NEW YORK — Film productions often face climate change, the threat of crew working overtime or dwindling daylight. Concerns about plaster sliding off the top of an airship are less common.

But that was one of the oddities of making “Grand Theft Hamlet,” a documentary about two British actors, Sam Crane and Mark Oosterveen, who, while idle because of the pandemic, decided to put stage “Hamlet” in the violent virtual world of “Grand Theft Auto”. When Shakespeare spoke of the “slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,” he may not have imagined the threat of a python running loose in a bar or of Hamlet wondering if he “ought to be” on a heliport. Still, “Grand Theft Auto” might be a strangely appropriate location for a play where almost everyone dies.

“The first time Sam did a bit of Shakespeare in this space, he said, ‘I imagine it was like that in the days of Shakespeare at the Globe, when people threw apples at you if you were bad. ‘”, explains Pinny Grylls. who wrote and directed the film with Crane, her husband. “No one really looks at you, but they sometimes look around and listen to poetry.”

“Grand Theft Hamlet,” which Mubi will release in theaters in January, opens with the avatars of Crane and Oosterveen, fleeing the police and rushing into an outdoor amphitheater. One of them said out loud, “I wonder if you could stage something here?”

They’re not the only ones who have drifted into virtual spaces and wondered whether it could make a rich landscape for a film. In “The Remarkable Life of Ibelin,” which debuted Friday on Netflix, director Benjamin Ree dives into “World of Warcraft” to tell both the life and virtual story of Mats Steen, a late Norwegian gamer at the age of Duchenne muscular dystrophy. 25.

“Knit’s Island,” which airs on Metrograph at Home, takes place almost entirely in the survival role-playing game DayZ. The filmmakers entered with “PRESS” badges on their avatars’ chests and sought interviews with high-kill players. “Don’t shoot!”, we shout during an approach. “I’m a documentarian!”

The three documentaries enter the field of video games with curiosity for what can be discovered there. For them, the surreal life inside these virtual spaces and the possibilities for real human connections are just as interesting there as anywhere else.

“Filmmakers want to make films about the world we live in. And more and more people are living in these virtual online gaming spaces,” says Grylls. “As filmmakers, we’re just holding a mirror up to the world and saying, ‘Look what’s happening here.'”

As the video game industry has become the dominant entertainment medium (by some estimates, eclipsing film, television, and music combined), the lines between films and video games are increasingly blurred. This doesn’t just apply to big box office films like “The Super Mario Bros.” Movie”, but also the small films known as machinima (a combination of “machine” and “cinema”) which use game engines to create their own narratives.

But “The Remarkable Life of Ibelin,” “Grand Theft Hamlet” and “Knit’s Island” are first-of-its-kind forays into bridging the gap between the virtual and cinema.

“This is just the beginning,” says Grylls. “We’re only at the beginning of this project. It’s nice to think that we’re part of this evolution of cinema.

Reconstructing the life of Mats Steen

When Ree first read Steen’s story, he was extremely moved. When Steen died in 2014, his parents, Robert and Trude, felt like their son had missed out on most of life. As Duchenne muscular dystrophy, a rare and incurable disease, progressed, Steen’s life was increasingly limited to playing video games from a wheelchair in their basement.

But after Steen’s parents posted the news of their son’s death on his blog, they were stunned by the response. Messages poured in, praising Steen, known to most as the burly Ibelin Redmoore from “World of Warcraft.” Ree rewinds her film to start again, telling Steen’s story using thousands of pages of archived text to bring Ibelin/Steen’s vibrant life to life within the game. In the game, Steen, as Ibelin, experienced her first kiss.

“I asked myself: is it possible to translate these huge archives and reconstruct real events with real dialogue and real characters, but also invite everyone? Ree said. “He actually came of age during one game. And I was so curious: what was it like? He experienced friendships, love – everything I can recognize in my own life growing up.

Ree knew that to make a film about Steen’s life, he had to illustrate it through “World of Warcraft.” Even though he wasn’t a gamer himself, Ree looked for players who posted fan videos on YouTube. Rasmus Tukia, a 28-year-old self-taught 3D animator, led two other animators in rendering the game environment with the same models used for the gameplay videos.

“They were all YouTubers and this was their first job,” says Ree. “We are doing something completely new here. If it works, it’s a credit to these YouTubers.

Ree’s goal wasn’t to imitate the game exactly – it can look clunky or too choppy. So for three years, without permission from the game’s creator, Blizzard Entertainment, they animated Steen/Ibelin’s experiences in “World of Warcraft,” but with a slightly more cinematic twist. Along the way, they showed drafts to Steen’s online friends to get their feedback.

“When I showed them the film after working on it for three and a half years, the response after the screening was, ‘That’s exactly how we remember Ibelin,’” says Ree. “Then they said, ‘But you made a mistake.’ Ibelin liked women with more leather clothing.’

It was only after the film – a small independent Norwegian production before its acquisition by Netflix – was nearing completion that Ree contacted Blizzard. He traveled to their offices in California to project it to executives.

“I was so nervous. I hadn’t slept in days. We didn’t have a plan B. I had to take extra doses of asthma medication to be able to breathe before the meeting,” says Ree. “We showed them the film and right after they saw it, they were crying. The boss turned around and said, “This movie is fantastic. You will get the rights.

Shakespeare with a cargo plane in “Grand Theft Hamlet”

Crane, an experienced stage and screen actor, had initially launched what became “Grand Theft Hamlet” as a lark, a way to stay busy while movie theaters were closed during the pandemic. However, when he posted videos, people responded enthusiastically, as did the game’s creator, Rockstar Games.

“They talked to us about how they designed the game to be used like this, like a sandbox, like a creative space,” Crane says.

But little has been established about how to make “Grand Theft Hamlet,” which won best documentary at SXSW in March. For starters, almost every audition or rehearsal for the game ended in bloodshed. Someone with a gun would usually show up and chaos would ensue.

The filmmakers had a few touchstones, like Joe Hunting’s 2022 documentary “We Met in Virtual Reality” and the work of artist Jacky Connolly, who used “Grand Theft Auto” to make the nightmarish, existential short film ” Descent into Hell. But little has been prescribed about how to make a film set entirely in a game world.

“We were kind of working on all aspects: putting on a play in that world, learning how to capture the images of that world, and then how to edit all of those images,” Crane explains. “We were learning as we went.”

It also meant freedom. At some point, they realized they could essentially perform Shakespeare “on a billion-dollar budget.” This is the first “Hamlet” to feature the car from “Back to the Future” or a cargo plane. Meanwhile, Grylls, an experienced filmmaker, was experimenting with camera positioning.

“I realized: OK, let’s try to make things a little more still and more cinematic,” she says. “When I found out there was a phone inside the game with a camera on it, I was able to do close-ups and wide shots and sort of cinematic language.

The game is not over

While “Grand Theft Hamlet” has been screened at various film festivals, Crane and Grylls find themselves in the surprising position of being celebrated for a film they made mostly in their bedroom on a PlayStation. Like their forays into the virtual world, something done in physical isolation found an ever-growing community.

Ree, who spoke at a festival in San Francisco, traveled with “Ibelin” with Streen’s parents. A life that once seemed quiet and lonely has spread across the globe.

“They watched the film at every screening,” he says. “In a way, for them, the film is part of their healing but also part of their grieving process. They have seen it now over 150 times.