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A Roller Coaster Tycoon Movie Rattles Toward the Big Screen

by Ethan Anderton
May 13, 2010

It's been proven time and time again that video games have had more than a few problems translating their success to their respective film adaptations. But rather than going after the action adventure kind of games that keep hitting the big screen, Sony Pictures Animation is taking a different route by picking up the rights to Atari's video game series Roller Coaster Tycoon for a feature film adaptation. Development is being headed by Harald Zwart, who recently directed The Karate Kid remake for Sony, and there's a chance he might even direct. What's next, a movie centered around that old party trivia game You Don't Know Jack?

The game is easily described as a more focused version of Sim City but instead of building an entire city you build and manage a theme park with a special focus on customizing your very own roller coasters. Obviously Sony is trying to reel in audiences with that oh so wonderful brand recognition trick that everyone seems to be falling for as of late, when they could just as easily make a movie about theme parks and roller coasters without spending the money on the name itself. David Ronn & Jay Scherick, who recently wrote The Smurfs for Sony, will write this screenplay which, like that pointless adaptation, will be a live-action/CG hybrid.

Surely the studio won't pass up the opportunity to make this in 3-D (how can you ignore a 3-D roller coaster ride?!), then we'll be that much closer to movies becoming nothing more than amusement park attractions, and then those attractions will have stories with more substance (or so I hope). Hell, some theme park rides already have better stories than some movies, so we're already halfway there. Soon you'll be heading to the county fair or carnival to get a sneak peak of J.J. Abrams secret roller coaster. Anybody care about this?

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