Monster Hunter (2020)
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The bigger they are, the harder to kill
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— Tagline |
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Go to a world beyond imagination— (想像を絶する世界へ―)
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— Japanese tagline |
Monster Hunter (モンスターハンター is a Monsutā Hantā)2020 Japanese-American giant monster film produced by Screen Gems, Impact Pictures, Constantin Film, Tencent Pictures and Toho. It is based on Capcom's video game franchise of the same name. The film was released to American theaters on December 18, 2020 and will be released in Japan by Towa Pictures, a subsidiary of Toho, on March 26, 2021.
Description
Plot
“I knew that『plot』wasn't up to much.” This plot synopsis is missing or incomplete. Please help by editing this section. |
To be added.
Staff
Staff role on the left, staff member's name on the right.
- Directed by Paul W.S. Anderson
- Produced by Jeremy Bolt, Paul W.S. Anderson, Dennis Berardi, Robert Kulzer, Martin Moszkowicz
- Music by Paul Haslinger
- Cinematography by Glen MacPherson
- Edited by Doobie White
- Production design by Edward Thomas
- Assistant directors Peter Freeman, Simon Green, Cameron Hadlow
- Sound design by Brandon Kim
- Visual effects supervisor Dennis Berardi
Cast
Actor's name on the left, character played on the right.
- Milla Jovovich as Lieutenant Natalie Artemis
- Tony Jaa as The Hunter
- Ron Perlman as The Admiral
- Tip "T.I." Harris as Lincoln
- Diego Boneta as Sergeant Marshall
- Meagan Good as Sergeant Dash
- Josh Helman as Steeler
- Jin Au-Yeung as Axe
- Hirona Yamazaki as The Handler
- Jannik Schümann as Aiden
- Nanda Costa as Lea
- Nic Rasenti as Captain Roark
- Clyde Berning as JSO V22 Pilot #1
- Paul Hampshire as JSO Soldier #2
- Schelaine Bennett as Comms Officer E3 Sentry
- Pope Jerrod as E3 Sentry Pilot
- Aaron Beelner as Meowscular Chef
Appearances
Monsters
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Weapons, Vehicles, and Races |
Development
Director Paul W.S. Anderson and producer Jeremy Bolt began negotiations with Capcom to adapt the Monster Hunter series in 2009, one year after Anderson began playing the games.[2] Anderson publicized their plans in 2012, while doing press for another Capcom adaptation, Resident Evil: Retribution.[3] On September 15, 2016, during the Tokyo Game Show, Capcom producer Ryozo Tsujimoto announced that a live-action Hollywood adaption of Monster Hunter was in development, but provided no further details. Anderson and Bolt confirmed their involvement to Deadline that November, with Anderson describing the setting of the games as "a fresh, exciting world that we could expose and build a whole world around, like a Marvel or Star Wars universe."[4] By then, he had written the first iteration of the script, with the following logline:
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For every Monster, there is a Hero. An ordinary man in a dead end job discovers that he is actually the descendant of an ancient hero. He must travel to a mystical world to train to become a Monster Hunter, before the mythical creatures from that world destroy ours.[4]
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A piece of concept art published with the article showed a Rathalos, the series' flagship monster, attacking the Los Angeles International Airport. In another version of the script, the protagonist was a "bullied, quite clumsy" 16-year-old boy chosen as the latest hero chosen to protect Earth from the Monster Hunter world's creatures, who inspired countless legends during previous invasions.[2] By the time Anderson's schedule allowed him to make the film, however, young adult fantasy had fallen out of fashion. In 2017, visual effects company Mr. X uploaded an effects reel which featured brief footage based on this version of the script, showing a Rathalos and Gore Magala battling inside a mall. Anderson cited Avatar, the Indiana Jones films, and a 2010 collaboration between Monster Hunter and Metal Gear Solid as influences on the final draft.[2][5] Of the collaboration, he said, "[W]hat fun to kind of play with the hubris of the modern world in that we put our faith in technology so much — in fact, too much in my opinion."[5]
On May 11, 2018, Variety reported that Milla Jovovich, star of the Resident Evil films, was set to star in Monster Hunter, which would begin filming in September.[6] The casting of Tip "T.I." Harris, Ron Perlman, and Tony Jaa was announced that month, with filming postponed until October.[7][8]
Production
Marketing
IGN revealed the first still from Monster Hunter on November 20, 2018, showing a fully-armed Lieutenant Natalie Artemis and the Hunter running in the desert.[9] Footage from the film played at the 2019 Shanghai International Film Festival, and leaked online in June.[10] IGN had another exclusive reveal on February 28, 2020: the first two posters.[11] Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Sony halted the film's marketing campaign for months and moved its U.S. release date from September 4, 2020, to April 23, 2021.[12] From there, its release date moved up three consecutive times, from December 30 to December 25 to December 18.[13][14][15]
The first officially-released footage from Monster Hunter came on October 3, 2020: a 16-second teaser focusing on the Black Diablos. One week later, director Paul W.S. Anderson revealed more footage at his New York Comic Con panel. He described the enormous Rathalos in this footage as a Greater Rathalos, associated in some way with an ancient civilization that is an established part of Monster Hunter lore. Later that day, Sony would upload a vignette to YouTube featuring Anderson speaking to Ryozo Tsujimoto and Kaname Fujioka, the producer and director of the Monster Hunter games, as well as the reveal of the herbivorous monster Apceros's presence within the film. An American and international trailer followed on October 14, 2020, with the former showing Nerscylla and a Gore Magala. A Chinese trailer followed on November 19, showing Ron Perlman's character and the Meowscular Chef.
