Bandai NamcoAlex Garland is making an Elden Ring movie for A24, and according to a new report, his first draft of the script was huge – and it got him the job.
Nobody would have paired A24 and Elden Ring. One is an indie movie distributor that tends to release arthouse (and often acclaimed) films, the other is one of the best games ever made, and arguably the most iconic RPG of the 2020s so far.
However, the video game movie curse is a thing of the past, and there’s serious money to be made from adapting games; just look at The Super Mario Bros Movie, one of the highest-grossing films of all time.
So, when Garland pitched A24 on making a feature based on Elden Ring, it didn’t take much convincing – but he still needed the support of its creator, Hidetaka Miyazaki.
Alex Garland wrote a 200-page script for A24’s Elden Ring movie
Bandai NamcoA New Yorker profile on A24 includes a small section about Garland’s work on Elden Ring. It remains a highly secretive project, but the article reveals a little bit about how it came to fruition.
Noah Sacco, the studio’s head of film, visited Garland at his home in London after he’d spoken to him on the phone about playing the game. The writer-director is a big Elden Ring fan (he’s beaten it six times, and there’s only one boss that still gives him trouble).
Garland, emboldened by the flame of ambition, showed the game to Sacco and asked if he’d support a big-screen adaptation. “The lush visuals and fantasy setting reminded Sacco of the Lord of the Rings movies,” the profile reads.
“He replied, ‘F**k yeah.”
Garland then wrote a “script on spec” (meaning it wasn’t strictly commissioned by A24 or Bandai Namco), hoping to impress Miyazaki. It became a 160-page draft with 40 pages of additional imagery, and after a hop, skip, and a jump to Japan to meet him, they closed the deal.
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Don’t expect to find anything else out, though. It’s one of the most secretive projects in the A24 canon, with Heartstopper’s Kit Connor the only confirmed star. Cailee Spaeny, who appeared in Civil War and Alien: Romulus, is also rumored to have joined the cast, as per Jeff Sneider.
Considering the next installment of the 28 Years Later trilogy comes out next year, with production on the third film hoped to begin in 2026, it could be a while before we see or hear anything else about the movie.
In the meantime, check out our list of the best video game movies and see what else is dropping this year with our 2025 movie calendar.