By Alec Meer on April 7th, 2010 at 11:11 pm.
Non-gaming news now, gamers. Ish. You’re probably aware of Samorost and Machinarium, the gorgeous (and gorgeously strange) point and click adventures known for reducing grown men to tears. (Well, Walker. But then you can also do that by mentioning puppy dogs with itchy ears to him.) If you were holding out for Machinarium 2 or Samorost 3, you’ll need to hold out a fair bit longer, because Czech developer Jakub ‘Amanita’ Dvorský has now turned his attention to a movie instead. This is far from sad news, as he’s bringing his distinctive twisted-beauty character design ethos to the upcoming semi-stop-motion animation Kooky’s Revenge. It looks spectacular, as you’ll see below…
Pink teddy bear aside, the puppets seem agreeably reminsicent of his game work. It’s not strictly speaking his film, however – the director is one Jan Sverák, who’s been making films since 1984, has scooped a BAFTA nomination and was behind Akumulator 1, the most expensive Czech film ever made. Amanita’s role is character and puppet design, which he’s quite clearly done with great aplomb.
Kooky’s revenge is due later this year, and there’s more on the official site. Let’s hope Amanita makes a tie-in game, eh?
07/04/2010 at 23:18 robrob says:
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2010/03/21/the-sunday-papers-111/
Pow!
08/04/2010 at 00:10 Heliosicle says:
beat me to it
it does look fantastic though, I’m looking forward to a dubbed/subbed version coming out
08/04/2010 at 10:23 Lobotomist says:
I am sure that original Czech voices will be much better ;)
07/04/2010 at 23:22 Cinnamon says:
This reminded me that as a small child that the Dark Crystal was the most terrifying thing ever. Even scarier than David Bowie’s trousers and hairdo in Labyrinth.
08/04/2010 at 03:07 Hodge says:
Not to mention his crotch.
08/04/2010 at 04:34 Wulf says:
Great memories, there.
07/04/2010 at 23:23 Gritz says:
Can’t wait until Disney buys the U.S. rights to this and dubs everything over with Robin Williams, Eddie Murphy and Miley Cyrus.
08/04/2010 at 04:34 Wulf says:
Personally I’m hoping a talented dubbing group will get their hands on this.
I miss Redline.
07/04/2010 at 23:27 Hentzau says:
@Mike: Yes.
http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/6052/wjat.jpg
07/04/2010 at 23:38 Alec Meer says:
Oof, that shouldn’t be there. If anyone sees it again, could you copy and paste whatever the ad links to in a comment or mail to us, please? We need the URL to block it, see.
08/04/2010 at 00:37 HarbourMaster says:
I got that once earlier too, next thing I know, my anti-virus starts going haywire.
08/04/2010 at 04:36 Wulf says:
Hence NoScript and subscribing to RPS…
08/04/2010 at 09:13 Lambchops says:
Yup I got that too. I thought “what a horrid ad” then “hmm anti virus doesn’t like that one” then “sigh . . . task manager time.”
So in short if it pops up again I doubt i’d even get to the URL!
08/04/2010 at 09:31 PixelCody says:
Just a note to say that I saw that ad about 5 minutes ago so it’s still around. My antivirus went similarly berserk about whatever was in the Java cache.
Sadly I found this comment a little later so don’t have a link for you. Apologies.
08/04/2010 at 10:37 James G says:
Oh dear. Got that yesterday and was a bit worried, but Avast! didn’t throw a fit so I just assumed it was a mildly annoying flash ad. Hopefully it was just a case of Opera not executing the relevant bit of javascript, or of the host of the exploit code being blocked by spybot’s various measures.
Using a freshly refurbished laptop, so not sure of the state of adobe. Better make sure I’m all patched up.
08/04/2010 at 11:02 Discordance says:
Status: Infected (events: 1)
08/04/2010 10:54:58 Infected virus HEUR:Trojan.Script.Iframer http://makimode.com/adserve.cfm/?ad_cl=3031&lo_id=261647284&ad_ty=mediumrectangle&ns=n High
Who approved that ad thing anyway? The ones that intrude into the reading area are disgusting things, and this seems full of virus please just remove it
07/04/2010 at 23:29 Billy says:
I saw that too and immediately downloaded malware bytes only to find out it was actually on this website!
