The new Borderlands movie is disappointing in every way. A German director seems particularly pleased about this. He mocks the very low box office result of the video game adaptation on Twitter, even though his own works performed even worse at the box office.
Who is mocking Borderlands? The German director, producer, and screenwriter Uwe Boll is likely a name many of you recognize. In the 2000s, he was THE guy when it came to bringing gaming franchises to the big screen or to video rental stores on a somewhat low budget but with some well-known actors.
At the same time, he was one of the main reasons why video game adaptations earned a bad reputation for years. His filmography includes:
- House of the Dead (with Jürgen Prochnow)
- Alone in the Dark (with Christian Slater, Tara Reid, and Stephen Dorff)
- BloodRayne (with Ben Kingsley, Meat Loaf, Michael Madsen, Udo Kier, Michelle Rodriguez, Kristanna Loken) plus sequels
- Postal (with Zack Ward, Ralf Moeller, J.K. Simmons)
- In the Name of the King – A Dungeon Siege Tale (with Jason Statham, John Rhys-Davies, Ray Liotta, Burt Reynolds, Ron Perlman, Claire Forlani, Kristanna Loken) plus sequels
- Far Cry (with Til Schweiger, Udo Kier, Ralf Moeller, Emmanuelle Vaugier)
Uwe Boll is also known for not holding back his opinions and is willing to fight critics in the boxing ring if necessary (via spiegel.de).
Here is one of the trailers for the new adaptation of Borderlands:
The wrong man for the director’s chair?
What does Uwe Boll say about Borderlands? The new video game adaptation of the Borderlands franchise is directed by Eli Roth (Hostel, Death Proof, Inglourious Basterds, Thanksgiving), who also has a well-known cast – including Cate Blanchett, Kevin Hart, Jamie Lee Curtis, Haley Bennett, and Jack Black.
However, many of the viewers so far have expressed disappointment with the quality of the film – including MeinMMO editor Nikolas Hernes. The disappointment is reflected at the box office: According to boxofficemojo.com, only about 15 million US dollars have been made worldwide so far, with production costs of about 115 million US dollars (not including marketing and distribution costs).
A corresponding report from IGN is commented on by Uwe Boll via X with a bit of schadenfreude: “Ha ha. My movies were rated for audiences 18 and over and made more money than this one. Now you wish I had directed it.” Boll is confident that he would have made a better film – the ultimate punishment for Eli Roth’s team.
In response to the well-supported observation by YouTuber SSFF via X, that Boll’s films “House of the Dead,” “Alone in the Dark,” “BloodRayne,” and “Dungeon Siege” performed even worse at the box office, the director replied with “Wrong” and the image: “Boll is back! 41 billion illegal downloads!”
What is Uwe Boll doing now? The German filmmaker is now a podcaster (via podcasters.spotify.com) and an author (via amazon.com), but he also continues to work as a director, screenwriter, and producer. His current project is called “First Shift,” which is set to hit theaters in the fall of 2024 and revolves around the dangerous daily life of cops in New York.
If you’re interested in some exciting anecdotes from Uwe Boll, we recommend episode 18 of the Pixelkino podcast (via pixelkino-podcast.com). In this episode, hosts Christian Genzel and Heinrich Lenhardt talk to Uwe Boll about some of his video game adaptations, mistakes made, and current projects.
For instance, Boll mentions that he reportedly owned the licenses for Fear Effect and Baldur’s Gate at one point, but nothing came of these two projects. The same goes for a Dungeon Siege production that the director wanted to do for Netflix. These were not the only rejections for Boll: The German director wanted to make the Warcraft film – but Blizzard found him too bad
