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Last year, lovers of good cinema worldwide were baffled by what seemed to be a sign of the end times, as Hasbro and Universal teamed up to develop movies from popular board games and lured directors like Ridley Scott in to helm them. Now, Variety reports that Battleship moves closer to production with director Peter Berg at the helm, and is aiming for a release date of July 1, 2011.

Berg describes Battleship as "a contemporary story of an international five-ship fleet engaged in a very dynamic, violent and intense battle" but wouldn't name what country is supplying the enemies of the piece. He's very enthusiastic about the project, noting that he's always wanted to pit ship against ship, navy against navy. "I've been consumed with doing one of these since I tried to convince Tom Rothman at Fox to make a film about John Paul Jones, the founder of the American Navy. As a kid, I was dragged from Navy museum to museum, and spent so much time on ships, listening to my father talk about the great battles of WWII, I did my high school thesis on the Battle of Midway. When this came up, it didn't take me long to find a take for a film that is filled with raucous action-packed naval battles."

In an interview over on Collider, Frosty spoke with Hasbro CEO Brian Goldner at a G.I. Joe screening and he covered the movies that the company has in development. In many ways it mirrored what our own Jessica Barnes wrote about back in March. Hasbro clearly isn't content to sit back and dive into the coffers filled with money from the Transformers movies, which will likely swell even further when G.I. Joe is released this weekend. They aren't just licensing their toys for film development (Stretch Armstrong is slated to be a movie in 2011), it now looks like they'll be tossing their entire board game range into the mix.

You've probably heard that Ridley Scott is developing Monopoly into a movie, as hard as that is to believe, but according to Goldner that will be joined by Candy Land and Battleship. Battleship!? Really? A movie based around Battleship? As much as I strained my brain to try and figure out how Ridley Scott could make Monopoly into a compelling film, Battleship just makes my grey matter give up abandon ship. You might as well make Connect Four into a movie. Everyone would be on the edge of their seats waiting for the "Pretty sneaky, sis." line.

Of all the stupid ideas in all the world, why do they have to raid my precious memories of childhood board games? Who is holding their breath waiting to see Ridley Scott's Monopoly, or Michael Bay's Ouija Board? How about the latest marketing move, an adaptation of Battleship? Writers have been signed, and Peter Berg is in talks to direct a film version of the game, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

The idea, apparently, is "to make an epic naval action adventure." Of course, with tens of millions of dollars at stake in development, production, and marketing costs, no one wants to just make an original naval action adventure. They want a movie with a built-in tag line -- "You sunk my battleship!" -- and consumer familiarity so that everyone will know what the movie is about. The last epic naval adventure was Peter Weir's Master and Commander, but I guess it's cheaper to license board games than novels.

Peter Berg has proven with Hancock and The Kingdom that he can handle action scenes, but he's also got (possibly) Hercules: The Thracian Wars and Dune on his plate of potential projects, so who knows when he could fit this one in. First they have to get a workable script. Here's my idea: robots! Yeah, robots can pilot the ships, and humans can control the ships from thousands of miles away, and the plot involves the conquest of ocean territories to secure the bad guy's conquest of the free world. (Obviously, this is why I'm not a highly-paid screenwriter.) What are your ideas for making an epic out of a board game?

Well, it's official: The Hollywood Reporter tells us that Hasbro and Universal are moving forward on that movie based on the Monopoly board game by not only hiring Pamela Pettler (Corpse Bride, Monster House) to write the screenplay, but also by bringing Ridley Scott (who was simply a producer before) on as director. There's no mention of a solid story here yet, but THR does say that Scott plans to give the flick "a futuristic sheen along the lines of his iconic Blade Runner." Apart from Monopoly -- and as mentioned previously on Cinematical -- Universal and Hasbro are also working on adapting other games like Ouija Board and Battleship for the big screen too.

But what about Monopoly? Considering the struggling economy and how folks all over the world are losing property, do you think this is the right or wrong time to make a movie like this? I mean, the main point of the board game is to create a monopoly and bankrupt the other players, right? So who, exactly, will we be rooting for? A character by the name of Bill Yates? That said, I do dig the futuristic possibilities, and the comparisons to Blade Runner, so it'll be interesting to see what they end up with. And also, seeing as Pettler's written these family-friendly flicks, I wonder if that will be their direction as well.

Thoughts?

We already know some studios (like Universal) are looking to bring our most favorite childhood games to the big screen, including Monopoly, Ouija, Candy Land, Clue (which was already a film), Battleship and a few others. And while at first it might sound rather ridiculous, you'd be amazed to see the types of stories a few clever Hollywood screenwriters could throw together for these. Heck, I can't imagine Candy Land would differ greatly from something like Willy Wonka.

That said, the folks over at Worth 1000 launched a photoshop contest recently in which the idea was to take a popular children's game and create a movie poster for it. The poster above for Monopoly (which director Ridley Scott is apparently developing for real) doesn't make much sense, but I do admire the casting choices. Could you imagine a film based on the Monopoly board game having a cast like that? After settling all their paychecks, you'd have -- what -- fifteen bucks to shoot the thing? Check out a few more of our favorites in the gallery below.

Out of all your favorite childhood games, which could you see becoming the most worthwhile film?



Related: Cinematical Seven: Bad Ideas for Board Game Movies

Looking to get in on the -- well -- game, Universal has partnered with Hasbro to develop feature films based on at least four of their branded properties. Those include Monopoly, Candy Land, Clue, Ouija, Battleship, Magic, the Gathering and Stretch Armstrong. The move comes after Paramount snatched up Transformers and G.I. Joe, which means neither is part of this new deal. There's already been talk that Ridley Scott will direct a film based on the Monopoly board game, and the director even spoke about it recently -- but the others are all completely up in the air as of now.

Out of these, I could honestly see a very cute Wonka-ish film coming from Candy Land, and Stretch Armstrong could be fun if it was developed as a comedy for someone like, say, Jim Carrey. Clue was already made into a film, so the framework is there, and Battleship could go a number of different ways (though ship movies never seem to excite us all that much unless Leo DiCaprio is involved). I don't know much about Magic, the Gathering, except that it's very popular and would probably entice the teen audience, and Ouija could go either the comedic route or the haunting thriller route. As much as I'd like to trash this entire deal, fact is I really can see some potential in these games, assuming they bring onboard the right talent, the right director and the right creative minds.

What about you? Which game could you see becoming the next big motion picture?