Heavy Rain the Movie.

[Lord_Stewie]

Hey,

Looks like a deal in the works to adapt a movie the Heavy Rain game.

The PlayStation3 game Heavy Rain is a multi-character detective story, of sorts, that focuses around a mysterious figure called the Origami Killer. The game is deliberately cinematic in many respects, so it’s no surprise that the film rights have been up for sale. Now, the rights auction is about to close and it looks like former New Line guys Bob Shaye and Michael Lynne will be left holding Heavy Rain.

Deadline doesn’t have much more than that, other than the fact that Shaye and Lynne put up their own money to bid for the rights. The site also notes that Heavy Rain is fairly well indebted to Seven, which the pair of execs put together at New Line over a decade ago.

There’s more than enough story material in Heavy Rain to fashion into a film. But stripped of the gameplay aspects that story may not be the most unique tale. As with most games, a great deal of the appeal of Heavy Rain is the particular manner in which it is played. Characters are controlled with an unusual set of context-sensitive button commands. Some scenes are focused on minutia that would never work in a film. One of the unique qualities of the game is that there are four playable characters, any of whom can be killed during the story. If one character dies, the perspective shifts to the next. That dynamic aspect probably won’t make it to the screen, unless this tries to go a lot father than Clue ever did.

The game is about:

…four protagonists involved with the mystery of the Origami Killer, a serial killer who uses extended periods of rainfall to drown his victims. Ethan Mars is a father who is trying to save his son from being the next victim, while investigative journalist Madison Paige, FBI profiler Norman Jayden, and private detective Scott Shelby are each trying to track down clues to the Origami Killer’s identity.

(Last time we talked about Heavy Rain, remember, it was because Neil LaBute was corralling directors like Peter Bodanovich and Nicolas Roeg to talk about love and sacrifice as a promo piece for the game. Let’s hope Shaye and Lynne don’t look towards LaBute to direct.)

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More to confirm:

One of the major selling points for the PlayStation 3 video game Heavy Rain was that it was basically an interactive movie. There’s even a mock-up poster that lists the characters’ names as if they were actors. There was very little in the way of actual gameplay beyond simple button inputs to perform even the most mundane actions (if you’ve ever wanted to feel the excitement of a guy shaving his face, then Heavy Rain is for you). The story followed four characters hunting for the “Origami Killer” who read the serial killer manual, has a timetable for his kills and little mementos to let you know that he’s a serial killer (in this case, an origami figure and an orchid on his drowned victim).

Deadline reports that Unique Features is close to winning a bidding war on the project. It’s not a bad purchase. They’re basically buying something that requires almost no adaptation.

What do you think?

Enjoy.