Is Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson going to be the one to break cinema’s longest running curse? Well, the charismatic superstar certainly hopes so with Rampage, director Brad Peyton‘s blockbuster adaptation of the classic ’80s arcade game of monsters mashing skyscrapers. Of course, many have tried to take on the difficult task of making a good movie based on a video game and practically all have failed mightily. Perhaps the fact that Rampage featured no real plot aside from monsters destroying cities means that there’s no obligation to maintain a mythology that often bogs down video game adaptations.
The second trailer for Rampage teases a story that features Dwayne Johnson as a scientist who has formed a bond with a silverback gorilla, communicating through sign language. (Remember Congo? Kinda like that.) Of course, a mysterious substance falls from the sky and transforms Dwyane’s best simian bud into a giant rampaging monster who will soon have to fight other giant rampaging monsters in the streets of a sprawling metropolis. It’s obvious we’re not dealing with high-minded fare, but that doesn’t matter as long as Rampage delivers the entertaining goods of monster vs. monster mayhem.
Co-starring alongside Johnson in Rampage is Naomie Harris, Malin Ackerman, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, and Joe Manganiello. Rampage a number of the key players from 2015’s San Andreas with Brad Peyton directing a script credited to Carlton Cuse along with Ryan Engel, Ryan J. Condal, and Adam Sztykiel.
We’ll see if The Rock can break the curse of the video game movie when the monsters are unleashed and Rampage tears up the screen on April 20, 2018.
The official synopsis for Rampage:
Primatologist Davis Okoye (Johnson), a man who keeps people at a distance, shares an unshakable bond with George, the extraordinarily intelligent, silverback gorilla who has been in his care since birth. But a rogue genetic experiment gone awry mutates this gentle ape into a raging creature of enormous size. To make matters worse, it’s soon discovered there are other similarly altered animals. As these newly created alpha predators tear across North America, destroying everything in their path, Okoye teams with a discredited genetic engineer to secure an antidote, fighting his way through an ever-changing battlefield, not only to halt a global catastrophe but to save the fearsome creature that was once his friend.
