Duke4.net Forums: What would be the perfect Duke movie? - Duke4.net Forums

PsychoGoatee, on 30 April 2015 - 03:46 PM, said:

I think the best Duke Nukem movie would be one based off of Duke 3D, maybe not using every single scene, but enough to let people know it is a Duke movie. Otherwise it'd fall into the category of Game based Movies that tried but failed... like Doom. I loved that movie, but compared to the game it failed. I think if you take the story and, most of, the areas from Duke 3D, I think fans would react better and it'd probably be a decent movie.

The perfect Duke movie is no Duke movie.

Princess Twilight Sparkle, on 03 May 2015 - 06:59 PM, said:

Why is everyone so against the Duke movie?

Because every Duke-related thing after Duke Nukem 3D sucked (feel free to prove me wrong on that), and DNF proved that even lots of time and money isn't enough to make Duke appealing in the current millennium. Maybe if somebody like Christopher Nolan, Quentin Tarantino, or Martin Scorsese (or anybody else just as exceptional) approached to direct the film then I'd give it a chance - but since that will never happen, any attempt to make a Duke film can go die IMO.

I edited this post like crazy.

Princess Twilight Sparkle, on 03 May 2015 - 07:37 PM, said:

I still have faith in a Duke Nukem movie, and there are only two games after 3D that sucked (by everyone else's standards), DNF and Critical Mass, I have yet to play the latter, but the former I thoroughly enjoyed and still play frequently. Directing wise, I think Michael Bay from when he did Bad Boys (his other stuff's a bit to much) would be great, as he loves explosions... but no shaky cam or extreme slowmo. I love Christopher Nolan's movies, but I think that'd be a mistake, as I think he'd take it a bit too dark/serious.

Never Forgotten, on 03 May 2015 - 07:41 PM, said:

LOL

Yeah no.

Princess Twilight Sparkle, on 03 May 2015 - 07:44 PM, said:

You're thinking of his recent stuff, back then he was a decent director, and knew what to do with action. Every movie now is plagued by modern superhero movies... as Lester said in GTA V, every movie now is superheroes, romantic comedies, or a remake (I think I got the quote right...). But I believe somewhere out there someone could make a good, or great, Duke movie.

Actually, I agree. I really did like "The Rock" for quite some time, then a few years later I learned it was a Micheal Bay film and I felt a little embarrassed. Then I figured since I liked it so much, maybe he's really not that bad.

I still hate Transformers though.

Princess Twilight Sparkle, on 03 May 2015 - 07:51 PM, said:

I liked the first one, but the rest have been a bit bleh. But it seemed back in the 90s he actually knew how to direct, then it seems as if he's been having seizures while directing.

A Tarantino Duke film would be ridiculously over-the-top to the point of parody. The "one man army" trope would be played to a T, with Duke Nukem somehow managing to haul his entire arsenal of weapons - shotgun, chaingun, RPG, freezer, devastator, etc. - into combat to the blaring accompaniment of spaghetti Western music. And then he'd eat a cheeseburger.

Comrade Major, on 03 May 2015 - 07:55 PM, said:

That would be somehow amazing. I'd love the idea of Duke being a one man army in a movie as well, even thought some side characters that pop in-and-out here and there would be okay by me, Bombshell, Dylan, Graves, etc.

1. Duke Nukem reboot/Duke Nukem Begins.
An origin story which tells us how Duke went from a former rogue military member to a world renowned hero by defeating his arch nemesis Dr. Proton.




2. Duke Nukem, embracing the stigma of the character.
Duke is an older has been whom the world has shunned and forgotten. A deadly foe from the past returns to devastate the Earth, leaving only Duke to save the world, and our chicks.




3. Duke Nukem, "The hack job."
Cutting bits and pieces from all the Duke games and creating a unique stand alone scenario that ignores that Duke has become somewhat of a forgotten character of yesteryear.




4. Using Duke Nukem 3D as the basis.
Duke 3D is the most successful game in the series, and it retains a cult following to this day. The most iconic aspects of the character, the most iconic locations, situations, monsters, gadgets, and Dukeisms all come from this game.

 Duke3D Movie Transcript Full.rtf (11.51K)
Number of downloads: 182

^ This is a fairly accurate transcription of all the dialogue and plot relevant information for the first three episodes of Duke Nukem 3D.(I utilised some of the quips heard in the various betas that were ultimately cut.) This is just about everything except for the visual parody/sight gags, that could be utilised for an adaption. Interesting to note that most of the humour doesn't exactly shine through in this transcription format. You can't just port these events straight over to a film for obvious reasons, but you could use it to form a treatment, and then mold that into a screenplay. At my estimation there are about five really stand out moments, situations, and set pieces that you could structure the film around in the first episode. The opening with Duke returning to Earth and being shot down would make for a fantastic action-suspense piece, the theater is just a great piece of Americana and would make for a fantastic fourth wall breaking action piece. The strip club/bar setting is excellent for that retro grungy 80s atmosphere, and if you were to tweak the details a bit, having the strippers basically be brainwashed agents of the aliens that lure Duke into a trap, that would be awesome. The escape from the Prison is also a great set piece, and finally the descent into Hell to finally discovering the source of the initial invasion of LA is just so cinematic, those sequences practically would write themselves. You'd want to weave in characters. I think having a "heavy" pig cop would be a smart move, having Graves in communication with Duke somehow ala John McClane and Al Powell of Die Hard, and maybe having a babe who's basically hiding, evading aliens ala "Newt" and in the end Duke has to rescue her from the Battlelord's hive ship.

If I were to go the Duke3D adaption route, I would probably only follow the events of the first episode to start with, and have one of those now common-place post-credit sequences where we have it revealed to use that there is alien activity on the moon.



