Uwe Boll To Quit Making Movies With 1M Signatures

An anonymous reader writes to mention that Uwe Boll, the infamous German director behind such video game adaptations as House of the Dead, BloodRayne, Dungeon Siege and Postal, has recently admitted that he would retire from making movies if enough people want him to stop. When FearNet mentioned to Boll a petition online signed by 18,000 people requesting that he cease making films, Boll responded that '18,000 is not enough to convince me.' So how much would be enough? 'One million,' Boll said."

What's so bad about Uwe Boll?

[oncehour]

Having never seen a Uwe Boll movie, can someone tell me what's so bad about him? He's got some serious hate going on on the internet, and I'm just a bit curious as to why?

Re:What's so bad about Uwe Boll?

[JediLow]

He makes your eyes bleed... seriously. (I've tried to watch some of his stuff, I couldn't take it)

just let him be

[nguy]

I don't get it. Why petition the guy to stop making movies? Maybe his movies will be quickly forgotten, maybe they'll be cult classics 50 years from now. As long as he manages to finance them somehow and stay in business, who cares? If you don't like his movies, do what I do: just don't go.

That's got to hurt

[Devin Jeanpierre]

I'd never sign such a petition. He can make whatever films he wants, so long as people are willing to pay. It's a lot more hurtful to try to convince him to stop with 1 million people asking. That's... well, that kind of thing hurts. The only thing that could lessen it is the whole idea that, chances are, the petition wouldn't really have had 1 million people sign it, but maybe 300 000 sign it 3 or 4 times on average.

Re:What's so bad about Uwe Boll?

[Schnapple]

Having never seen a Uwe Boll movie, can someone tell me what's so bad about him?

• -His movies are bad. Really, universally accepted as terrible.
• -He keeps getting handed video game franchises to make movies out of, which is problematic because video game fans hate to see their favorite franchises turned into crappy movies, but it has further reaching implications in that it states, essentially, that the movie industry has no respect for the video game industry since they keep letting this man make shitty movies (that lose money, no less)
• -His initial career was only made possible due to a loophole in German tax law which allowed him to spend other people's money on his bad movies since they could write off the loss for tax purposes. Once that loophole was closed, he decided to stop making expensive ($1M+) movies
• -He's quite arrogant and usually pretty angry (which you might be too if people kept shitting on your movies
• -He lured critcs out to a charity fight [wired.com] and then beat the snot out of them, sending one to the hospital

On a deeper level, whereas people like you and me have to work our asses off, he's rich off his no-talent works because of a (now closed) loophole. He wipes his asses with video game franchises (the Postal movie actually made 9/11 jokes) and he's a pretty despicable human being (see the Wired article above).

Re:What's so bad about Uwe Boll?

[Coryoth]

Having never seen a Uwe Boll movie, can someone tell me what's so bad about him? He's got some serious hate going on on the internet, and I'm just a bit curious as to why?

He engenders the degree of hate (particularly on the internet) that he does for a couple of reasons. The first is that his movies are bad -- and I mean really, painfully, teeth-grindingly bad. Of course that alone doesn't generate that much hate; there are, after all, an endless supply of incredibly bad movies and abysmal movie makers in the world. The second point is that Uwe Boll has a great love of "adapting" computer games for the screen, and he is highly prolific at doing so. This manages to piss of geeks by raping their fond memories of games (Boll has a habit of going after older games, as far back as the 80s) by butchering what made the game good and simultaneously making something that, while attractive from the title, is painful to sit through. For those who have wised up and don't attend his films, there's still the niggling fact that, by producing so many video game based films that are so very bad, Boll has gone a long way toward discrediting both video games, and the idea of making films based on video games (in this latter point he is hardly alone of course). Since internet geeks and video game geeks have a nice large overlap, this makes internet based Boll hate something that gets noticed.

Free publicity

[HexRei]

This is nothing but a scam to get Uwe more publicity. Right now he's a hack director, I doubt a million people are even really all that aware of him.

In All Fairness...

[sking]

This only makes sense if there is a petition to sign asking him to KEEP making movies.

And does it really matter? Nobody has to watch the movies he makes. Let the market decide.

Re:What's so bad about Uwe Boll?

[dougmc]

I'm not sure it's entirely his fault. After all, video game movies have a history of sucking, even before Uwe started making them. But you would think he'd either 1) get the hint and stop, or 2) find out why they suck and fix it and if #2 is impossible, there's always #1.

Re:What's so bad about Uwe Boll?

[iluvcapra]

As someone who actually works in the film industry, I'm not too quick to complain, since all of his films generally result in people working....

But on the other hand, his films are some of the most cynically exploitive junk you've ever seen. He uses a provision in the German tax code to get tax credits and free money, and uses those to bootstrap foreign distribution pre-sales and video-game tie in deals. In effect, he's made money before he even starts rolling the camera, and so the quality of his film itself is irrelevant as long as it cuts a good trailer, will have a good poster, and has enough "bankable" stars in the project to stimulate box office. It's essentially the Roger Corman model, just without the class and punk authenticity.

