Made In Hollywood-Chapter 917: Creating a Nostalgic Effect

Scarlett Johansson was also curious and immediately asked, "What’s the reason for that?"

Duke thought for a moment and said, "Most modern video games have rather simple storylines, so when studios adapt them into movies, they usually need to make certain adjustments to the plot."

He shrugged. "However, in the eyes of the players, what they hope for in a game-adapted movie is that it can faithfully reproduce the game to the greatest extent possible and respect the original work."

"But the plots and settings of games may not necessarily suit a movie," Sofia Coppola said knowingly. "Games and movies are completely different mediums."

"Exactly." Duke nodded slightly. "And that’s where the contradiction appears. Moviegoers in the film market expect game-adapted films to bring them more exciting plots. If the film sticks too closely to what the players want, the movie will be limited by the game’s storyline and settings, greatly reducing its quality. But if it caters too much to the general movie audience, then the gamers won’t accept it."

Hearing this, Scarlett also said, "That kind of contradiction seems very hard to resolve."

In such a situation, a game-adapted movie has to satisfy both the expectations of general movie audiences and the demands of gamers, something that studios find extremely difficult to balance.

Then, Duke gave an example using the movie Resident Evil, which was adapted from the game. This work, in a relative sense, could still be considered a success. Even though it didn’t make a huge profit, at least the studio definitely earned money.

"The reason I bring up Resident Evil," Duke explained slightly, "is because the film completely deviated from the main path of the game and didn’t care about how the players felt. It went down a completely self-indulgent road."

It’s no exaggeration to say that one of the key reasons the Resident Evil movie could be considered relatively successful was precisely because it strayed far from the game’s setting.

In the Resident Evil movie, the plot had almost nothing to do with the game. Because of this, Resident Evil was often mocked by players. The movie bore the game’s title while telling an entirely unrelated story, and gamers ridiculed it as a blatant case of "selling dog meat under a sheep’s head."

From this, one can think carefully—although a game-adapted film can gain recognition by breaking away from the balance of adaptation, it still receives countless complaints from gamers, and without achieving remarkable success, isn’t that just self-sabotaging the IP?

When a game IP can never be forgiven by its players, will those same players buy into it the next time? The answer is, of course, no.

"Can game-adapted movies ever escape the curse of failure?" As a fellow director, Sofia Coppola couldn’t help but raise this question. "And what kind of approach could make that possible?"

When bringing a game to the big screen, how can one make it into a better film? Duke still believed that the most important thing was for the story to strike a perfect balance between the expectations of gamers and those of general movie audiences.

Since plot changes are inevitable in game-to-movie adaptations, studios can, during the filmmaking process, have movie producers and game developers collaborate and work closely together. Perhaps through such cooperation, the final product might achieve better results.

Moreover, during the filming and production of game-adapted movies, film studios should select more competent actors.

The reason for emphasizing competence is that in many game-adapted films, a large number of actors have never even played the game they’re portraying, resulting in a huge difference between their performances and the original in-game characters—for example, in expressions and movements.

The films adapted from World of Warcraft and Assassin’s Creed, in a certain sense, might become historically significant battles for game-to-movie adaptations.

World of Warcraft and Assassin’s Creed are both diamond-tier IPs with incredibly strong fan bases, and both games have rich storylines. This significantly reduces the pressure of rewriting the game’s story for a film adaptation.

There’s no doubt that commercially, this has already laid a solid foundation for success. The multiple delays of these two films were surely meant to improve their overall quality.

However, in Duke’s view, while these two films might change the situation for game-based movies, even if they succeed, they are unlikely to achieve a massive breakout.

After attending George Lucas’s wedding, Duke returned to the post-production of Star Wars: The Force Awakens. He specifically instructed Tina Fey, under strict confidentiality, to order a custom-made ring from Tiffany, so that once the production and release of The Force Awakens were finished, it could be put to use at the right time.

Because the prequel trilogy’s dizzying overload of visual effects had caused dissatisfaction among many die-hard Star Wars fans, Duke used a large number of practical shots during filming. In post-production, CG effects were often used to remove elements from the frame rather than to add more.

