Heed my warning: You’re going to look back at the days of movies based on board games as a golden era for movie adaptations. There is shit brewing in Hollywood right now that will freak you out. We’re not that many years away from a movie starring Jack from Jack in the Box, and you can only imagine the sorts of adventures the Ty-D-Bowl Man will get into.
But we’re still smack dab in the midst of the board game revolution, with Peter Berg making Battleship next and Ridley Scott still hovering around Monopoly. Sony’s getting into the running with a movie version of Risk, the war game. I’ve never played a single game of Risk (despite owning the lame ass Lord of the Rings variant that doesn’t even include Mordor), so I don’t really know how this game could make a movie.
And based on the vagueness in the press release, I’m not sure Sony or Hasbro knows either. Columbia Pictures president Doug Belgrad says, “The strategic thinking and the tactical gambles that players must take in the game are what make RISK a classic, thoroughly engaging game. Those elements translated into an action-packed, thrilling story are what will make this a uniquely exciting movie.”
Berg’s Battleship is just going to be a naval combat movie that uses the title of the game. Could Risk be the same – a movie about a massive land war? – or will the studio go with a Jumanji type story, where kids playing the game fall into the world or something? Perhaps by the time the plot is announced we’ll have mustered up the enthusiasm to care.