Free Guy's Shawn Levy On Why Good Video Game Movies Are So Difficult

Shawn Levy almost ended up directing the Uncharted movie, but ultimately left that project to work on Free Guy with Ryan Reynolds, which comes out this Friday. In an interview with io9, Levy explained why making video game movies can be so hard, and why he had a better time with Free Guy, which so far has been compared favorably to the vast majority of video game movies.

Movies based on video games have a terrible reputation that, for the most part, is well earned. Levy has explained why he thinks that happens, saying that Free Guy turned out so well because it didn't have the burden of being based on an already popular video game.

"What I know from experience--from having walked a bit of road with Nathan Drake and that Uncharted title--is you can tell a story on screen, but you have to be faithful to the game expectations and gamer expectations of the original franchise," Levy explained. "That will always put guardrails on your storytelling."

"I can't wait to see Uncharted also, but for me as a director, to have absolute freedom, absolute creative freedom where I'm beholden to nothing except the ideas that were exciting to Ryan and me, that was really fun," Levy added. "And that is not the case when you are making an adaptation of a video game, a true video game movie in that regard. There's always going to be parameters that you have to be conscious of."

For what it's worth, the Uncharted movie is still largely based on the script Levy developed when he was attached to the project, though it sounds like the director had a lot more fun with Free Guy in the end.