Re:What's so bad about Uwe Boll?

[dougmc]

Nothing wrong with 9/11 jokes. A Postal movie *should* be un-PC.

(Not that I'm saying his movies haven't sucked. Or that video game movies didn't have a history of suckage even before he started making them.)

Internet petitions...

[jandrese]

If my grandmother rolls her eyes at the idea of internet petitions, what reason is there to think that Uwe would stop making movies from one? Just because someone name Soukin McCocksoff said he's a bad man and should go away on the internet means he'll do it.

Re:just let him be

[Anonymous Coward]

Because they hand him the sole rights to video game franchise movies that might actually have been GOOD if someone else had made them.

I wouldn't do it

[blind biker]

I don't care what kind of movies he did - it doesn't really matter. What matters is to have self-esteem, and that means noone is going to tell me what I should or should not do. It's not a democracy; when it comes to my life, I am the only one responsible to make the decisions. If I feel that my movies have a value, then just because there's lots of people who disagree doesn't mean much. You know the saying: eat shit - one billion flies can't be wrong.

Re:just let him be

[SydShamino]

As long as he manages to finance them somehow and stay in business, who cares? If you don't like his movies, do what I do: just don't go.

I've seen Uwe Boll but never a Uwe Boll film. The problem as I understand it is that he doesn't write original scripts. Instead, he is often handed a gaming franchise, which he then proceeds to shit upon.

So, if you've played a video game and loved the story, environment, characters, you're already invested in the franchise and, bluntly, "care". To see Uwe Boll shit on something you care about makes you angry. Plus, it is very unlikely that a video game whose movie fared poorly in the theater will get a second motion picture in the next few decades, potentially preventing us from ever seeing a movie about a story we love.

You're point would be valid if Uwe Boll did what Woody Allen does - write his own stories - because then we could just all ignore them.

Re:Sign the petition!

[sherpajohn]

Its just a PR stunt. Stop pandering to the tax-loophole-exploiting jerk.

A PR stunt it may well be, but I take exception to your characterization of his financing methods. At least according to his Wikipedia entry, he is one of the few people in Germany using the German tax laws in regards to German film fiancing on the way the German government intended it. the article states most "German" film financing using these "tax-loopholes" are mere exploits used to finance American films.

His movies may suck, but at least he is using the money and tax laws as they were intended!

Re:What's so bad about Uwe Boll?

[ewhac]

Uwe Boll is the worst director EVER.

No. Harold P. Warren [imdb.com] is the worst director ever.

Schwab

Ah more publicity, the last thing he needs...

[kentrel]

This kind of hatred over a filmmaker who's creating something is really sad, pathetic and unhealthy. No, his movies might not be very good, and yes they are in fact terrible, but they're hardly the worst films ever made unless you've never seen 90% of the horror\musical genre, or anything made for youtube.

Filmmaking was and never ever has been a democracy. This idea of writing petitions to DEMAND that he stop making movies that you don't ever have to watch or think about is pathetic. 99% of movies are released weekly around the world that you'll never ever know about, simply because you don't care enough. His movies aren't mass-marketed, they're not shoved in your face on TV or fast food restaurants. The only people who are shouting about Uwe Boll loud enough for ANYONE to hear are the people who hate him. Stop hating him, stop shouting about him, and he'll likely go away a lot faster. In fact, if he had been ignored like most other filmmakers he may have gone a long time ago.

No member of the public has a say in who gets to make movies. It's not a democracy. If they want to vote, vote with their dollar. If enough people still pay to see the movies, such that the filmmaker is still in work, then nobody has a right to demand that he goes, except his business partners. That's life. Suck it up. There are bigger injustices in the world to worry about.

Signing a petition is just hilarious and pathetic, and will probably have the opposite effect people intend. This kind of hatred is unhealthy. Have some perspective people. He's not answerable to any of you. Fanboys need to stop kidding themselves into thinking that they have any say in what filmmakers do. They don't. Filmmaking has been a business since its inception, and still is. Even if there were a million signatures he's under no obligation to do anything that a bunch of deluded movie geeks "demand" of him.

He could make a movie where he prints those signatures out, laughs at them, tears them up, and posts the resulting video on youtube. Don't fanboys ever see that the more they are outraged at something inconsequential like this the more ridiculous and hilarious they appear to the rest of us? Pick your battles.

Re:What's so bad about Uwe Boll?

[commodoresloat]

I'm impressed that this guy had the guts to beat the snot out of his critics. Most of us would B.S. about it or try to bluff our way out of something, but we just wouldn't have the balls to do that. I'm sorry, but that's great.

It doesn't take a whole lot of guts to beat up a guy with no fighting experience who gets lured into the ring thinking the whole thing is a publicity stunt rather than an actual fight.

