Elden Ring Is Getting A Movie Adaptation From A Modern Sci-Fi Legend

Although cinematic video game adaptations have been a thing for over 30 years now, it feels like we've entered a new era of such films. What's certainly true is that their popularity has only grown, and as more and more of these games get brought to the big screen, the opportunity for variety within the films themselves and the possibilities of who's behind them increases. As evidence comes the news today (via Deadline) that Alex Garland is partnering with A24 and Bandai Namco Entertainment Inc. to bring a live-action "Elden Ring" to cinemas in the near future. While Garland has lent his talents to numerous films in various capacities — a big example being the upcoming "28 Years Later," which he scripted for director Danny Boyle — it seems that he won't just be writing the "Elden Ring" adaptation, but that it will be his next film as a director, too.

Unlike a number of recent video game adaptations — "A Minecraft Movie," "Until Dawn," and the upcoming "Gears of War" — "Elden Ring" is a relatively recent video game, first released on consoles in February of 2022. Despite its freshness, the game has an impressive pedigree: it was co-directed and co-written by FromSoftware guru Hidetaka Miyazaki (of "Dark Souls" notoriety) and working from a story and world created by George R.R. Martin. While it retains some elements from other FromSoftware games (such as a high difficulty level), it features a third-person perspective open world gameplay, allowing players to explore the Lands Between in their own way at their own pace.

While open world video games have been prevalent for many years, there haven't been a ton turned into films yet for a pretty understandable reason: their entire appeal is the customization of a player's experience, as opposed to just a single standard, scripted plot. With a sci-fi legend like Garland on board (not to mention his regular studio, A24), it seems likely that we're not going to get an awkward experience like 2016's "Warcraft," nor a lark like "A Minecraft Movie." It's entirely possible that "Elden Ring" might push the entire subgenre of video game movies forward.

Anyone tackling an "Elden Ring" film adaptation would have quite the task ahead of them, as the game, despite ostensibly having a linear narrative and multiple possible endings, isn't so clear-cut in its storyline. All of the lore of the game's world (and there is a lot) is buried under a pervasive sense of dread and horror, with the player (who belongs to a race of warriors known as the Tarnished) returning to the Lands Between in the aftermath of some devastating, mysterious conflict between godlike beings. In essence, there is a ton of mystery within the game itself, something which matters less in a gameplay scenario when there's lots to do, places to go, and monsters to kill, but could become a hindrance to a non-interactive story.

However, perhaps where others might see obstacles, Garland sees opportunity. After all, the majority of his films are works that place more of an emphasis on the experiential than the concrete. In fact, it's this approach which has seen Garland become rejected as much as embraced; where the journey of "Annihilation" (a movie that happens to feature a very video game-esque structure) beguiled a majority of audiences, the likes of "Men" upset just as many, and "Civil War" ironically split them down the middle. Even this year's "Warfare," assumed by some folks before its release to be a treatise on the Iraq War, ended up being a much more intriguing exercise in depicting war as a warts-and-all "you are there" experience.

With this in mind, it's entirely possible that Garland doesn't bother bogging down his "Elden Ring" adaptation with oodles of lore a la "Warcraft," but instead allows the game's sense of mystery and ambiguity to remain intact. It would also explain A24's involvement in a video game movie, as such an approach would be closer to their indie/arthouse aesthetic than a straightforward action fantasy film. Only time will tell, of course, but this news makes the prospect of an "Elden Ring" movie far more intriguing than most other video game adaptations.