The Monster Hunter World: Iceborne expansion pack debuted two single-player event quests tying into the film, "The New World" and "To Our World", on December 3.[16] Artemis, voiced by Milla Jovovich, is a playable character in these quests, and faces her two primary opponents from the film. In "The New World," the player is rewarded with an Artemis α+ Armor Set for slaying a Black Diablos, while "To Our World" tasks them with killing an enlarged Rathalos, with the Artemis Layered Armor Set as a reward. Availability for the quests will end on December 2, 2021.
Gallery
- Main article: Monster Hunter/Gallery.
Soundtrack
- Main article: Monster Hunter (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack).
Theatrical releases
- Austria, Germany, Netherlands, Saudi Arabia - December 3, 2020
- China, Taiwan, United Kingdom - December 4, 2020
- United States - December 18, 2020
- Singapore - December 24, 2020
- Canada, Vietnam - December 30, 2020
- Hungary - December 2020
- Australia - January 1, 2021
- Russia - January 14, 2021
- Brazil, Ukraine - January 28, 2021[17]
- Estonia, India - February 5, 2021
- Mexico - February 18, 2021
- Iceland - February 19, 2021
- Portugal - February 25, 2021
- Bulgaria - February 26, 2021
- Lithuania - March 12, 2021
- Japan, Spain - March 26, 2021
- Italy - April 23, 2021
- France - April 28, 2021
Alternate titles
- Monster Hunter the Movie (映画 モンスターハンター Eiga Monsutā Hantā, alternate Japanese title)
- MonHun (モンハン Monhan, Japanese abbreviated title)
Box office
At a time when other studios were delaying their most expensive films or making them available to stream in viewers' homes, Sony opted to give Monster Hunter a traditional theatrical release. Opening during the third and deadliest wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, it grossed only $2.2 million domestically in its opening weekend, well below expectations.[18] However, with many theaters closed and others operating under capacity restrictions, it was still the highest-grossing film that weekend. Limited competition in the months that followed allowed it to reach a domestic gross of over $14 million by March 2021.[1]
Monster Hunter grossed $5.19 million on its opening day in China, only to be swiftly pulled from theaters following an outcry on social media.[19] In an exchange early in the film, the Axe character played by Chinese-American actor Jin Au-Yeung jokingly referred to his knees as "Chi-knees", which many viewers linked to a racist playground taunt. Yeung, Anderson, Jovovich, and Constantin Films all issued apologies for the line, though they maintained no offense was intended, and it was removed from all versions of the film.[20] However, Monster Hunter has yet to be reissued in China, which Deadline noted was the country where it had the greatest box office potential.[21]
Monster Hunter will open in Japan, another key market, on March 26. Internationally, it has grossed just over half of its $60 million production budget.
Reception
Video releases
Sony 4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray + HD / Blu-ray + Digital HD / DVD (2021)
- Region: Various (Blu-ray and DVD)
- Discs: 2 (4K Ultra HD combo pack) or 1 (Blu-ray and DVD)
- Audio: English (Dolby Atmos and Dolby TrueHD 7.1 for 4K Ultra HD, DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 for Blu-ray, and Dolby Digital 5.1 for DVD), French, Spanish, English audio description
- Subtitles: English, Spanish, French [U.S. release - will vary depending on country]
- Special features: "The Monster Hunters - Cast & Characters" (8 minutes), "Monstrous Arsenal - Weaponry in the Film" (5 minutes), "For the Players - From Game to Screen" (7 minutes), deleted scenes
Videos
Trailers
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Miscellaneous
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External links
References
This is a list of references for Monster Hunter. These citations are used to identify the reliable sources on which this article is based. These references appear inside articles in the form of superscript numbers, which look like this: [1]
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