Eli Roth to direct Borderlands movie

Video game movies have a long, rocky history, with a rare few turning out to be absolute gems while many more end up being…decidedly-less-than-gems.

But that doesn’t appear to be stopping studios from taking a crack at adapting some of the biggest franchises in gaming. Last week, the news came through that Sony is finally set to start filming on its long-in-coming Uncharted movie, and now, the good word is that director Eli Roth has stepped in to helm Lionsgate’s adaptation of Borderlands. Cue mayhem!

Set on the wasteland planet of Pandora, Borderlands is a hit first-person shooter series developed by Gearbox Software. If there’s one thing the series is known for, it’s the over-the-top humor. Borderlands is set in a Mad Max style post-apocalyptic world, filled with raider gangs to wasteland creatures to “midget psychos” (yes, that is an actual enemy in the game, although the third Borderlands installment did away with the insensitive descriptor). There’s also a friendly robot named Claptrap, who sounds exactly like the GIR from Invader Zim and manages to get players into all sorts of ridiculous scenarios.

It’s easy to imagine how Roth — known for directing horror movies like Cabin Fever and Hostel as well as acting in Quentin Tarantino’s Inglorious Basterds — could bring his own unique blend of horror and comedy to this world. It almost feels like a match made in heaven…which might prove crucial, because I don’t think anyone could rightly accuse Borderlands of being a story for the ages. It’s a game geared strongly toward a multiplayer experience, and while it does have a decent plot, it’s perhaps not the sort of thing you could see getting turned into an Oscar-worthy film. To work as a movie, Borderlands will need a strong hand at the helm.

On the plus side, the fact that Borderlands doesn’t have a super-deep plot might mean that Roth and company could have a bit more freedom to write an original tale set against the backdrop of this very richly realized world.

But it’s still too early to tell. Considering how little has been revealed about the project thus far, we’ll just have to wait and see.

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