At the Monster hunter, Milla Jovovich plays an outsider. Your character, a US Army ranger named Artemis, is mysteriously transported from our world to a fantastic kingdom full of giant and dangerous monsters. American soldiers are not something that you will find in any of the Monster hunter games. But Jovovich believes that Artemis helped provide an important perspective – almost serving as a replacement for a player who enters his first experience with a Monster hunter games.
“When my character is transported to the Monster hunter the world I could see with the same eyes as when I first saw the game ”, she says The Verge. “I was like, ‘Wow, it’s so beautiful.’ We really wanted people to feel that way when they watched the movie, as if they were playing the game for the first time. “
Jovovich says she was introduced to the franchise through her husband, Monster hunter director Paul WS Anderson, who “was really obsessed with this property for over 10 years”. Eventually, he obtained the franchise rights and went through a few iterations of a script. But it was only rewriting history to have Jovovich as the protagonist that things really worked out.
There was also something about the fictional universe that spoke to her. Monster hunter it is not a typical kaiju story with giant creatures destroying the world. You would not confuse Godzilla. Instead, it is about a place where humanity is deeply invested in the natural world around them. In games, you don’t just hunt monsters to kill them; you use them to create food, weapons and other items. It’s all about survival and gives Monster Hunter its own distinct vibe compared to other action games, with slow, methodical gameplay based on careful planning and preparation.
“I really like this feeling of having to use all parts of the animal and there is no waste,” says Jovovich. There are even scenes in the film in which the slaughtered monsters are well used, as well as in the game.
She says she was able to better understand this aspect of the universe by playing Monster hunter. This experience also helped inform his character’s fighting style. In the film, Artemis joins forces with a local hunter, played by Tony Jaa, and the two have very different techniques. Jaa wields a huge glaive, while Artemis eventually adopts a pair of twin blades (which at one point are on fire). “I really liked the double blades and there are certain movements that go with the double blades that we wanted to shoot”, she explains. But these two distinct fighting styles were not the original plan.
“I felt at first that our fighting styles were very similar, in the sense that the choreographer was giving me some really cool moves, but they looked very much like film martial arts,” said Jovovich. “I was like, I just feel like my character wouldn’t be able to do a butterfly kick. This is not her training. Your training as a soldier would be much more hand-to-hand … Considering that the martial arts that Tony does are much more cinematic and beautiful. I felt it was good to let him do those things, and then have very different fighting styles. Because it’s more realistic, but I also found it more interesting for our characters. “
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Photo: Sony Pictures Entertainment
Adapting an existing property is always a complicated proposition. Fans come with pre-conceived expectations and it can be difficult to meet them and, at the same time, make things accessible to new audiences. It is something that Jovovich and Anderson have experience, having worked together in the long run resident Evil series, which is also based on a Capcom game. The new film offered a slightly different challenge. Since the launch of Monster Hunter World, the franchise is as popular as it always has been, but still not exactly a household name.
“When you’re dealing with a 90-minute version of something, you always have to make certain sacrifices,” she explains. “If this were Monster hunter the TV show, it would be very different. You would have a lot more time to spend on small details. The most important thing for us when making a film was to have the spirit of the game. “
Monster hunter is available for digital purchase now and will be available on Blu-Ray and DVD from March 2nd.