I’ve already reported on planned movie adaptations of board games, arcade games,

Today’s canoe is Angry Birds, an iPhone game from Finland’s Rovio that boasts 6.5 million downloads.  Rovio’s execs are currently scheduling meetings around Hollywood with the idea of turning their iPhone game into a TV show, comic book, and/or feature film.  Yes, an iPhone-game-based feature film. No word on whether they expect it to be CGI, live-action, or some horrible Squeaquel combination of the two, but Rovio CEO Mikael Hed reportedly enjoys Wallace & Gromit-style claymation.  Whatever you say, dude.

CEO Mikael Hed understands that producing a movie could take three years before it bows.  “The challenge is to make sure the brand is relevant when the movie comes out,” he said.
To do that, Rovio hopes to take a page from Pixar’s playbook.
“Time and time again, they take an unknown brand and make it big,” Hed added.

If by “taking an unknown brand and making it big” you mean “writing an original movie,” then yes, that’s exactly what they do.  I like to imagine this guy asking John Lennon, “So, you just took a song people had never heard and made it big, huh?  Incredible.  What PR firm did you use? Where did you do your focus groups?”

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Variety reports that Scorpion King director Chuck Russell is set to do a $70 million, 3D re-working of Arabian Nights, aka 1,001 Nights.  Here’s the plot of the original (which varies, but these are the basics):

A Persian king begins to marry a succession of virgins only to execute each one the next morning. Eventually the vizier, whose duty it is to provide them, cannot find any more virgins. Scheherazade, the vizier’s daughter, offers herself as the next bride and her father reluctantly agrees. On the night of their marriage, Scheherazade begins to tell the king a tale, but does not end it. The king is thus forced to postpone her execution in order to hear the conclusion. The next night, as soon as she finishes the tale, she begins a new one, and the king, eager to hear the conclusion, postpones her execution once again. So it goes on for 1,001 nights.

Now, here’s the Hollywood version:

In a new spin on the classic, the story follows a young commander who, after his king is killed in a palace coup, joins forces with Sinbad, Aladdin and his genie to rescue Scheherazade and her kingdom from dark powers.

BUT WAIT, THAT’S NOT THE FACEPALM PART!

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