However, that didn’t mean the film lacked visual effects. From the richness of its settings to the creation of entirely new characters, every step relied on the magic of VFX. During production, the film had 128 shots completed entirely through visual effects, and the total number of scenes exceeded 1,350—including shots such as Kylo Ren’s ship taking off from the Jakku Desert and heading toward the Starkiller Base, or the TIE fighters returning there after battle.

In other words, almost all shots involving the Starkiller Base, TIE fighters, and outer space were created through post-production effects. Andy Serkis’s Supreme Leader Snoke and Sienna Miller’s pirate Maz were also entirely realized through visual effects.

For a film with such a massive fan base, whether choosing tradition or innovation, the creators bore tremendous risks.

For example, the design of the new lightsaber was highly controversial. Many fans sent emails to Duke and the production team, and some even said, "This design could kill the user instead." Duke repeatedly emphasized that it was inspired by the operational mechanics of the lightsabers in earlier films. The visual effects artists at Industrial Light & Magic frequently reviewed the original lightsaber designs during production and adjusted their appearance according to the environment and lighting of each scene.

The sheer power of Star Wars fandom brought tremendous pressure to the team. Every time the crew released a character image, a poster, or even a concept sketch, countless fans would flood online to analyze it, breaking down every detail—sometimes even zooming in to the smallest pixel. But this pressure also became motivation, driving Duke and his team to never slack off for a moment.

Duke demanded that the visual effects designs make everything look like a real world, not a purely fabricated galaxy.

Without affecting the final cut, Duke also deliberately added a number of emotional, nostalgia-inducing touches during post-production.

For example, Rey’s home planet, Jakku, was designed as a desert world much like Tatooine from Episode I: The Phantom Menace—remote, barren, and far removed from the Empire’s influence. Like Anakin and Luke before her, Rey lived there in obscurity.

Jakku was filled with relics from the Imperial era—massive Star Destroyer wrecks, the remains of AT-AT walkers, and other ruins. Rey’s helmet belonged to a Rebel pilot, and her goggles were made from parts scavenged off an Imperial stormtrooper’s helmet.

Daniel Wu’s character, Finn, bore the stormtrooper ID "FN-2187." In Star Wars (1977), Princess Leia was imprisoned in cell number 2187—a deliberate callback for the fans.

In one of Finn’s scenes, the team added a holographic chess game through post-production—the same one first seen aboard the Millennium Falcon in A New Hope. The same effects team that had created that scene with stop-motion animation decades ago returned to replicate it using the same technique.

Even the floating training remote that Obi-Wan once used to teach Luke lightsaber basics made an appearance—it could be seen lying quietly aboard the Millennium Falcon, instantly stirring memories of classic moments for long-time fans.

The Starkiller Base in The Force Awakens was essentially the new generation’s Death Star, but vastly more powerful—it could drain an entire star’s energy. Few people knew that when George Lucas first wrote the Star Wars script, Luke’s original surname wasn’t "Skywalker," but "Starkiller."

To insert all these nostalgic elements into the film without affecting its overall quality, Duke truly racked his brains.

For instance, he cleverly placed the voices of Obi-Wan and Yoda within Rey’s vision sequence.

When Rey touches Luke’s lightsaber in Maz’s castle basement, she experiences visions of the past, present, and future—and hears the voices of Obi-Wan and Master Yoda.

For this scene, Duke personally invited Ewan McGregor and Frank Oz to record brand-new dialogue for the film.

As for the iconic line "I have a bad feeling about this," it had appeared in every Star Wars movie to date—spoken by Luke, Leia, C-3PO, Anakin, and Obi-Wan and The Force Awakens was, of course, no exception.

The Resistance also featured many familiar faces from previous films: Nien Nunb, who once co-piloted the Millennium Falcon in the assault on the second Death Star, and Admiral Ackbar, a decorated veteran who fought in the Clone Wars, the Battle of Endor, and many others.

In addition, Duke included the famous "Wilhelm scream" during sound mixing.

This wasn’t unique to Star Wars—the "Wilhelm scream," that distinctive male shriek, originated as a stock sound effect used for convenience by the original Star Wars sound designers. To their surprise, it later became a long-running in-joke among sound engineers across countless films.

Post-production continued until mid-November. Once everything was completed, Duke immediately released a public statement.

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