Mario Movie Leak Addressed By Nintendo

When Sony Pictures was hacked, several email conversations were made public between Sony and Nintendo about the possibility of creating a Mario movie.   The emails leaked had the contact that seemingly brokered the deal confident that it would go forward.

The planned film from Sony was reported to be animated and only in the very early stages of development. The email that contained the subject, “Mario,” said:

“I am the proud father of Mario the animated film,” producer Avi Arad wrote to Sony studio head Amy Pascal in an email dated Oct. 23, 2014, with the subject “Mario.” Arad also sent Pascal separate photos of himself with Mario Bros. creator Shigeru Miyamoto and Nintendo CEO Satoru Iwata, the latter of which included the note, “Happy CEO, let’s meet up, it’s the mother load.”

Unfortunately, fans will have to keep waiting for a potential Mario movie. Shigeru Miyamoto has squashed the notion that there will be a Mario movie made with Sony Pictures.

“I heard something about that this morning. What’s interesting is that over the past 20 years, people come to us on a fairly regular basis about creating ‘Mario’ movies. There are times that those ideas end right when they bring them to us, and other times we’ll listen to presentations. It’s not very unusual, and it’s something we’ve been doing for a very long time. I don’t particularly have a vision that the next iteration of ‘Mario’ is going to be in film.”

Miyamoto mentions that Nintendo is approached almost every year by studios wanting to make a movie featuring the world’s most famous plumber. While Nintendo entertains many of the ideas, he isn’t sure when Mario will make his next appearance on film.

It is unclear if Nintendo is simply downplaying a Mario movie possibility because of the hack of Sony Pictures or not. We’ve seen a revival of interest in movies surrounding video game characters, especially with the release of Wreck-It Ralph and the upcoming Wreck-It Ralph 2. Nintendo refused to license Mario for the movie perhaps because of future plans for their own movie.