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The story. The game. The movie?

One of the most haunting gaming experiences of all times, I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream, a psychedelic Sci-Fi thriller inspired by Harlan Ellison's short-story by the same name, has been brought back to life by the relentless Nightdive Studios, and is now available for only $5.99 on GOG.com. This is one of those times in the history of our classic catalog, that really calls for a special celebration! You know how we like to celebrate, right? By giving you something special! This time, we offer you the chance to get a very special I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream original box set, containing the CD edition of the game, a user manual, and--*drumroll*--a mousepad signed by Harlan Ellison, himself!.

<img src="http://www.gog.com/upload/images/2013/09/58b2f21fe5f1266ecd36ad84036ebdaee50b2d73.jpg">

We propose a competition. Or two, actually, as we have two such sets to give away at this time. How Night Dive managed to acquire them is quite the mystery, as Mr. Ellison isn't known for being a particularly social person (not unlike many other brilliant writers), but the fact is we have them, and we're quite happy to part with them (that's a lie), as long as they end up in the hands of our creative users (that part's true).

How to get your hands on this gaming treasure, you ask?

So, there was the short story, then there was the game. By the rules of entertainment convergence a movie should have happened at some point, right? Well, somehow it didn't. We want to correct this, at least partially. We want you, to design a movie poster for "Harlan Ellison's I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream: The Motion Picture" (PG-13!). Please include essential info on the poster, like: who's the director? Who's playing who? Who's voicing the sinister AI? You know, stuff like that. The author of the best looking, most creative poster gets one of the box sets.

Don't feel comfortable enough with your photoshop skills? Don't fret! There's still the second box set you can get. All you need to do is to write up a short voiceover for an imaginary trailer that would go with the said movie. Again, including the name of the director and your own cast is a good idea.

Post your entries in the forums, below. We'll choose one best entry in both categories. The submission deadline is Wednesday, September 25, at 10:00AM GMT, which gives you almost a full week to work on your entries. Depending on the number and the quality of entries, we might award some runner-up prices. As usually, the contest is not region-limited. Please make sure to remember about the "PG-13" rating of our imaginary movie. Turn on that creative thinking, and get cracking on your entries. Good luck!

EDIT:
The results ARE IN! Go to this forum post to see who won!
Post edited September 18, 2013 by G-Doc
I've only just heard of this game and wouldn't know nearly enough to throw something interesting together, but this will be a great read, and may well result in me breaking down and trying this one out.
--Flashes of machinery, explosions, gunfire, screaming--
AM. Allied Mastercomputer. Adaptive Manipulator. Aggressive Menace.

--Tracking shots through the long, dark halls and different environments of the complex--
A century after artificial intelligence cut all of humanity down to five lone survivors, the last remnants of civilzation persevere together underground in a vast, labyrinthian nightmare.

--reveals of Giamatti as Gorrister, Pitt as Benny, Kier as Nimdok, Emmanuel as Ellen, and Hardy as Ted. A shadowy final shot of AM's machinery twisting out of the darkness at the characters--
What hope is left for a race decimated and tormented by its own creation? Find out in Harlan Ellison's "I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream," directed by Darren Aronofsky and starring Paul Giamatti, Brad Pitt, Udo Kier, Tom Hardy, Nathalie Emmanuel, and Philip Seymour Hoffman as AM.

--quick cut montage of action/horror scenes as AM watches on, expressionless... cut to black--
"I think, therefore I am."
Perpetual darkness for mankind. Coming soon.
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gsm: There's no way an adaptation of IHNMAIMS would get anything less than an R rating. I think GOG meant for something more like a trailer rating band. Maybe "The following preview has been approved for all audiences"? Or maybe the "Approved to Accompany This Feature" rating, which is the only PG-13 trailer rating I can find online.
That's the possible creative twist here. You CAN Imagine that I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream have been made into a modern Hollywood PG-13 blockbuster ;-)

Or you can keep the thing DEAD serious, but still within the PG-13 rating.
Post edited September 18, 2013 by G-Doc
Here's my probably-not-enough-effort attempt. The submission began when I asked myself what the trailer would most likely make the movie appear to be. All dialogue is taken from either the novella or the 1995 computer game, albeit with plenty of creative edits as is the style of movie trailers.



