Portal Could Get The Backrooms Treatment

Take a look through any list of the all-time greatest video games, and chances are you’ll see Portal and its sequel, Portal 2, a lot. Developed by Valve Software, the team behind beloved games like Half-Life and Left 4 Dead, Portal was a revolutionary piece of art when it hit the scene back in 2007.

Its easy-to-learn but difficult-to-master physics-based mechanics, uncanny and sleek futuristic setting, thoughtful environmental storytelling, and impeccable voice acting immediately gripped audiences and earned it unceasing praise from both critics and gamers. The 2011 sequel further solidified the series’ place in the annals of video game history, but unfortunately, there still seems to be no plans for a third installment.

That’s not to say that fans will never get to revisit the Aperture Science Enrichment Center in any capacity, though. There have been rumblings of a Portal film adaptation as far back as 2013, with initial talks revolving around a partnership between Valve’s Gabe Newell and J.J. Abrams. The last update came in 2021, when Abrams revealed that a script was being written at Warner Bros., although the lack of updates since then implies the project is either canceled or in development hell. But in a surprising twist of fate, the director of one of the year’s biggest surprises has cited the games as a huge influence, and has already declared his interest in directing an adaptation himself.

Fresh off the heels of Backrooms becoming A24’s highest-grossing film at $216.3 million (beating out last year’s Marty Supreme), a recent profile in the New York Times casually dropped the fact that 20-year-old filmmaker Kane Parsons is interested in directing an adaptation of Portal. Parsons, during Backrooms’ press tour, has already mentioned that Portal 2 was a massive inspiration for his YouTube work and his first feature. The unnerving corporate office sprawl that makes up the game’s setting, as well as the frequent crude murals that indicate a prior human presence, were a particular influence on Backrooms' aesthetic and atmosphere, and if you’re familiar with the games, that influence is hard to miss.

Despite being puzzle games first and foremost, there’s a consistent narrative driving the two-game series: you play as a woman named Chell, who wakes up from stasis within the dilapidated Aperture Science Laboratory, only to be forced by a rogue artificial intelligence named GLaDOS to complete a series of increasingly dangerous tests involving the usage of a gun that materializes traversable portals on surfaces. Both games emphasize environmental storytelling that slowly unravels the history of the Aperture Science Center and the grisly fates that befell those who worked there, as well as the test subjects who came before Chell.

Somewhat like Backrooms, Portal’s story is a vehicle for exploring a world filled with its own history and secrets. On both YouTube and the big screen, Parsons has demonstrated his adeptness at crafting worlds filled to the brim with mysterious and intriguing implications, as well as a knack for crafting unnerving liminal spaces that you can’t help but want to explore.

If Parsons were to direct something within the universe of the games, there’s no guarantee it would have to be Chell’s story; considering GLaDOS had been torturing test subjects for quite some time before and after the first game, a film adaptation could tell an original story following one of them. There’s no indication that Parsons is involved with a Portal project in any official capacity, but it would certainly be an intriguing match. When talking about the future of an adaptation that’s been stalled out for 13 years, who better to tackle it than a young director with an interest in the material who just delivered one of the year’s most successful projects?