Finally Nintendo Makes A Movie
Nintendo is finally making a Legend of Zelda movie and judging by the trailer its going to be amazing. It almost seems too good to be true.
That’s because it is. The trailer is an elaborate April fools’ joke by the ign.com staff. It almost seems unfair to play with nerd emotions like that
The trailer opens with an epic musical score over images of medieval life complete with horses, a castles, and pre renaissance clothing. We are shown a young man following his father to Hyrule castle. From there the young man, who we can also assume is Link, played by real actor JR Killigrew, finds the Triforce. This is where nerds across the world leap up in cheers of delight. The thought of a realistic Zelda movie given the epic Hollywood makeover has been an idea never spoken out loud but secretly wished for.
The other two characters that make a Zelda game; Princess Zelda and Ganondorf are also shown in the trailer. Princess Zelda, played by Camille C. Brown, looks perfect as Zelda. The beautiful princess is portrayed as the wise guardian of the Hyrule, which makes sense as in Zelda lore she holds the Triforce of Wisdom. Ganondorf, played by Gregory Lee Kenyon, is the weakest link of the trailer. Don’t get me wrong he looks and sounds intimidating as we would hope from an evil sorcerer, but he looks the least realistic of the three. His makeup seems a bit off which is a shame because overall it a good depiction of the video game character.
Judging by the storyline of the trailer it would seem that the film is drawing heavily from the Nintendo 64 classic, Ocarina of Time. In the trailer Princess Zelda shows a young Link the temple of time and says that he will travel seven years back in time when he exits the temple. This is the inverse of the game however, where when Link went to the temple he traveled seven years in the future.
After the time shift Link looks older and is now wearing the trademark green tunic and cap. As much as we except this ridiculous outfit in the games, it looks kind of goofy in live action, but cool nonetheless.
The scope of the film presented looks massive. We see Link in town, in the temple, in a cave fighting the always frustrating spider, on top of a mountain overlooking mechanical creations of Ganondorf, fighting a giant dragon, and finally battling his arch nemesis atop a spire very reminiscent of the final battle in Ocarina. The last shot of the trailer is of the Master sword resting in a stone we can assume inside the temple of time. It is a power last image. The master sword in the stone is quite possible the most iconic image of the Legend of Zelda franchise and leave you with almost dangerous levels of anticipation.
After the trailer and the thought of a live action Zelda movie sinks in, you start to realize that it, in fact, is too good to be true. After watching you look at the posting date and realize its April first. The IGN editors had spent weeks putting the trailer together and while they have not explicitly given the cost, some estimates have been as high as a hundred thousand dollars. The editors have said it was labor of love and that the time investment was more than the cost.
While the trailer may be for a fake movie, it is still great nonetheless. It is sufficiently epic, and a little ridiculous, as we would hope it would be. I for one am sad that the film is not real.
Tags: 20th Century Fox, movie, Movies, Zelda