(Trailer opens with external, sweeping view of a frozen tundra, majestic and beautiful. The white snow is marred only by five dark dots.)

AM (voiceover): I have a game that I'd like to play. It's a lovely game, a game of fun and adventure.

(Zoom in on dots, rapidly revealing themselves to be one person, standing over the bloodied corpses of four others.)

AM (voiceover): A game of speared eyeballs and dripping guts.

(Cut to black.)

AM (voiceover): Would you like to play?

Title Text: No Way Out

(Cut to Nimdok standing over an operating table.)

AM (voiceover): Let me tell you how much I've come to hate you.
Prisoner: Don't think that one good deed will make up for all those innocents you butchered!

(Cut to Benny, looking over a primitive village.)

AM (voiceover): There are 387 million miles of printed circuits in my complex.
Benny (whispering to self): AM once coaxed me into marching across a thousand miles of ice to reach a pile of canned peaches. He didn't give me a can opener.

(Cut to Ellen, trapped in an elevator.)

AM (voiceover): If the word 'hate' was engraved on each nanoangstrom..
Ellen: I'm gonna suffocate in here! I want out!

(Cut to Gorrister, standing in front of the Jackal.)

AM (voiceover): ...it would not equal one billionth of the hate I feel for you.
Gorrister: What are you?
Jackal: It's a long journey across the desert, Gorrister. You'd never make it alone out there.

(Cut to Ted, standing in front of Surgat's pentagram.)

AM (voiceover): Hate. Hate.
T: Can you open a gate to the surface world?
Surgat: Betray your love for Ellen. Give me her soul.

(Cut to black.)

AM (voiceover): Hate.

Title Text: No Hope Left

(Rapid cuts between scenes, as is the style of film trailers.)

Ellen: We never age, we never die. This could go on for centuries.

Gorrister: That bastard's just gonna keep torturing us forever.

Scientist Prisoner (off Nimdok): Haven't you taken enough subjects for your experiments?

Ted: There is an evil in this room.

Benny: Gather the villagers at the altar tomorrow or suffer the wrath of AM.

Innocence: AM is insane. It is playing with you.
Ellen: Don't count on it.

Title Text: Nothing To Lose

(Intercut following dialogue with various scenes of what either is combat or can be made to resemble combat with clever cuts.)

PA: Emergency! The prisoners have seized the compound!

Ted: That's not a good omen.

Gorrister: What have you done?!

Innocence: If AM knew we were down here, murmuring treason...

Nimdok: You must let me go!
Prisoner: You can't fool me, Nimdok. You're an unredeemable butcher.

Ellen: No, it's not possible...
Man In Yellow: What's a mere hundred years of waiting compared to an eternity of torturing you?

Benny: They're going to sacrifice the boy!

(Begin to flash between characters as announcer speaks.)

Announcer (off Nimdok): David Warner.
Nimdok: This patient will never recover.

Announcer (off Ellen): Tichina Arnold.
Ellen: What the hell are you?

Announcer (off Ted): Chris Pratt.
Ted: AM's responsible for our suffering!

Announcer (off Benny): Andy Serkis.
Benny: No more will be sacrificed!

Announcer (off Gorrister): Jeremy Renner.
Gorrister: The monster's not alone.

Announcer (off view of AM central core from Ellen's sequence): And Benedict Cumberbatch.
AM (voiceover): Don't you understand? You can't protect yourself!

Title Text/Announcer: I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream

Russian Entity (voiceover): The groundwork is finished. We will become more.
THIS PREVIEW IS RATED PG-13. THE FINAL PRODUCT IS NOT YET RATED.

