Rapper Chris Bridges (Ludacris), and former rapper and current actor and producer Mark Wahlberg are starring in a film adaptation of the popular Noir detective shooter video game series Max Payne. The movie, directed by John Moore is due to be released on Friday.

In movie, Wahlberg plays the titular character, a cop who’s had his family brutally murdered and is now out for revenge justice. Chris “Ludacris” Bridges plays the part of Deputy Chief Jim Bravura, an internal affairs agent who is helping Payne. The choice may seem a touch odd considering that in the original game series, the character is a balding, middle aged pot-bellied man of Italian heritage, but the director stated that the movie is only a loose adaptation of the original story.

We also see the beautiful Mila Kunis cast as Mona Sax, an assassin seeking revenge for her sister’s murder and, in the games at least, a brushing love interest to Max.

The movie intends to cater to its original hardcore gamer audience, as well as people who’ve never seen it before. "First and foremost, we wanted to satisfy the die-hard game fans, and hopefully it will draw a lot of other people to the film based on the images that they see [on the trailers]," said Wahlberg in an interview.

To achieve that, the actors in the main roles as well as the director played through the whole game (well Moore rather watched being played through by his teenage assistant because he wasn’t comfortable with video gaming controls) to get a feel for the story and the characters. Mark Wahlberg was actually pleasantly surprised by the game, as he himself states:

"I didn't know it was based on a video game until after I read the script, and that made me a little freaked out, because I grew up playing 'Pac-Man' and 'Asteroids' — there's no story, he said" but went on to comment on the very atmospheric and Noir script of Max Payne. "After seeing the game, I was very impressed," he says, "It's a very elaborate story, it's very cinematic, and video games have changed quite a bit since I was a kid."

Hollywood veteran Beau Bridges, who plays the role of Max’s friend B.B. Hensley, had a similar view of the script. "When I read the script, even the way things were described, I knew it would have a definite style about it," he explains. "And then I saw the video game, and that impressed me again. A real important element in this is the style, and [director] John Moore brought that. ... All the time through [filming], we were always conscious of who these people were, because I think that's what makes this video game stand out — that it had human elements in it that were important to the story.

These passionate comments from the people involved in making this picture tell this author, who is himself a fan of the Max Payne saga, that the adaptation of this wonderful, cerebral story, is in good hands, being made by people who are devoted to capturing the drama and spirit of ‘Max Payne’, devoid of which, a film version would be just another dime-a-dozen bullet-fest. Gamers really have something to look forward to this weekend, but even if you just like noir films in general, or would like to see a ‘thinking man’s action movie’, then Max Payne is for you

P.S. For fans: Yes, there will be bullet-time in the film, and it’s actually being realized in an interesting way – a 1000 FPS high-speed camera – that should be a treat to see.