When film studios try to create a movie based on a video game, they don’t always get it right. The trend started with Super Mario Bros in 1993. These days Hollywood’s most recognizable face Dwayne Johnson is having a game-to-film adaptation of his own hitting theaters. But, action-adventure Rampage is not Johnson’s first venture into this genre. Years ago he stared in Doom which was an utter failure. People’s Champ will be hoping that his Rampage will go more in the direction of Tomb Raider.
Doom was released in 2005, and it was based on the third installment of this first-person shooter game. In addition to Johnson, this project also had Karl Urban and Rosamund Pike on board. The game itself didn’t have a deep storyline. It revolves around a soldier trapped on Mars who needs to kill thousands of demonic creatures to get out of there alive. In the movie they didn’t kill that many, and those they did were murdered in the dark with light from flashlights. Not fun, not fun at all. The movie flopped, and it even failed to bring back what was invested in the first place.
The Doom was terrible, but Johnson managed to get the best out of it, and some critics gave him good reviews. But, despite that, he walked away from action films for a five-year period starting in comedies instead.
Today that his latest project Rampage premieres he is aware that this type of films don’t always succeed: “I lived the video game curse because I made Doom. And Doom was a movie based off a very popular video game and was incredibly unsuccessful. So I lived the curse, and I experienced it.”
Jumanji: Welcome to The Jungle star believes that part of the reason for Doom failure was its lack of humor. This is something that he addressed in Rampage: “Also making sure that there was a winking charm and humor in Rampage that, for me personally, was not in Doom.”
Rampage is based on an arcade game from the 80s and is fueled by Johnson’s charm and star power which is something he lacked back in 2005. Add a dose of humor to it, and this action-adventure has all predispositions to be a blockbuster.