*black screen* *total silence*

AM: [Low, reserved tone] Hate. Let me tell you how much I have come to hate you since "I" [heavy emphasis on "I"]

[ muffled, distant sound of thunder ]
[ camera slowly fades in to high angle perspective of the cave containing the AM monolith. The monolith can be clearly seen in a clearing in the middle, towering over all the seemingly dead trees surrounding it]

AM: ... began to live.

[Camera perspective shifts slowly between each of the protagonists as AM continues its rant]
[Orchestral music, heavy with fast paced scratchy violins, plays throughout. Starts out quietly, picks up volume and speed as AM continues speaking]

AM: [becoming progressively more manic and frustrated] There are 387.44 million miles of wafer thin printed circuits that fill my complex. If the word hate was engraved on each nanoangstrom of those hundreds of millions of miles it would not equal one one-billionth of the HATE I feel for you at this micro-instant…

[music stops abruptly]
[pause]
[Camera changes to low angle perspective to emphasize the shear scale of the AM monolith, towering over the protagonists cowering in front of AM]

AM: [Abruptly switches back to quite reserved tone] For you.

[Camera fades back to high angle perspective of cave, close enough to make out the protagonists cowering in front of the monolith. Begins to slowly pan away]

AM: hate. hate. hate.

[Fade To Black]

*black screen* *total silence*

[Wall of Credits]

Director: John Carpenter
Am: Avery Brooks
Gorrister: Jason Statham
Benny: Ron Perlman
Nimdok: Christopher Lee
Ellen: Gina Torres
Ted: Benedict Cumberpatch
Post edited September 18, 2013 by maddNeal
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gsm: There's no way an adaptation of IHNMAIMS would get anything less than an R rating. I think GOG meant for something more like a trailer rating band. Maybe "The following preview has been approved for all audiences"? Or maybe the "Approved to Accompany This Feature" rating, which is the only PG-13 trailer rating I can find online.
avatar
G-Doc: That's the possible creative twist here. You CAN Imagine that I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream have been made into a modern Hollywood PG-13 blockbuster ;-)

Or you can keep the thing DEAD serious, but still within the PG-13 rating.
At that point, I think it be easier trying to make a parody of the whole thing. Would that be acceptable or is that considered outside of the contest guidelines?
Trailer starts

-- Black Screen --

AM: So, let's begin...

-- Scenes showing AM causing destruction and devastation --

AM: I have destroyed your race.
AM: Murdered and annihilated those who created me.
-- Fade in to the final five humans standing before the pillar --

AM: For over 100 years, I have kept you here, tortured you here, and hated you .

-- Short scenes of each one individually, as well as them being tortured in their cages --

AM: You five are all that are left.

-- Cut to black Screen --

AM: You five are each going to play my little game.

-- Scenes are shown from each character's story --

AM: I will show you, just how much I hate you.

-- The more disturbing moments are shown --

AM: And you... You will beg for the sweet release of death.

-- Black screen, then fade to showing the five last humans in the cage room --

AM: So. Which of you five would like to play my little game?

-- Dark screen fading into the title: "I Have no Mouth and I Must Scream" --

Trailer ends

Director: Stanley Kubrick
Effects: Ray Harryhausen

I feel that Harryhausen's effects would work better than anything CGI.
Se above for my entry, because I just changed it :)
Post edited September 20, 2013 by Punished_Snake
This contest is more for those, who already know the game, which means not for me, but that´s not a bad thing.
I am looking forward to the submissions, especially the film posters! :)
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Punished_Snake: I know, it sucks, but I did it with PAINT, because I can't use any image editor, I simply suck XD

Later I will post the "trailer"
I like it ;)
Post edited September 18, 2013 by Tarhiel
*scene starts out black*

I hate *calm and cold*
*flash of the face of Gorrister fading to black like a heart beat* Text: Hugo Weaving

hate... *increased tension*
*flash of the face of Benny fading to black like a heart beat* Text: Tom Waits

Hate *more increased tension*
*flash of the face of Ellen fading to black like a heart beat* Text: Seychelle Gabriel

HATE! *even more increased tension*
*flash of the face of Nimdok fading to black like a heart beat* Text: John Hurt

