Doom

Film 2 in the weekend marathon and another computer game adaptation although this one is a loose use of the licence unlike FF7.

The game never really had a story, you would just run around and shoot monsters that jumped out of the dark at you. So this was never going to win any awards for best screenplay. When a distress call is sent from an archaeological dig, a team of galactic commandoes, led by WWE franchised eyebrow The Rock, are sent to investigate.

They then find the scientists infected with a condition that turns them into zombies which threaten the planet should they escape from the laboratories they're currently running amok in. A back story shows that a botched genetic experiment was the cause.

The film is shite, and I suspect this due to the lack of story to work on. Rosamund Pike is drafted in as a doctor providing the only female role in the film. Fortunately for the executives there is no love thread involving her. Instead she's the feuding sister of one of the marines.

There are a couple of nods to the game, in particular with the weaponry with each marine having their weapon of choice being one of the selectable weapons in the game. The BFG is in the game too as a hidden weapon. I cried with despair when they called it the Big Force Gun, fortunately the writers redeemed themselves when The Rock later referred to it by its real name "The Big Fucking Gun". In perhaps the closest nod to the original game there is a first person sequence that runs for about 5 minutes. It's during this sequence where an axe wielding zombie drops the axe into his head that provided the biggest laugh out loud moment.

A strange piece of casting was having Dexter Fletcher play the part of a administrator who has lost his legs and moves around on CGI wheels. I wonder what he was thinking when he agreed to play that part.

I don't think we've yet to have a good adaptation of a computer game yet, although Silent Hill might manage it. On the scale of adaptations I think this one would have to be down the bottom of the scale close to the Super Mario Brothers movie. Doom is a horror game but rather than make a horror movie they made an action one, and I don't think it works as well as it could have.