Oregon Trail ‘action comedy’ film in the works from Apple

GenXers and elder millennials, rejoice – or maybe don’t: An Oregon Trail movie is on the way from Apple. 

Billed as an “action comedy,” it’s been confirmed to The Register that Apple’s film studio has accepted a pitch from duo Will Speck and Josh Gordon to direct the film. The movie will be based on the classic computer game where countless schoolchildren in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s forded rivers, shot bison, and inevitably died of dysentery before (probably not) making it to Oregon City. 

Created in 1971 by Minnesota schoolteachers looking for a way to engage their students in the history of the overland route from Missouri across the unsettled American West, the game saw broad release after the Minnesota Educational Computing Consortium (MECC – also responsible for genX/millennial grade school edutainment classics like Number Munchers and the Secret Island of Dr Quandary) released an updated version in 1974.

The game has gone through many incarnations over the years, and Apple is closely linked to the most popular version, released in 1985 for the Apple II. That version of the game is still playable online on multiple websites and is downloadable as freeware. 

For those unfamiliar with the Oregon Trail itself, it was a 2,170-mile (c 3,500 km) route traveled by hundreds of thousands of settlers who opted to head west to the Oregon territory to make their fortunes, with most travelers hitting the trail from the 1840s through the late 1860s. 

A map of the Oregon Trail, as shown in the 1985 Apple II release of the game – click to enlarge

The trail was rough, and between threats from disease, weather, wild animals, river crossings, and other dangers, it’s believed as many as 10 percent of those who undertook the journey never reached the end of the trail. 

The grim nature of the real Oregon Trail was reflected in the game of the same title, as anyone who went to school in the US in the 1990s (this vulture included) will tell you, leading to a sort of gallows humor as characters named for friends and family succumbed to the perils of the trail. 

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That makes the film a natural fit for an action comedy – at least a dark one – but it remains unclear what we’ll actually get if and when the film gets made. We’re told it’s still the earliest days of the process and a screenplay hasn’t even been written yet. 

Directors Gordon and Speck have reportedly been looking for a studio to make the film since 2022, which the pair said at the time they hoped to make into a musical comedy. According to THR, that’s still the plan, with award-winning songwriters and producers Benj Pasek and Justin Paul tapped to write songs for the film. 

But will it please the original players of the game? The Reg isn’t sure at this stage, but the team behind it is helmed by the same people who created less-than-successful TV shows like Cavemen, a short-run series based on Geico insurance commercials, and movies Blades of Glory and Office Christmas Party. 

So if you want to have some laughs on the Oregon Trail, it might be a good idea to stick to the game – who knows when that movie’ll be out, or if it’ll even be worth watching. ®