http://www.pajiba.com/trade_news/exclusive-ken-kwapis-to-direct-liveaction-dilbert-movie.php
This seems several years past the “sell-by” date. I suppose it could work if the Wally character is prominently featured - he’s consistently the best character in the strip, even over Dogbert.
I thought they made one already. It’s called Office Space. 
Interesting reading the comments on that page, with the “Who should play Dilbert?” debate. Toward the end, the name John Hodgman comes up a lot. I think to myself “I don’t know who that is, but the ‘I’m a PC’ guy from those Mac commercials needs to play Dilbert”.
Then I googled “John Hodgman” – lo and behold…
Hodgman has the right personality to play Dilbert, but if they want to get someone who looks a little like Dilbert, they could cast Jim Gaffigan.
My initial reaction was that this movie will surely suck with the collective power of 47,219 black holes.
I’ve backed off from that a bit, though I still can’t imagine it being very good. The strip (still often amusing and occasionally brilliant) has its own particular vibe and attitude that probably can’t be replicated in live-action.
And I’ll lay odds that Dogbert (and Catbert and Ratbert, etc., if they appear) will be computer-animated. It’s either that or use an actual dog, as in Underdog. I can’t decide which would be worse.
For Wally, how about either Paul Giamatti or maybe T.J. Thyne.
Is there somewhere I can go, to bet absolutely everything I own, or ever will own, that this movie will suck as much as any movie has ever sucked? And will make ***McGruber ***look like Garfield? Not that I’d get very good odds . . .
The obvious choice (in appearance, anyway) for the Pointy-headed Boss is Danny DiVito. But he’s getting on in years, so how about Rex Linn?
I’d bet Marmaduke will be worse.
Perhaps it will acheive the stellar critical success of the Garfield movie.
Personally, I think Hagar the Horrible would be a better choice.
As much as I like *Dilbert * in print, I don’t see this being any good.
The strips lose a lot in translation to video - they need about oh, 2,000 strips worth of writing to flesh out a half-hour of TV.
Take a look at the *Dilbert *TV show that had a fairly short life in 1999 or so. (Netflix has it available for instant view)
My vote would be to use a real dog with some CGI enhancement. Forget Underdog, it worked well enough in Babe, and surely there have been some advances in 15 years.
You can’t write out Dogbert and have it be a Dilbert movie, but you can keep him at home and keep his lines at a minimum. The movie should focus on the workplace, not talking animals. Save Catbert and Ratbert for the sequels.
I approve of John Hodgman.
Yeah, the movie would have to tread very carefully to not be just another talking animal movie. Leave Dogbert out, and you’d lose a lot. Feature Dogbert too much, and you’ll end up with just another family fun comedy movie that happens to take place in an office.
I can’t even begin to imagine what they could possibly do with this idea. I really love the comic strip, but it’s a comic strip, and not the kind with a story that progresses.
And in the specific case of Dilbert, the strip just won’t translate well to being a movie. Comedies and such need a protagonist. Dilbert is, almost by design, NOT a protagonist. Dilbert does not do things; things are done to Dilbert. Dogbert does things, but Dilbert does not. The very best strips are the ones where Dilbert and his coworkers are victimized by the Pointy-Haired Boss and the company in general.
So you buy the characters from Scott Adams. What is the movie supposed to be ABOUT? Dilbert? Okay, what’s he supposed to do, what obstacle should be overcome? No matter what sort of movie you put together, you have to have him accomplish something - which is precisely the opposite of the point of the strip. It would completely shoot the entire Dilbert concept to hell.
Or else you could make it some sort of experimental film where he DOESN’T do anything, in which case the target audience will hate it and why make the movie at all?
Do you actually read the strips? I don’t find it that difficult to put a coherent storyline through the Dilbert universe. Put them on a big project with jobs on the line, maybe the company goes bankrupt if it fails. Cue Alice punching people, Wally slacking off, Catbert and PHB being their sadistic selves, Dogbert as Dilberts confidante/co-conspirator/tormentor. Dilbert spots a shy new secretary and has to do well with his project to get a date with her. There’s tons of stuff you could do here. Would it be good? I dunno, but my point is I don’t think it would be that difficult to come up with a semi coherent storyline to wrap the funny bits around.
I can see major problems making a live action movie out of a cartoon populated by talking rats, cats, dogs, and dinosaurs, but not in coming up with a storyline/plot, etc.
If it’s live action it will suck. If it’s animated a la Shrek or Toy Story, it will suck. If it’s a cartoon with some decent voice acting it could be good.
The Dilbert TV show stank because great comic strips need a few seconds to figure out and appreciate the joke. Crap like Garfield makes an excellent TV show since you don’t need to go back or look at the scene carefully. Also, a 3 panel strip takes less than a few seconds of screen time.
The cartoon is a bunch of pithy, occasionally (though less and less lately) funny one liners. I don’t see this as a live action comedy goldmine.
Well, I liked the TV show, and suspect a good movie could be made with the same actors (Daniel Stern, Larry Miller, Chris Elliott, etc.), even if done live-action. But then, I’ve been wrong before…TRM
I keep thinking “What about LIVE-live-action: people playing the animal parts?”
Wouldn’t Steve Buscemi make a great Ratbert?
Superhal:
The TV Show greatly improved during the second half of its brief life. After a while, they realized that office/engineer jokes weren’t going to be all that popular and figured out that the show had to be BASED in the office of an engineer-employing firm, but the plots didn’t necessarily need to be on office-related subjects.
But after the lackluster first season, too much of the potential audience fell away for the show to really get noticed.
I can’t imagine a live Dilbert movie. No human could possibly look as clueless as the Pointy-Haired Boss should look. No human with actual eyes behind lenses could possibly convey the kind of world-weariness that the cartoon Dilbert and Wally do with their blank glasses. If they can come up with a plot that will carry a feature-length movie, a long version of the TV cartoon could be very watchable, but live? Don’t think so.
