The main pirate film of the 90s from cult director Steven Spielberg! Star cast: Robin Williams, Dustin Hoffman and Julia Roberts. At the same time, I’ll tell you about an undeservedly forgotten 16-bit game adaptation.
Long road to release
For Steven Spielberg, the story of Peter Pan has always been very personal. Even as a child, he imagined himself as the hero of a work by James Barry and dreamed of going to Neverland. So it’s no surprise that Spielberg began to consider adapting his own version of the story shortly after the runaway success of his family film E.T.
The film, tentatively titled Pan, was intended to be a remake of Disney’s 1953 classic Peter Pan. Over time, the concept changed in favor of the musical. The change in genre was largely due to Michael Jackson’s attention to the role of Peter Pan. Several songs were written for the film, and construction of sets began in London when Spielberg left the project. At this time, the director’s son was born, and he did not want to move to England.
Disney froze production, but did not completely put an end to the film. “The Mouse Company” had been looking for ways to “unfreeze” the film for a long time, but this was not destined to come true. “Pan” began to wander around the studios in search of a home. Ultimately, the rights went to TriStar Pictures, with Nick Castle (The Last Starfighter, Major Payne) directing. It was Nick Castle who proposed releasing a sequel to the famous story with a grown-up Peter Pan. Such changes helped the film finally sever its ties to Disney, since TriStar Pictures did not have the rights to 1953’s Peter Pan.
At that time, the post of director of TriStar Pictures was held by Mike Medavoy, a longtime friend of Steven Spielberg, and the production of the film began to stall. Nick Castle’s vision did not coincide with Dustin Hoffman (Captain Hook), and the director had to give up his chair to Steven Spielberg. However, Nick Castle did not leave offended and received $500 thousand in compensation.
Michael Jackson did not lose interest in the role of Peter Pan all this time, but after a telephone conversation with Steven Spielberg he dropped out of the project. The singer was so disappointed with the script about an adult Peter Pan that he even tried to damage the director. Robin Williams took his place and production finally moved forward.
The production of the film was difficult. The original production budget was set at $48 million, but ended up being between $60–80 million. The main reason for the budget increase was the filming schedule, which lasted 40 days longer than the original 76-day schedule. Spielberg explained: "It was my fault. I started working slower than usual."
It was very difficult for the director to work with child actors and get the desired reaction from them. The little actors were not told to whom Peter Pan would give his legendary sword… So the guys’ emotions were sincere, not feigned.
Julia Roberts has negative memories of working with Steven Spielberg. They often had conflicts, and it was difficult for the actress to work with a green screen. Jon Voight, with whom Dustin Hoffman had previously worked, asked Hoffman if he could bring his children, James Haven and Angelina Jolie, to the set. He didn’t mind and even stayed for the sake of visitors dressed as Captain Hook. Jolie was 16 years old at the time; Hoffman thought she was “slender, tall and with braces on her teeth.”. Jolie then told him that she also wanted to become an actress. Hoffman told his wife that evening that Jolie “doesn’t understand how difficult it is to be an actress.”.
The film grossed more than $300 million on a budget of $70 million. But the studio was still unhappy with his financial performance. Spielberg, Williams and Hoffman were not paid for the film. The star trinity knocked out a huge percentage of the box office and even the right to the “first dollar”.
“Captain Hook”, at the time of its release, received devastating reviews from viewers and critics. Spielberg doesn’t like to remember him, and Julia Roberts was nominated for a Golden Raspberry Award as Worst Supporting Actress.
Plot and personal opinion (beware, spoilers)
I have many warm memories from my childhood about the movie “Captain Hook”. I remember very well the fabulous Neverland, where children enjoy freedom and mermaids live on the seabed. The majestic ship of Captain Hook beckoned with its unusual design, but most of all I liked the city of pirates. The aesthetics of the pirate world were fascinating and contrasted perfectly with the settlement of the lost children. Just imagine – the whole city consisted of old pirate ships! Art director Norman Garwood did a truly ambitious job and created a real visual masterpiece.
But at the same time, I haven’t reviewed the film for more than 20 years… Therefore, having decided to refresh my memory of the film, I was, to put it mildly, very surprised. In adulthood, “Captain Hook” is perceived completely differently than in childhood. But first things first!
From the first minutes we are shown a matured Pete, for whom his career is much higher than the desires of his family. At the same time, the hero of Robin Williams does not look repulsive, he simply forgot how to be a child. Moreover, every scene of the film is filled with colors, humor and action. “Captain Hook” is a family movie from Spielberg from the 90s, and that says it all.
Next, Pete, along with his wife and children, visits Wendy’s shelter… And at this point the plot of the film completely falls apart. Understanding the ancestry of the Peng family was quite difficult. Just think about it, Peter Pan had children with his half-sister, and his adopted (90-year-old) mother is his ex-lover. George Martin never dreamed of this!
