It's hard to imagine how anyone could improve on the documentary awesomeness that is the "The King of Kong" — but it looks like a cinematic remake is in the works and is for real.
In case you somehow missed it, the "The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters" is a fascinating, nail-biting and often hilarious documentary from 2007 about the battle for the top "Donkey Kong" score. The doc followed, in particular, two main competitors — Steve Wiebe and Billy Mitchell — in an epic back-and-forth battle that continues to this day.
The good news is, the people who brought us the original documentary are the ones working on the remake — that's director/producer Seth Gordon and producer Ed Cunningham.
Gordon, who most recently directed the feature comedy "Horrible Bosses," talked to The Playlist about how some of his television work has inspired him to revisit "King of Kong" in a mockumentary-style:
I've done some work on 'Modern Family' and 'The Office' and have worked in this doc style, and so that inspired me to say, instead of doing a traditional narrative feature script, what if we did the remake in the doc style? What doors what that open? What opportunities? What additional story could we tell? And that's essentially the approach we took.
Though there is no timeframe for the movie to begin shooting and Gordon is already scheduled to direct a remake of "WarGames," he said screenwriter Melissa Stack has completed a script. "So it’s quite real.”
Remaking a documentary as a mockumentary is ... an unusual choice. But as a fan of "Waiting for Guffman," "Best in Show" and "This is Spinal Tap" ... I can see how the serious and sometimes silly world of competitive arcade gaming could get fantastic cinematic treatment in this style.
One thing's for sure, it sounds a whole lot better than the "Space Invaders" movie.
(Thanks to Kotaku for the heads up.)
For more gaming news, check out:
- Space Invaders ... The Movie? Yes, Space Invaders: The Movie
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- Sid Meier and 'Civilization World' set out to conquer Facebook
- All hail the new King of (Donkey) Kong
Winda Benedetti writes about games for msnbc.com. You can follow her tweets about games and other things right here on Twitter.