I’m reasonably certain most everyone played this at one point, right? It’s basically a “roll the dice and move” game for pre-literate children, so drawing random color-cards replaced a dice or number-wheel.
What’s ironic is that it probably lends itself more readily to a movie than, say, “Battleship” because there was a nominal narrative and set of characters attached to hold the kiddie’s interest. So very, very soon we may learn which actors-in-need-of-work will be vying for such choice roles as King Kandy (tailor-made for aging, retirement-minded British thespians!) Queen Frostine (“hottie” TV actresses making the jump to features?) and mincing, vaugely-“fey” villain Lord Licorice (Mr. Depp? Mr. Cage? Start your engines.)
The “big story,” of course, is this delightful quote offered to EW by Glenn Berger, one of the films two (!!!) writers, about their ambitious vision for the project:
“We envision it as Lord of The Rings, but set in a world of candy.”
And elaborating…
“We don’t see it as a movie based on a board game, although it has characters from that world and takes the idea of people finding themselves in a world that happens to be made entirely of candy where there are huge battles going on,” Berger says. “We are going for real comedy, real action, and real emotions at stake.”
…
Y’know what? Fuck it. Fuck being snarky. I want this movie to come out NOW. I want to see the Battle of Pelennor Fields being fought by gingerbread men with giant-ass peppermint sticks and lollipops. I want to see $200 Million worth of CGI used to render a giant fortress made of Licorice. I want to see Mr. Mint wailing on dudes with his axe. I want to see Plumpy getting the ever-living shit beaten out of him – don’t care what context.
MOVIEBOB CENTRAL 
Only good can come from this.
LikeLike
It's CANDYLAND! Whatever fight is in there could be won by a SuperSoaker full of mildly warm-to-hot water. But Bob is right. Fuck it, lets see how ridiculous this can be.
LikeLike
Sweet!
LikeLike
I just hope this scene makes it into the film.
LikeLike
I'm get flashbacks to Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland.
And now I'm envisioning “Tim Burton's Candy Land”.
FUCK.
LikeLike
Every time I hear about a board game being made into a movie, for a second I go, “that's the stupidest thing I've ever heard.” Then I immediately remember the 1980s Clue movie, which was done almost like a British comedy of manners, and was actually quite good. So I can't just dismiss the whole concept outright, I have to wait on execution.
Battleship's not likely to be good, but there hasn't been a decent large-scale naval battle since when–the 70s? They might actually make something cool-looking now that effects technology has progressed from grainy stock footage and models.
LikeLike
A Candy Land movie? Now THAT is an AWESOME idea! I remember playing that game all the time when I was a kid! I remember all the different characters and lands on the board. Plus, “Lord of the Rings but with candy themes”? HELL YEAH, I'd see that!
LikeLike
This could be a hilarious satire of the fantasy genre – but I know that's not what they're actually aiming for.
LikeLike
Lord of the Rings but with candy? Interesting…when I heard about this I was picturing Jumanji as told by high fructose corn syrup.
LikeLike
Sure, why not? But yeah, let's not let Tim Burton handle this one. Grab a few people from Kung Fu Panda or something. That team has the whole “obviously for kids, but also fun for adults” angle nailed.
LikeLike
Oh wow. That sounds… pretty awesome, actually.
Production design by Maurice Sendak, I hope?
LikeLike
You know, of they do it right…
huh.
Didn't think I'd see this day.
LikeLike
I hate to be the one dissenting voice, but are you all serious about liking this idea? This sounds incredibly misguided.
Actually, this sounds exactly like what happened with the Tim Burton Alice in Wonderland: take a relatively narrative-free piece of iconography and force it into the “epic fantasy” mold that's been bastardized ever since 2003.
Come to think of it, its this kind of mentality that turned the Transformers flicks into human-centric, douchey, generic 90s action movies when they could have been a lot simpler.
Maybe its just because I'm a huge fan of the LotR trilogy, but when you start slinging THAT name around, it better be in conjunction with a property that warrants that comparison. CANDYLAND IS NOT ONE OF THOSE PROPERTIES.
LikeLike
No Ryan, I'm honestly with you. While I like the concept of big epic battles, huge ass Kaiju and other no-thought-required geekiness, this seems like a gross misuse of the property.
Candy Land really is a board game with a tale already, an advantage most other board games lack. But it's not supposed to be a big epic like that. It seems more appropriate to use A Bug's Life as your inspiration for something like this.
Maybe they're just getting the idea across incorrectly, but in the end I just can't have faith in this as a family film yet.
LikeLike
Why can't they make movies out of GOOD board games?
Like:
Mansions Of Madness, Arkham Horror, Last Night On Earth, Earth Reborn, Pandemic, 7 Wonders (a card game, I know), Shadows Over Camelot, Betrayal At House On The Hill, City Of Thieves, Letters From Whitechapel, Ghost Stories, Descent: Journeys In The Dark, Dust, Dust Tactics, Tannhauser, Runebound, Battles Of Westeros and Smallworld
you know, just to name a few 😛
I mean, that list right there would comprise at least 10 years of summer blockbusters. CandyLand? Battleship? Bullshit.
LikeLike
“Battles of Westeros” sounds like it is based on Game of Thrones, in which case someone clearly hasn't been keeping up with HBO's marketing.
LikeLike