It was the second third www.jettbetcasino.co.uk of the film that I remember best as a child. It perfectly depicts the fairy-tale world. But rewatching the film now, I noticed that there is very little dynamics in the middle. Peter takes too long to remember who he is and over time I started to tire of the character. Another problem was Peng’s "seductive aura". Besides Wendy, the fairy Tinkerbell and even sea mermaids are in love with Peter. This moment greatly destroys the family orientation of the film.
The finale is memorable for the grandiose, full-scale battle between the pirates and the lost boys and the epic duel between Peter and Captain Hook. A great and very funny action awaits us, although the drama seemed unnecessary to me. Rufio didn’t have time to prove himself, and everyone quickly forgot about him.
Without a doubt, Captain Hook is a wonderful film, but it has a number of shortcomings. Julia Roberts did a brilliant job in her role. At that time, not many films were released that used green screens, and it was doubly difficult for the actress. The real treasure of the film was Dustin Hoffman. A crazy, cool and very funny pirate with his own code of honor.
Robin Williams played the role of Peter well, but he did it as if on autopilot. It seems to me that Williams was too far from the image of Peter Pan, and the role itself was poorly written in the script. Steven Spielberg couldn’t decide what kind of film he wanted to make – a fairy tale for the whole family or a drama about fathers and sons. Many creative people had a hand in the production of “Captain Hook,” but the film lacked an evil producer who could remove unnecessary storylines and shorten the running time.
In any case, “Captain Hook” is and will be remembered. A true classic. They don’t make films like this anymore. I recommend it to all Peter Pan fans and Steven Spielberg fans. Dante Basco (who plays Rufio) is currently working on an animated spin-off about his character, but there has been no information about the project recently.
Sony Imagesoft
During the production of Captain Hook, TriStar was in the process of being acquired by Sony. The Japanese continued to produce films under the TriStar brand, and Sony had big plans for game adaptations. Long before the PlayStation 1, Sony decided to break into the gaming industry as a publisher. The subsidiary, called Sony Imagesoft, had a confident strategy to conquer the hearts of gamers.
Sony, in addition to TriStar, owned Columbia Pictures, so the Japanese could offer platform holders a whole bunch of licenses for popular films.
Innovative FMV game for Sega CD. Publisher – Sony Imagesoft
Initially, Sony Imagesoft relied heavily on cooperation with Nintendo, but after the cancellation of the Super NES CD-ROM, relations between the companies cooled greatly. In 1992, Sony Imagesoft made a sharp turn towards Sega. At the same time, Sony was most worried about the addon for the Sega Mega Drive (SMD), called Sega CD. This collaboration spawned a whole bunch of FMV games and expanded versions.
It was according to this scheme that the development of game adaptations of Hook began. The publisher of the 16-bit versions was Sony Imagesoft, and the developer was the Japanese company Ukiyotei – originally from Capcom. Hook became the debut project for the young studio. Version for Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) became the main one.
Ukiyotei employees had no experience in developing games for SMD, so the Core Design studio, the future creators of Tomb Raider, was sent to help them. Core Design’s main efforts were aimed at creating an expanded version for the Sega CD. All the game’s cutscenes were fully voiced, and at the beginning there was a small video with Captain Hook’s ship. The port also contains music from the film and several small video clips, but otherwise it is identical to the SMD version.
Ukiyotei subsequently developed games for the SNES until it was acquired by SNK in 2002. Among the significant projects I can mention: Todd McFarlane’s Spawn: The Video Game, the Metal Slug Mission series, as well as Punky Skunk.
Sega and SNES
Ukiyotei tried not to take risks and made a traditional platformer. All versions of Hook use 2 control buttons, which has become a controversial decision – gamers have to hold down the attack button to make Pan run.
From a mechanical point of view, the game turned out to be quite primitive. Besides running, Pan can only jump and hit with a sword. But Hook still had one truly unique feature – flight. Ukiyotei knew what gamers wanted, and the flight sections turned out to be interesting and memorable. I liked that we have entire levels based entirely on flying. For example, at the level in the mountains we must slowly and carefully spend fairy pollen so as not to fall into the abyss, and at the level in the forest we need to constantly move, running away from the constantly scrolling screen.
Each level in the game is designed in a similar way. For example, in Neverland Skeleton Rock, Peter is haunted by an annoying light. Fire is dangerous, but it also lights the path for the hero. The boss fight with the skeleton king turned out to be quite interesting and dynamic. The bosses, in general, turned out to be quite good. In addition to the skeleton king, I remember the flying boss and the fight with Captain Hook.
Another important feature of the game was the search for leaves and a magic sword. The leaf increases the life scale and provides great assistance in passing. The sword is capable of delivering ranged attacks, but it disappears after receiving damage.
