Paul W.S. Anderson has gone from directing Mortal Kombat to Resident Evil and now he wants a stab at Metal Gear Solid

Director Paul W.S. Anderson has an extremely mixed reaction when it comes to movie watchers and the gaming community.  Say what you will but the man brought the world of Mortal Kombat to life back in 1995 and he gave us what is still probably one of the best video game film adaptations ever despite the few story concessions that were made.  Paul then followed MK up with the sci-fi horror film Event Horizon, which was an inspiration for the game Dead Space, and the old-school action film Soldier. Both were respectable genre films that while they didn’t set the world on fire got the job done when it came to being entertaining.

Then Paul gave us the film adaptation of Resident Evil which to this day still has a very mixed reaction amongst fans.  The movie and its subsequent sequels have all the familiar characters, locations and creatures that we know and love from the games but are placed in a story that is tepid at best and fails to really grasp the source material.  And don’t even get me started on Death Race, a film that despite starring Jason Statham was a bit hard to sit through.

Speaking to Collider.com about his various projects including Resident Evil: Afterlife and The Three Musketeers Paul mentioned how he and collaborator Jeremy Bolt would like to do the film version of Metal Gear Solid. I’m going to let that soak in for everyone.  While Paul can give us an entertaining popcorn genre film I really can’t imagine what he’ll do with MGS if he manages to get his hands on the project.  I kind of doubt that Paul would be able to give us the deep story that the MGS film would need to have and not have the film just be non-stop action set pieces. 

Ever since it was announced that the MGS film was being developed at Sony Pictures and that writer/director Kurt Wimmer (Equilibrium, Ultraviolet) was taking a stab at the script news on the project has been virtually non-existent.  Now no deal or talks have begun with Paul and Sony concerning MGS but considering that the Sony subsidiary Screen Gems distributes the Resident Evil films I can definitely see Paul directing MGS considering the relationship between the two. Or maybe Uwe Boll will get his wish and he’ll direct the MGS film instead.