For years, Nintendo wanted nothing to do with Hollywood. After the disasterous 1993 movie Super Mario Bros. , the company put up a nearly impenetrable wall, refusing to license its biggest franchises for film adaptations.
Shigeru Miyamoto, the creator of Mario and Zelda, was especially firm on this stance. According to former Nintendo of America advertising manager Gail Tilden, it didn’t matter who came knocking. She said, even “if Stephen Spielberg himself” wanted to make a Zelda movie, the answer was still no.
But not everyone at Nintendo felt the same way. Metroid co-creator Yoshio Sakamoto was open to the idea, and for a brief moment, a Metroid movie nearly became a reality, with legendary action director John Woo (Hard Boiled, Face/Off, Mission: Impossible 2) at the helm.
With Metroid Prime reinvigorating the franchise on the GameCube, the timing seemed perfect. According to Tilden, Woo and his team were serious about the project:
“John Woo’s company… had wanted to pitch to do a Metroid movie. We had several meetings, it took a long time. We would talk sometimes about who should play Samus. Should it be Charlize Theron? Should it be– no, she’s not right.
“Anyway, it was on and on about the actresses that they could see as Samus. Which, we never settled on anything. I think they thought [Samus is] not such a beauty, as opposed to kind of an athlete.”
It’s wild to think how close we were to seeing a Metroid film from Woo! But just as momentum was building, the entire project fell apart. It hit a wall that had nothing to do with Metroid. The issue was Hollywood’s unwillingness to invest in female-led action films, and the one movie that sealed Metroid’s fate was Catwoman (2004).
Halle Berry’s Catwoman was supposed to prove that female-led action movie could be successful. Instead, it bombed hard at the box office and with critics. That failure sent shockwaves through the industry, and any big-budget film starring a female lead suddenly became a tough sell.
“We had several story angles that we pitched or presented and finally landed on something and did a pitch kit and took it out. The level of budget that would be needed to make the movie was significant.
“At the time, the only female action movie that had come out was Halle Berry’s Catwoman, and it didn’t do well. So, John Woo’s company pitched for Metroid, but we did not make a sale.”
And just like that, the project died. That sucks. What Hallowood didn’t realize is that is was the script and story for Catwoman that sucked, not that fact that it it was a feamle-led film. There are lots of successful feamle led movies that came before!
These days, Nintendo has become much more open to film adaptations. Miyamoto personally oversaw The Super Mario Bros. Movie, and a live-action Legend of Zelda film, which is now in the works with Sony.
But despite these Nintendo movies on the horizon, there’s been no word on Metroid getting another shot. But, it sure would be awesome if Nintendo actually finally did produce a Metroid movie!
It would’ve been really interesting to see what a John Woo-directed Metroid movie would be like! Such a missed opportunity for a film that couldv’ve been awesome.
Would you still want to see a Metroid film? And who would you cast as Samus?
Source: Video Game History Foundation
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