Death Stranding Live-Action Movie Gets Update From Director Michael Sarnoski [Exclusive]

When it comes to the "Death Stranding" movie, we've gotten a very slow drip of information so far. We learned a film was in the works in 2022, and the next year, A24 came on board as the financier and distributor. In 2025, word came out that Michael Sarnoski, the director of "Pig" and "A Quiet Place: Day One," would be writing and directing the movie, but there hasn't been a ton of concrete information since then. 

I recently had the opportunity to speak with Sarnoski about his newest film, "The Death of Robin Hood" (you can hear our full conversation on the upcoming June 24, 2026 episode of our /Film Weekly podcast), and at the end, I asked him for a status update on "Death Stranding."

"I'm doing a revision on that right now," he replied. "I'm super happy with it. A24 and Kojima seem really excited about it. It's been going great." Then he confirmed the approach they're taking with the story:

"Kojima's given me a ton of freedom to just explore the world however I want to, use all my own characters, tell a totally new story that's within this world and adjacent to the games, but really does its own thing. And it's been a really cool experience. I love those games, and it's been cool to take what speaks to me about those games thematically and what my experience of playing those games feels like and then find a different story that sort of taps into that but is still all its own. It's been really, really cool and they've been very supportive. So that's definitely the next feature and I'm very excited about that and it's been going great."

2019's "Death Stranding" was a boundary-pushing video game from industry icon Hideo Kojima, and with Kojima — who's a massive cinephile — serving as an executive producer on the movie, it seems that whoever is approving the decisions about this adaptation has learned the right lessons from Hollywood for once. Zach Cregger's upcoming "Resident Evil" movie looks like a great example of a game studio being willing to cede control to a filmmaker with a vision and let that filmmaker use the intellectual property as a springboard for a story that the director is interested in telling. The underseen "Werewolves Within" did this as well, and even the "Sonic the Hedgehog" movies have carved out their own identity while incorporating elements that gamers know and love. It sounds like "Death Stranding" is going to take a page from that playbook, which is exciting.

"There are a lot of 'game adaptation films' out there but what we are creating is not just a direct translation of the game," Kojima said about this film in 2023 (via Variety). "The intention is that our audience will not only be fans of the games, but our film will be for anyone who loves cinema. We are creating a 'Death Stranding' universe that has never been seen before, achievable only through the medium of film, it will be born."

Hollywood remains obsessed with IP, but at least movie studios seem to be coming around to the idea that slavishly recreating plot beats from games on the big screen isn't a recipe for guaranteed success. (A24 already learned this lesson with "Backrooms," which is not a video game, but the same idea applies.) With more video game movies coming down the pike, let's hope they continue to value the filmmaker's vision over all else.