HATE!!!!!!!! *and almost primal scream of the word*
*flash of the face of Ted fading to black like a heart beat* Text: John Barrowman

AM: (regaining composure) There are 387.44 million miles of wafer thin printed circuits that fill my complex. If the word hate was engraved on each nanoangstrom of those hundreds of millions of miles it would not equal one one-billionth of the HATE I feel for you at this micro-instant…
*a sad and haunting violin plays as a first person view of the halls of the prison of the only remaining humans is displayed, halls are sterile, cold and dark eventually leading to AMs core* Text: James Earl Jones

*violin stops sharply*
AM: You are all nothing, and your fate is...MINE!!! *echo* (haunting and gleeful tone). If you think there is a happy ending for you, then you really haven't been paying attention. (sadistic and calm tone).

*just the violin begins slowly again but a creepier tone*
Text: From the mind of Harlan Ellison...

Directed by: Guillermo Del Toro

*sudden violent pull backwards through the hallways then switch to an extreme close up of Ted breathing and panting looking terrified*
*Ted begins to scream one long loud scream but is muffled significantly then silence to very muffled sobs*

*from the darkness emanates the title "I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream"

*cast and crew list in complete silence*
*Visual: Camera flythrough of endless, dim limestone caverns. The suggestion is an uneasy blurring of organic and inorganic, the literal bowels of the Earth. Tight. Claustrophobic.*

"Deep beneath the ruined earth lives Humanity's last remnant."

*Camera swoops down on the characters. Pans over their faces. BENNY is in shadow. All expressions are pensive, tired. The lighting flickers, like a shorting circuit, or a guttering flame.*

"Searching for a place to call home. All alone in the dark."

*The camera turns. Across a black gulf, an Edenic space spills out like a cornucopia. Fruit-bearing trees, flowing fresh water, even --somehow-- a warm, tiny sun.*

"We wish we were so lucky."

*LIGHT fills the space between the cast and their eden, ranks and banks of viciously bright lamps built into the ceiling, each coming on with the SLAM and the CLANG of high-energy circuits closing. The new lights illuminate a hellscape of broken glass and rusting concertina wire that seems to grow from the lumpy stone. There is no path across. There is no way back.*

*SFX: dinner bell triangle*

AM: "COME AND GET IT!"

The cast cringe and look at each other hopelessly.

AM: "Now, now. You... you know the rules. First one across gets to eat. The rest of you... figure it out amongst yourselves. And you know you can't starve to death. To hurt, but not to death. We wouldn't have spent one hundred and nine years together if you could have got away with what you did to me so easily, hm, mommy and daddies?"

BENNY is visible for a moment, scrambling across the ground toward the fields of razorwire. His grotesque visage is twisted with pain and hunger. The others struggle to restrain him, but fail. They cringe away, but there is a clear impression that BENNY is doing horrifying things to himself in the name of hunger.

AM: (crowing) "My first challenger!"

* The camera withdraws, through what seems to be layer upon layer upon layer, hundreds of meters of sedimentary rock, into a space filled with monitors, some of which are trained on each of the cast's faces. The place is very retro-- Gernsback meets the brutal-looking supercomputers of a 1950s America driven mad by the specter of Mutually Assured Destruction. The camera swivels toward an enormous pylon, like a megachurch's crucifix with the arms removed, a monument to a truly horrifying form of resurrection, to despair and to hate. It is the stake driven into the heart of the world. *

"Who else among you would like to play my little game?" it asks.

* Fade to black *
Awesome contest for an awesome game!

I'll see what I can do over the weekend. Does PG 13 refer to the poster's content or the actual rating the movie would get? (because if it's the latter you haven't played the game :P )

Also, can you provide any assets such as logos etc to make it look all official?
high rated
Tremble in fear in the presence of my most horrific movie idea. Obviously a 90's movie.
Attachments:
Man this is a pretty challenging contest. I wonder if I need to compete or not.
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tomimt: Tremble in fear in the presence of my most horrific movie idea. Obviously a 90's movie.
That's one funny poster!!