One’s judgment of a movie is pretty much dependent on the criteria one uses to decide the movie’s worth. Some people look for characterisation, others look for profound messages while others will simply look at the film’s entertainment value. Doom may not score many points on the first two but for mindless, action-packed entertainment it can’t be faulted.
Adapting a movie from a game is no easy task. Games are interactive, while movies are passive. In games, especially first-person-shooters like Doom, the player is integral to the action and the story is generally less important than the tasks at hand, whereas in films you are simply a witness to the events unfolding, unable to alter the outcome. This may explain the popularity of games, but it doesn’t justify badly scripted films.
Games have served as the basis for several films, with various degrees of success. Arguably, the best of these was Tomb Raider, but it had a decent character in Lara Croft, who was an attractive, sexy version of Indiana Jones, with plenty of scope for story expansion, which it managed to do. Its success should be have been less of a surprise than Disney turning one of their amusement park rides into a successful movie franchise.
The type of game would also have some bearing on the genre of the film. Tomb Raider is an adventure game, while Doom is simply a shoot-em-up. Out of deference to the fans of the game the movie does not try to be more than that and it succeeds. The whole point of the game was to blast the shit out of anything that moved – kill or be killed – and film does maintain that objective.
The story of portals to Mars and research establishments involved in dubious genetic experiments is pretty thin, but no more so than game-movie Resident Evil. Although it is explained how the beasts came into existence, it is not that important. What is important is they must be destroyed with extreme prejudice.
Once we are given a cursory introduction to Sarge (Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson) and his elite team, with not much more than a roll-call of their monikers from their larger-than-life weapons, and a quick summary of their predictable and stereotyped characteristics, the film jumps straight into the action, which doesn’t let up until the final credits.
When I went into the screening I was expecting it to be nothing but a constant bloodbath and not much else but, to their credit, the writers and director managed to maintain a high level tension and excitement throughout, as members of the team are picked off, with very few flat spots despite some pretty dire and predictable dialogue; but if you want good dialogue in a movie you would watch a Tarantino or Joss Whedon film. It might seem nit-picky, given the fairly implausible nature of the story, but I did find it a bit hard to believe that Reaper (gruff, swarthy Karl Urban) and forensic archaeologist Sam Grimm (delicate, blonde Rosamund Pike) were twins. But their relationship is crucial to the thin plot.
The tension throughout the film was heightened by an obvious lack of CG. The fact that the creatures were men in suits, created by the legendary Stan Winston Studio, helped to bring more reality and menace than would have been possible with CG, with the actors actually interacting with what is seen on the screen. With Brothers Grimm and Serenity also using ‘real’ monsters it would be nice to think there is a return to good old-fashioned craftsmanship, to compensate for the over-reliance on CG seen in recent years. It was the ‘reality’ of the creatures in Aliens that made those films work, and the same applies here.
Fans of the game (and there are a lot of them) will not be disappointed, especially with the point of view sequences, although I wasn’t too sure about the chainsaw, or where it suddenly appeared from. At the risk of sounding sexist, this is more of a blokes’ film. It will, however, appeal to anyone who likes violent action films (like the old Arnie films) or even George A Romero’s movies; there is a sequence towards the end that resembled zombie carnage from Land of the Dead, but without the social commentary. Doom’s only message seems to be, don’t mess with genetics, which is a pretty important one anyway.
Don’t expect art, but there is plenty of bloody action to keep you entertained on a cold winter evening.
In Cinemas from December 2.
Added Nov 12th: I have just seen this movie and have to say how fabulous it was – if you have ever played the game you will pick up on the detail and the fun with chainsaws… I saw it with a lively audience in France who cheered when the BFG appeared on screen. Go expecting to see lots of things getting shot, quick cutting and cool effects and you will not be disappointed. Louis