Ukiyotei made a good and undeservedly forgotten game. Of course, many games using a pirate setting were released in the fourth generation (Pirates of Dark Water, Cutthroat Island, Melfand Stories). There were many games that developed flight mechanics (Rocket Knight, Gargoyles, Demon’s Crest), but they all came out later. The developers lacked the courage and experience to remain in history. But Ukiyotei will still have a chance to create a hit platformer about Peter Pan.
The SMD port was not very successful. Graphics and music suffered greatly. Animations and backgrounds have lost detail. This is most noticeable at the first level. The Nevertree is constantly changing weather and seasons. Leaves and snowflakes fly around the level, and the environment changes literally on the fly. But all this is only in the SNES version, all this is not on SMD. Water and lighting effects on SMD are particularly weak. The Sega CD port benefits from the film’s music, but I don’t recommend these versions for playthroughs.
The port on Sega Game Gear turned out to be quite good. It was created by the British studio Spidersoft. The developers tried and transferred most of the gameplay and mechanics of the original. Yes, the game feels a little raw and buggy, but Spidersoft made the gameplay easier and adjusted the hitboxes towards the player. Not all levels are included on Game Gear, but there is an exclusive boss.
Other games
“Captain Hook” is a real blockbuster, and Sony loved experiments in the 90s, so we got a whole bunch of video games in different genres. I won’t focus on them, but it would be a crime to forget about these adaptations.
Arcade – An incredibly colorful and driving beat ‘em up was released by Irem for arcade cabinets. This version of Hook suffered greatly due to Western censorship. The color palette has been changed and has become closer to the film of the same name. Pirate bosses have been removed because Peter Pan can’t hit girls. The Japanese company Irem was at the origins of the beat ‘em up genre (Kung-Fu Master, Vigilante, Spartan X 2). The Irem company did not lower the quality bar for a long time and released cool bitmaps (Undercover Cops, Blade Master).
On Amiga, Atari ST And DOS a quest from Ocean Software has been released. The game has some funny and absurd moments, but overall it’s a rather bland Monkey Island clone. I liked that most of the game takes place in the city of pirates and we can get a better understanding of the world. The Amiga version was the main one. It contains more animations and music tracks.
Another “Captain Hook” from Ocean Software released on NES, Commodore 64 and Game Boy. Before us is a rather stuffy and strange platformer. The game is very drawn out, especially the levels under water. The best mini-game was where we control the flying Peter. Ocean Software’s signature electronic soundtrack has become a real highlight. This branch became most famous thanks to the legendary AVGN review. In fact, everything is not so bad, for the Commodore 64 it’s a quite decent platformer.
Forgotten sequel
Interestingly, in 1994, Hook released a “spiritual sequel” called Skyblazer. This platformer was released on SNES and was also developed by Ukiyotei and published by Sony Imagesoft. This was not a typical project for Sony, as the publisher focused on film licenses and sports games. The giant believed in the small company and gave it a chance to create a AAA game. Ukiyotei was very enthusiastic about the project and, inspired by Indian mythology, created an amazing world.
The main character is Sky, who will have to save Ariana from the evil Lord of War. In the Japanese version, all the characters were named after Indian gods, so the American release lost some of its flavor.
What connects this game with the movie “Captain Hook”? Nothing! But just playing the game is enough to understand that this is a sequel to Hook, released on SNES. We expect the same approach to dynamics, gameplay and level construction. Some enemies and bosses came straight from Hook. There is a world map and levels with autoscrolling.
But there is one major change – every element of the game has been refined and improved. Now we can walk around the world map and return to previously completed locations. This must be done because forks have appeared in the levels. In Hook we were also given a choice of where to go, but the scale was several times smaller. Flight levels have been developed. Skye can maneuver in the air and deliver swift attacks, and Skyblazer also has a very nice mini-game that uses Mode 7.
Ukiyotei tried very hard to demonstrate a beautiful and technologically advanced picture. Several bosses and the Towers of Tarolisk level were created using Mode 7. Unlike Peter, Skye can crawl along some walls, but the most interesting difference was the magic system. After defeating the boss, Skye learns a new spell. For example, The Flash allows you to fly through the air for quite a long distance in a straight line. Magic brings a lot of variety to the gameplay, although some spells look useless compared to the almighty healing.
The main disadvantage of Skyblazer was its length. Towards the end the enemies and levels start to repeat themselves. I also didn’t like the fact that you have to hold down the jump button to fly. In any case, Skyblazer is a real masterpiece and an excellent SNES exclusive.
This concludes my story about the Captain Hook universe. Be sure to write to me if you had a cassette of this film as a child? Or did you play this game on Sega with your friends all day long?? Or maybe someone is lucky enough to have a SNES and play Skyblazer… My next article will be devoted to games based on two legendary franchises “Who Framed Roger Rabbit” and “Nutty”. Take care of your children and don’t feed the mermaids after midnight… That’s all for today!
