To right the cosmic balance temporarily upset by talk of a prequel we might actually want to see, director Ridley Scott continued his let’s-talk-about-everything-but-Robin-Hood press tour this week by dropping some hints on that Monopoly adaptation that is still not some sort of satirical prank, apparently. In an interview with Coming Soon, Scott talked some about the difficulties of transforming a real estate-based board game with no discernible narrative into a workable screenplay, including the demands from creative partner Hasbro that “many would want to integrate literally the shaking of the dice and the throwing of the dice into the board,” for one thing. Fortunately, Scott seems aware that this is a terrible, terrible idea, saying, “I wanted to just make a movie about the idea of greed. I told them, you know your game can turn your sweetest, dearest aunt into a demon—a nightmare of greed. So that's what we're going to do."
According to Scott, Monopoly: The Movie is being pitched as a comedy that will look at the “bloodbath” and “bad behavior” in the real estate market that led to the current economic crisis. Interestingly, the script is currently in the hands of Pamela Pettler, best known for primarily family-friendly animated fare like Corpse Bride, Monster House, and 9. Some time back, Coming Soon also spoke with producer Frank Beddor about his idea for a Monopoly film, and while it’s not clear how much of the story will be retained in Pettler’s version, it at least gives us some idea of how this film is being approached—which is to say from several different angles at once with apparently no concrete idea of how, exactly, to transform a board game into a film, which sounds about right:
Producer/author Frank Beddor previously revealed that the story he pitched for the movie featured a "comedic, lovable loser who lives in Manhattan and works at a real estate company and he's not very good at his job but he's great at playing Monopoly. And the world record for playing is 70 straight days—over 1,600 hours—and he wanted to try to convince his friends to help him break that world record. They think he is crazy. They kid him about this girl and they're playing the game and there's this big fight. And he's holding a Chance card and after they've left he says, 'Damn, I wanted to use that Chance card,' and he throws it down. He falls asleep and then he wakes up in the morning and he's holding the Chance card, and he thinks, 'That's odd.'
"He's all groggy and he goes down to buy some coffee and he reaches into his pocket and all he has is Monopoly money. All this Monopoly money pours out. He's confused and embarrassed and the girl reaches across the counter and says, 'That's OK.' And she gives him change in Monopoly money. He walks outside and he's in this very vibrant place, Monopoly City, and he's just come out of a Chance Shop. As it goes on, he takes on the evil Parker Brothers in the game of Monopoly."
So, some sort of combination of Jumanji and Wall Street, then. What, you’ve got a better idea?