Warcraft movie lands Saving Private Ryan writer(Link)

by Mike Smith

October 13 1:12 P.M.

It's fast becoming an established truth that any movie based on a video game will be terrible. As more details leak out about Sam Raimi's 2011-slated production based on Blizzard's epic World of Warcraft, however, we're wondering if the days of that tradition might already be numbered.

What's the latest news? According to an interview he conducted with MTV last week, the man behind Saving Private Ryan's Oscar-nominated screenplay will be writing the movie's script. Robert Rodat's other screenwriting credits include The Patriot and Fly Away Home.

"We want to be really faithful to the game," Raimi told MTV. "We would have our writer, Robert Rodat, really craft an original story within that world that feels like a 'World of Warcraft' adventure. Only obviously it's very different 'cause it's expanded and translated into the world of a motion picture."

Raimi also confirmed the movie will be an original story, not one based on one of the existing pieces of Warcraft lore. He's working to capture "the Horde and the Alliance and the mythology that takes place in the game, and the archetypes that the game presents. I think we would try and find touchstones within the game to make it accurate and true and choose one or some of the lands that are portrayed in the game with as much accuracy and authenticity as possible."

Does Warcraft's rich mythos have enough character, enough back-story, and (perhaps most importantly) enough brand recognition to succeed where so many other video game movies have crashed and burned? Would you go see a movie based on the second biggest-selling PC franchise of all time? Let us know what you think in the comments.