‘Company of Heroes’ Gets A Film Adaptation

Hey, did you know that Company of Heroes, the beloved PC RTS game, was getting a film adaptation? No? Neither did anybody else until the trailer hit. How’s it look?

Uh, well, see for yourself…

We really hate to say this, but everything about this movie screams “stinker.” First of all, the plot seems uncomfortably balanced between retro cheese (THE GERMANS HAVE A NUKE OMG!) and overly solemn “Grandpa was awesome, and then he got shot, because war is tragic” melodrama. It’s pretty clear this was intended for theaters at some point, considering the budget is a bit higher than one might expect. Secondly, the cast is of the “anything for a check” variety. Also, we’re pretty sure Neal McDonough is legally required to be in every movie about World War II anyway.

Thirdly, it’s from Destination Films, mostly notable as Sony’s extremely weird direct to video division. Seriously, this is the company that released both the legendarily amusing Bats and Satoishi Kon’s classic Tokyo Godfathers: These guys will pretty much put out anything.

Finally, the director, Don Michael Paul is mostly notable for making one of the last Steven Seagal movies to hit theaters and Who’s Your Caddy?. He does at least know his film history: A few of the shots are evocative of the classic war film Battleground, although reminding us of a movie that’s a lot grittier and has 100% more Khan (Ricardo Montalban is part of Battleground‘s ensemble cast and it’s considered among his finest work) than this movie is likely a bad idea.

No word on a release date yet, but we’re betting this hits around the time Company of Heroes 2 comes out, early next year.