DVD Critics Corner - Doom 2/21/06

[TJL]

It’s 1985.
Mister Mister is on the radio, “Fall Guy” is on the tube, and Ronald Regan is in charge.

All is right with the world.

And what better way to fritter away the afternoon than with a spirited game of "Super Mario Brothers" on your Nintendo Entertainment System? As roly-poly Mario charged left to right through the 16-bit Mushroom Kingdom you probably said to yourself that a game this darn fun should be made into a feature length film!
Little did you know that some movie executives were hiding in your closet
listening to your delusional ranting and a few years later in 1993 “Super Mario Brothers: The Movie” was unleashed on the poor movie going bastards of the planet.
So because of you on that faithful day back in 1985, Hollywood began its fruitless attempt to turn video games into movies, a horrible cinematic practice that continues to this day.

I hope you’re happy.

Okay, a few movies based on video games weren’t a total loss.

Pillow lipped home wrecker Angelina Jolie came close to filling the t-shirt of top-heavy treasure hunter Lara Croft in the “Tomb Raider” movies and the CG animated “Final Fantasy” did a great job of capturing the coma inducing dullness that was the “Final Fantasy” video game series.
Probably the best of the bunch was Merchant and Ivory’s big screen adaptation of the best selling Activision game “Pitfall”.
Released in America under the title “The Remains Of The Day,” Anthony Hopkins turned in the performance of his career as beleaguered adventurer and butler Pitfall Harry.
Emma Thompson was equally splendid as a man-eating alligator.

The latest video game inspired DVD to hit the video store is “Doom,” based on the awesome 1993 first person shooter.
In the game, the object was to run around willy nilly through the hundreds of levels killing the crap out of every monster and fire spitting creature that crossed your path, using a various array of artillery like shotguns, a hand held Gatling gun and a chainsaw, because it isn’t a tea party until someone whips out the chainsaw!
Sadly, the geniuses behind the movie version of “Doom” decided to leave out the stuff that made the game so cool (like the aforementioned chainsaw) and instead cranked out a lame “Aliens” clone starring beefy wrestler turned beefy action star The Rock.

It’s the future, and The Rock plays the Sarge, leader of a crew of Marines sent to bust heads on a remote science outpost on Mars because there are always space soldiers in these sci-fi movies and someone is always doing stupid crap on Mars.
It seems a few scientists tried to splice human and alien DNA together and wouldn’t you know it, the grant money is cancelled when mutants start killing everyone. Now I’m no sci-fi movie scientist, but I hope the scientific community of the future will devote their time to more noble pursuits, like curing all disease or perfecting the theory of cold fusion, and of course making a commercially available hot female sex android for the public.
Sarge and his squad of space jarhead stereotypes (the creepy guy, the stoic loner, the hip black guy, the green rookie) blast away at the mutants while protecting a pretty blonde scientist who invents a super serum that makes men invulnerable, but can’t seem to develop a convincing American accent.
The Rock does his best with the material provided, but alas the Academy better hold off that Oscar nomination for another time, like when I’m having sex with a commercially available hot female sex android.

In conclusion fellow gamers, the film adaptation of “Doom” doesn’t hold a candle to the blood soaked source material. So for old times sake, I say pop “Doom” into the Playstation, strip down to your boxers, break out the Pringles and call in sick tomorrow.
Those mutants aren’t going to shoot themselves.

[Janice]

I saw Doom, and you're right on target.