07/04/2010 at 23:31 bleeters says:
“There is no way to turn back the clock, but you can join us on this trip back to childhood. Assuming, of course, you aren’t a child. Then no journey necessary.”
Thanks for clearing that up, I suppose.
07/04/2010 at 23:51 Isometric says:
This looks lovely.
08/04/2010 at 02:30 jarvoll says:
Wow. That looks, to my surprise, really, really good.
08/04/2010 at 02:38 Cheespuffs says:
Looking forward to this. It is at least something I could show my family… I tried without success to interest them in his games, maybe a movie will work :)
08/04/2010 at 03:13 Hodge says:
This does indeed look wonderful…. much more so than this.
08/04/2010 at 03:47 Paco says:
Wonderful!!!!!!
Do want!
08/04/2010 at 04:39 Wulf says:
It should be no surprise to anyone who’s picked up on my tastes that this trailer completely sold me on the movie. Light fantastic and all that, the kind of thing I have a particular fondness for, a bit special, a bit alien, a bit good.
Now, hopefully a skilled bunch of dubbers will get their hands on this. Now let’s all hold hands and repeat the magical warding chant to keep the evil corporate demons away: Please don’t let it be Disney.
08/04/2010 at 16:21 Sonic Goo says:
Subtitles > dubbing, anyway.
08/04/2010 at 05:21 Frankie The Patrician[PF] says:
Can’t wait for that one…and as a Czech national I don’t need to wait for any subs/dubbing :D
08/04/2010 at 05:24 the_fanciest_of_pants says:
Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwesommmmmmmmmmmmmme. This looks great.
08/04/2010 at 07:18 ChewieDC says:
Jan Sverak did first feature lenght film in 1991. In 1996 he got Oscar for his movie Kolja. These film in 80s was only student films. But he got student Oscar also for Ropaci in 1988.
08/04/2010 at 07:19 GLOWi says:
Don’t worry about future Amanita games. Jakub Dvorsky focuses on games and does not plan any films at the moment. Kooky is coming to theatres this spring and was made alongside with Machinarium.
By the way, director of the movie Jan Sverak is an Oscar winner.
08/04/2010 at 07:38 Risingson says:
Hype machine working correctly.
08/04/2010 at 08:43 Dreamhacker says:
WOOOOW! Is this movie for real?
We now need to update the english vocabulary with the word “Samorosty” to sufficiently describe Amanita’s works!
08/04/2010 at 08:57 ghosted says:
“Burn them to a crisp!”
Amazing stuff.
08/04/2010 at 09:16 Lambchops says:
Looks fantastic.
08/04/2010 at 10:06 Pipin says:
I want to corret a few things in this post:
1. As mentioned before, the director Jan Sverak is a Oscar winner (for the movie Kolya). Also, the most expensive movie is not “Akumulator”, but “Tmavomodry svet” (i thing the english title was “A dark-blue world”, about czech pilots in GB in WW2)
2. The title of this movie is not “Kooky´s revenge”, but “Kooky returns”
08/04/2010 at 10:22 MadMatty says:
haha Way to go- i remember commenting on Machinarium: “i´d give this 9/10 IF IT WERE AN ANIMATED MOVIE”.
no more silly illogical puzzles- the style of the art and story however is awesome :D
08/04/2010 at 10:39 Czechton says:
As someone who speaks Czech I feel sorry for the people who cant see this in its native language. The lineup is made up of an all star cast of really funny/well known Czech actors, and this is used to very amusing effect in the trailer (I hope in the film too). I think you guys might miss out on quite alot of the humor if you go to see it. :(
Also, it’s not called Kooky’s Revenge but Kooky’s Return.
08/04/2010 at 10:57 Tei says:
This raise the standards for muppets movies, really. It look rather like a action movie, with supercute characters. It could be a good movie, but as a european production, It will probably get a limited distribution.
08/04/2010 at 11:45 PHeMoX says:
This looks quite amazing!! Great style and the camera work looks as professional as a big budget movie. I am looking forward to this.
08/04/2010 at 17:30 SprintJack says:
Don’t forget to check out the beautiful teaser
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v114H732ubY