The video game, which broke sales records this year, may soon be the subject of a horror movie adaptation.
Do you too have nightmares thinking about the colossal debt you owe to greedy Tom Nook? Do you also develop anxiety at the idea of having an island less cool than that of your friends? Get ready to shake even more with your pro video game
This is one of the most bizarre news of this week: the saga Animal Crossing could indeed be the subject of an upcoming horror film. This is not a joke. American director and producer Timur Bekmambetov (The Darkest Hour, Abraham Lincoln : Chasseur de Vampires) bought the rights to a short film, which aired this year during the digital edition of the South by Southwest (SXSW) festival in Austin, Texas.
Tom Nook, scarier than Uncle Scrooge?
Entitled Don’t Peek, the short film was very well received at the festival. It features a young girl playing Animal Crossing in her bedroom late at night. She quickly realizes that her avatar’s actions reverberate in real life. The story could have taken a very charming turn (after all, who has never dreamed of going trout fishing with a pink hippo wearing a polka dot sweater?), Except that she realizes that a mysterious monster wants to use her to exit the game. The young girl is afraid.
The short film, by Julian Terry, looks like a funny mix between Invisible Man (one of containment’s biggest cinematographic successes) and an advertisement for Animal Crossing : New Horizons, the video game that broke many records in 2020. In other words, a good cocktail of very lucrative products.
Horror vision
This process of dialogue between the world of video games and cinema has already inspired many authors: there are Ralph’s worlds at Disney of course, but also the super Ready Player One by Steven Spielberg. Coming soon, Ryan Reynolds is also set to appear in Free Guy, an action comedy in which he plays a character who fights to save his game from extinction.
After the box office success of Sonic, it’s no wonder hollywood is trying to capitalize on life simulation games. With very famous and very lucrative franchises like Animal Crossing where the Sims, the sector represents a market that is still relatively unexplored and potentially interesting for the cinema industry.
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