Re:Signed, signed, SIGNED!

[Bob9113]

I reacted slightly differently. At first, yes I was eager to sign this ... but then I paused ... what about the Mystery Science Theater 3000s and Cinematic Titanics of the future? Where will they buy the rights to destroy movies for a couple thousand dollars?

Nothing wrong with him making crap films. The problem is with making crap derivative works. Crap derivative works that the original artists in most cases are opposed to.

But, then, that's more a problem with copyrights being owned by corporations. The artists get boned and the lawyers and MBAs get paid. And oh how those (sociopathic, since we increasingly select for that in the corporate world) lawyers and MBAs love to sell their children to cannibals for a few bucks.

Copyright to support the progress of the useful arts? If that is truly the goal (and I'm not saying it is, or should be, just if it is), then give the artist more non-transferrable authority.

Re:Signed, signed, SIGNED!

[Alcoholic Synonymous]

You know, I recently made good on a promise that if they released Bloodrayne back in my store, I would buy both 1 & 2 since they come with the opposite PC game. About a month later, we had both.

I watched them, and the movies took me back to the low budget films of my youth and how much fun they were to watch. Then as a young adult, working with a low budget film company, how much fun they were to make.

I can appreciate that people don't like the way he is butchering licenses, but honestly, I have seen far worse films than his, and enjoyed them.

Bloodrayne was my introduction to Uwe Boll, and after all of the ruckus on /. about him, I had very low expectations. The film wasn't that bad. It was better than some of those b-flicks I like. Bloodrayne 2 lowered the bar substantially, but it was the same vein of steaming crap that some of us out there actually love.

I'm not saying the man is a genius, but he does have a place in the film world. Maybe instead of quitting, he should just give up direct video game adaptions and make derivative films instead. I would pay to see more so-bad-it's-good films from him.

And also, we really need to get back to hating the fucker's that made the Doom movie. It takes real effort to make something that bad, and defiantly piss off the fan base before you have even began shooting. (No, really, who did they think was coming to see this movie?) If we get them, it may serve as a "scared straight" program for the rest working on game-to-film adaptations.

Re:Ah more publicity, the last thing he needs...

[HeronBlademaster]

But voting in writing as well as with money is better than only voting with money.

If the studio gets enough people writing in saying "We'll forever hate you and your children if you license our beloved franchise XYZ to Uwe Boll, and we'll never buy your games again", that's more powerful than simply not seeing the movies.

Someone else pointed out as well that if Uwe Boll makes a craptastic film "version" of a video game, the chances that someone who is capable of making a good movie making a good film version of that video game is virtually zero.

The moral of the story is, if I want someone to make a good film version of Half-Life, to pick a random example, I'd better complain loud and incessantly if Valve mentions possibly licensing the franchise to a crappy director. Only if the complaints and letters fail would I have the need to vote with my wallet.

They're two separate forms of protest used at different times. Sometimes, neither is sufficient without the other.

One MEELION

[illuminatedwax]

I don't think people realize just how much one million actually is. If this had any chance of succeeding, I would expect it to be in the six-figure range by now, especially after hitting Digg, Slashdot, and Reddit. One million is a lot of people.

Re:What's so bad about Uwe Boll?

[The One and Only]

A publicity stunt where you're getting into a boxing ring and punching each other? Come on--Uwe Boll isn't a champion boxer or anything. You take a man up on a challenge, at least put in some time learning how to throw a punch.

Re:Signed, signed, SIGNED!

[RespekMyAthorati]

Can you say publicity stunt?

For fuck's sake, don't give this clown any more publicity.It's all he lives for.

Re:Signed, signed, SIGNED!

[davetd02]

That's the modern version of "vote early and vote often."

Re:Signed, signed, SIGNED!

[1u3hr]

Does anyone believe for a minute he would really give up no matter how many signatures?

He would just say: All these people SAY they hate me, but it means a million people know who I am and have seen my movies. Doesn't matter whether they like them or not, I still get paid.

As Oscar Wilde said, "There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about".

Re:What's so bad about Uwe Boll?

[cgenman]

Watch This [youtube.com]. I challenge you to watch the whole thing without skipping. Yes, that includes the part where they recap the current scene twice.

Now realize that this is probably the *best* scene in the movie, mainly because it isn't filled with lines like "Guys, check out this book. Looks pretty old, maybe it'll help us!" and "We finally got to the boat but it wasn't there."

Avoid at all costs.

Snopes' Take

[ecavalli]

I think Snopes' entry on internet petitions [snopes.com] sums this whole thing up nicely:

Claim: Signing and circulating online petitions is an effective way of remedying important issues. Status: False.

Re:What's so bad about Uwe Boll?

[Geno Z Heinlein]

The day arrives.... Two hours later, your eyeballs are bleeding.

You've just described the day I brought my friends to see Highlander 2.