGN in a fresh interview about the movie, Kojima said he talked to a lot of studios about a Death Stranding movie adaptation before finally settling with the studio, which released horror movie Barbarian earlier this year.
“I received a lot of offers, but my intention from the start was never to make a blockbuster film,” Kojima said. “Alex Lebovici from Hammerstone Studios shared my vision with regards to that.
“There were a lot of pitches to make a large-scale movie with famous actors and flashy explosions, but what good would explosions be in Death Stranding? Making money isn't something I'm focused on at all, either. I'm aiming for a more arthouse approach, and the only person who offered to make a film like that was Alex Lebovici, which makes me think he's a rather unusual type.”
It hasn’t yet been decided if characters from the original game and the actors who played them – including Norman Reedus, Mads Mikkelsen, Léa Seydoux, Guillermo del Toro and Margaret Qualley – will return in the movie adaptation.
“We haven't quite decided that yet,” Kojima said. “The failure of film adaptations of games from a while back has led to a lot of movies that cater to gamers, right? That's why they have the same kind of look as a game. I don't want the Death Stranding movie to be like that. Rather, I'm taking the approach of changing and evolving the world of Death Stranding in a way that suits film well.
“I made Death Stranding to be a game, and games are games. There's no real need to turn them into films. So in a way, the Death Stranding movie is taking a direction that nobody has tried before with a movie adaptation of a game. I think that what I need to make is something that will inspire some of the people who watch it to become creators 10 or 20 years down the line.”
For all its quirky world-building and Kojima-style storytelling, we reckon Death Stranding is one of the best PS5 games around. Like the Metal Gear Solid series before it, it’s got a roster of weird characters, very long cutscenes, and a wild story (cynics might call it convoluted). It’s no surprise Kojima wants to avoid cramming it into a run-of-the-mill Hollywood blockbuster, but how he and Hammerstone Studios will translate it even into an arthouse piece is a bit of a mystery.
You don’t even need to secure a PS5 restock to check it out for yourself. Death Stranding came to PC Game Pass earlier this year, which you can check out on the cheap with our Xbox Game Pass Ultimate discount code.