For my money, it needs to be an animated film if it's ever going to happen. Either in the vein of the adult Spawn animated series, or a CGI series done in the same style as the old Duke Nukem Time To Kill intro, which was probably the single best stylistic take on the Duke character/attitude. Duke Nukem Time to Kill Intro

^An adult animated film or CGI version could be a cool way of bringing Duke Nukem to the big screen, as JSJ would be able to provide the voice for it. I know he has spoken/joked before about the idea and making it R rated, and (hopefully) inspiring a new genre of adult CGI movies to follow. It would be neat to see something like that happen someday, but I think it will be a long time before we hear about anything Duke Nukem related.

P.s. I was really impressed with the Spawn animated series. Great stuff imo.

While that idea's not bad, it's probably one of the best ways to do it, I believe Duke needs to be live action. Live action is the only way to keep that's 80's/90's action movie feel. And I believe that you could keep all three episodes in one movie saving the sequels for other games/ideas.

Never Forgotten, on 06 May 2015 - 04:42 AM, said:

No it really isn't, and there are literally hundreds of examples in gaming and animation that demonstrate that. I'll name two right off the top of my head. Far Cry Blood Dragon and Hotline Miami. 80's/90's action movie feel has literally nothing to do with whether it's live action or not. It's down to the writing, directing, and editing. It's all about capturing the visual style and feel. The aforementioned Duke Nukem Time to Kill feels exactly like the opener for an 80s action movie.

Never Forgotten, on 06 May 2015 - 04:42 AM, said:

Sure, if you want to overstuff the run time with too much scenery and design that none of it ever get's a chance to shine. You might be able to stretch a budget to do that with animation, but in live action? Are you kidding? You've got three Jurassic Park T'rex-sized monsters to build there, you've got urban sets and locations, alien sets and locations, lunar base sets and locations, dozens of monsters to either build or do in CGI, all the gadgets for Duke. To say nothing of trying to smoosh all of it down into two hours. Nothing will get a chance to resonate or breath.

Commando Nukem, on 06 May 2015 - 10:40 AM, said:

I believe there are certain parts of Duke 3D that can be removed for realism/time, like the gearlike room in bank roll. And with the first episode being so short, it could easily be condensed, without removing any of the iconic areas. It's all about the skill of the person who makes the movie, and the dedication to the source material. Otherwise the first movie would be really short, with the second and third being a bit longer.

Never Forgotten, on 06 May 2015 - 10:59 AM, said:

You're talking about it as though it's going to be a direct translation of the game. Bad idea IMO.

Micky C, on 06 May 2015 - 08:10 PM, said:

Is it any worse than making a movie that does like almost every game based movie and completely ignores the game? Doom removed Hell, Resident Evil added a completely new area, Super Mario Bros. (which was the very first video game based movie) ignored the game completely, and even the Splinter Cell movie is removing Sam's trifocal goggles. We need a movie like what I'm describing, something that when you see it you get nostalgic and you automatically know it's Duke Nukem. Not something where you're sitting there wondering when the game references are going to kick in, or when the movie will take a turn towards the game.

Never Forgotten, on 06 May 2015 - 09:48 PM, said:

Lol every one of those movies sucked ass because of the very reasons you describe. When I sat down to watch RE I wanted Re, not some mainstream trash where the main character has absolutely retarded super-human abilities. Doom...lol Doom, Doom isn't Doom without hell that's why the movie is a complete joke written by hacks. I mean, RE would've been an awesome movie with the story from 1 or 2, no reason to change it what-so-ever. All game movies will always be written by hacks with no idea what they're doing. The problem with Duke Forever is they took it too seriously, Duke3D struck that perfect balance of sarcasm, parody and fantasy. The only decent game movie is MortalKombat because they actually stuck to the source material, lore and all.

I know 2 good/faithfull adaptations of video games : POSTAL and PRINCE OF PERSIA !

gemeaux333, on 07 May 2015 - 04:39 AM, said:

And Postal. Forgot about that. That was a hilarious movie

Never Forgotten, on 06 May 2015 - 09:48 PM, said:

You can't just take a game and turn it directly into a movie, that absolutely will not work. There's a difference between spending 5+ hours running around shooting stuff in a game, and having good memorable action with decent story and conversation in less than 2 hours in a non-interactive medium.

The movies you described weren't crap because they didn't recreate locations from the games, it's because they ignored the themes and tones of the games. If you make a Duke Nukem movie with the right themes and tones, with proper pacing and half-decent dialogue/story (at least by 80s standards), then Hollywood Holocaust or not, it'll be a damn good movie. Of course getting all those right is a pretty big "if".

Unless you're dealing with a very plot and character heavy game series, something like Mass Effect, you don't really want to do 1:1 transfers.

Duke as a character need not be changed to fit into the film world. He, after all, originates from the film world in Schwarzenegger's characters, and also They Live and Army of Darkness. So that's fine, but when you're talking about the structure of a film, you can't adapt any of Duke's outings straight over into a film. It just wouldn't work. Even the arguably best written Duke Nukem adventure, Zero Hour, would need a lot of tweaking to actually fit into a film. (For one, it would cost an obscene amount of money.)

If you look at Hellboy or the first two Blade films you can actually see a fairly solid template for the way a Duke Nukem film would have to handle itself. The awesome thing is we already have a solid set of characters to back Duke up that have been developed over the years. A mythos, as it were.

Here's an example scene I wrote utilising characters from DNF and transferring the character and attitude of Duke from the game format to the film format.

 Duke Movie Octabrain Sequence.rtf (7.91K)
Number of downloads: 177

^^^ It's very Arnie-esque. I like it. That is a good example of a scene that can be played either by a Dolph Lundgren, Arnold Schwarzenegger, or even just straight-up Duke Nukem/Jon St. John type of character.