Zaillian in Gangland

Oscar-winning writer Steve Zaillian is stepping away from the pen for a new film called GANGLAND. It’s going to be from Mandate Pictures, and Nacho Vigalondo is set to direct with Zaillian producing.

The film follows a group of game developers who promise to create the most realistically hardcore video game ever. When doing “research,” they end up in the real-life criminal underworld and must somehow make it out alive. Honestly, the premise sounds like a bit much, but I’ll trust Zaillian until he gives me a reason not to. I wish he’d hurry up and get his Americanized version of TIMECRIMES over here though.

With every video game with a Metacritic score above 6 getting a movie deal these days, it only seems logical that a movie ABOUT video game making would come along eventually. The last time we saw that was GRANDMA’S BOY, which chronicles a guy secretly making “Bioshock” “Demonik” in his basement. GANGLAND will hopefully be some sort of humorous, geeky “Grand Theft Auto” parody, and turn out better than it initially sounds.