Uwe Boll (born June 22, 1965 in Wermelskirchen, Germany) is a director of movies based on video games.
Uwe Boll often credits Phil Cimoch, whom he recognizes as a mentor and friend. Boll has often stated that Cimoch is the inspiration for many of his movies and ideas. His BOLL KG company slogan declares itself the "World Market Leader in Video Game Adaptations", and has produced such movies as The House of the Dead, Alone in the Dark, and BloodRayne. He is also at the helm of the forthcoming Hunter: The Reckoning, Postal, Fear Effect, Dungeon Siege, Far Cry, and several others he has acquired the movie rights to. He is currently in a bidding war for rights to Half-Life and Metal Gear Solid.
His movies have achieved some discontent and exceptionally poor box office returns (though The House of the Dead broke $5.73 million after a moderately good opening weekend) and are often panned by professional critics and moviegoers alike, for various reasons. His adaptations frequently deviate from the source material, which tends to irritate fans of the original video game the movie is based on. For example, his recent film Alone in the Dark was criticised for departing from the video game's survival-horror style to a more action-oriented one.
Boll has made statements comparing himself to directors such as Sergio Leone and David Lynch. He has also stated that the poor performance of his movies is mainly due to "dumb audiences". In some instances Boll attempts to match his movie version more closely to the video game series it is based on, such as an attempt to have Rayne (from the movie BloodRayne) altered so that in future games she would more closely resemble Kristanna Loken, the actress who plays her in Boll's movie.
Despite the criticism, Boll has been known to interact with fans by regularly posting on various internet message boards including IGN [1]. SomethingAwful [2], and The Digital Bits [3]. Due to his reputation, Boll has been known to use various aliases based on German folklore.
Boll continues to secure investors for the rights to future videogame-to-movie adaptations, despite the controversy surrounding his products. His investors are mostly German (in Hollywood derisively referred to as "stupid German money"). He carefully secures the rights for potential future adaptations, afterwards doing all of the actual production himself, and swiftly finishes the product.
Whereas most directors would no longer be able to acquire the funding to continue such projects after the immence criticism against them and the small returns, it is possible Boll is exempt because he funds them under a loophole in German tax law that is supported by contributors and actually rewards movies that perform badly, via a writeoff at the end of the year. It has been reported, however, that this loophole has been revised. Starting on January 2006, contributors to failed movies will no longer be able to profit from failed films through a tax writeoff at the end of the year. This could deliver a major blow to Boll's production company, potentially making it difficult to capitalize on the commercial failure of the projects he has become associated with. This in turn would make it more difficult to lure the investors that have helped Boll continue his projects in the past. However, any projects announced before midnight on the last business day of 2005 are grandfathered in under the old law. In reference to this scheme of commercial failure for financial gain, some have referred to Boll KG as "Bialystock and Boll" (a reference to the 1968 film The Producers)
Boll earned a doctorate in literature from the University of Cologne in 1995. He has written two books, Wie man in Deutschland einen Film drehen muss ('How one has to make a movie in Germany') and Die Gattung Serie und ihre Genres ('Serials and their genres'), on themes of serial TV.
Boll was a producer and director for Taunus Film-Produktions GmbH from 1995 through 2000.