| The Maze Runner | |
|---|---|
 Theatrical release poster | |
| Directed by | Wes Ball |
| Screenplay by |
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| Based on | The Maze Runner byJames Dashner |
| Produced by |
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| Starring | |
| Cinematography | Enrique Chediak |
| Edited by | Dan Zimmerman |
| Music by | John Paesano |
Production companies |
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| Distributed by | 20th Century Fox |
Release date |
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Running time | 113 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $34 million[1][2] |
| Box office | $348.3 million[1] |
The Maze Runner is a 2014 Americandystopianscience fiction film directed byWes Ball, in hisfeature directorial debut, based onJames Dashner's2009 novel. The film is the first installment inThe Maze Runner film series and was produced byNoah Oppenheim, Grant Pierce Myers andT. S. Nowlin. The film starsDylan O'Brien,Kaya Scodelario,Thomas Brodie-Sangster,Will Poulter andPatricia Clarkson. The story follows sixteen-year-old Thomas, portrayed by O'Brien, who awakens in a rusty elevator with no memory of who he is, only to learn that he has been delivered to the middle of an intricate maze, along with many other boys, who have been trying to find their way out of the ever-changing labyrinth—all while establishing a functioning society in what they call the Glade.
Development ofThe Maze Runner began in January 2011 whenFox purchased the film rights to Dashner's novel withGotham Group andTemple Hill Entertainment as producers andCatherine Hardwicke intended to direct. In 2012, Ball was hired to direct the film adaptation after presenting an animated short film titledRuin with a similar tone and was initially considered for a feature-length adaptation.Principal photography began inBaton Rouge, Louisiana on May 13, 2013, and officially concluded on July 12, 2013.
The Maze Runner was released on September 19, 2014, in the United States by20th Century Fox. The film received positive reviews, with praise for Ball's direction, the actors' performances and the film's tone. Critics considered it to be better than most young adult book-to-film adaptations. The film was first at the box office in its opening weekend, grossing $32.5 million, making it the seventh-highest-grossing debut in September. The film earned over $348 million worldwide at the box office, against its budget of $34 million. Two sequels,Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials andMaze Runner: The Death Cure, were released in 2015 and 2018.
A teenage boy awakens in an underground elevator without memory of his identity. A large group of male youths greets him in a large grassy area, called the "Glade", enclosed by massive stone walls. The "Gladers" have formed a rudimentary society, each taking on specialized roles. The boy learns that a vast maze encircles the Glade and is their only means of escape. During the day, designated "Runners" search the maze for an exit and return before its gate closes at sunset. After a fight with Gally, the boy remembers his name is Thomas.
Thomas is attacked by Ben, a Runner who was stung and left delirious by a Griever, one of the biomechanical creatures that roam the maze at night. The Gladers force Ben into the maze, as there is no cure for his condition, and leave him to die.
The next morning, Alby, the Glade's leader, and Minho, the lead Runner, retrace Ben's steps inside the maze. However, as the sun sets, Minho reappears near the gate, dragging a badly injured Alby who has been stung. Unable to reach the Glade in time, Thomas runs into the maze to help, leaving all three trapped. Thomas is chased by a Griever but manages to lure it into a closing passageway, crushing it. The three survive the night and return the next morning.
A girl arrives in the elevator with two syringes of Griever anti-venom and a note saying she is the last to enter the Glade. She recognizes Thomas, but he does not remember her. Gally accuses Thomas of disrupting the peace between the Gladers and the Grievers and insists he be punished. However, Newt, Alby's second-in-command, designates Thomas as a Runner instead. Thomas, Minho, Frypan, Winston and Zart enter the maze to locate the Griever's corpse and retrieve a mechanical device inside of it. Minho later shows Thomas a maze model based on previous explorations and explains that numbered sections open and close in a fixed sequence. Thomas realizes that the device corresponds to a specific section of the maze. One of the anti-venom syringes is used on Alby, who recovers quickly. Minho and Thomas venture back into the maze with the device and discover a potential exit but are forced to retreat after a series of traps suddenly activate.
Later that night, the maze entrance remains open, and additional gates open up, allowing Grievers to invade the Glade. Alby, Zart and many other Gladers are killed, leading Gally to blame Thomas for the chaos. Thomas, who has been experiencing fragmented memory flashes since his arrival, stabs himself with a severed Griever's stinger to recover his memories before receiving the last dose of the anti-venom. While unconscious, Thomas remembers that he and Teresa once worked for the World Catastrophe Killzone Department (WCKD), the organization behind the maze, and that all the Gladers are being used as test subjects for an experiment. He awakens and reveals his past.
Having taken command overnight, Gally plans to sacrifice Thomas and Teresa to the Grievers, believing it will restore peace. However, several Gladers free them and enter the maze together, while Gally and a few Gladers stay behind. Jeff and several other Gladers are killed by Grievers as the rest escape through the maze exit.
The Gladers eventually reach a laboratory strewn with corpses. In a video recording, a WCKD scientist, Ava Paige, explains that massivesolar flares followed by a pandemic caused by the Flare virus has devastated the planet, and the Gladers were part of an experiment to find a cure for the virus. The recording ends with Paige shooting herself as armed personnel storm the lab. Gally, having been stung by a Griever while following the group, declares that they will never be free and fires a gun at Thomas. Minho spears Gally, but not before he fatally shoots Chuck. As Thomas breaks down crying over Chuck, masked soldiers arrive and escort them to a helicopter, which flies over a vast desert wasteland toward a ruined city.
Later, the supposedly dead scientists gather in a room with Paige, who remarks that the experiment was a success and that the survivors are now entering Phase Two.
On January 4, 2011, it was announced that20th Century Fox had obtained the rights to a film adaptation ofThe Maze Runner byJames Dashner, withCatherine Hardwicke attached to direct.[3] On August 23, 2012Wes Ball was confirmed to direct the film, withGotham Group as producers.[4] Ball produced an animatedscience fictionpost-apocalyptic short film, titledRuin, and presented the short in3D to20th Century Fox. The studio initially considered a film adaptation of the short film, as it had the same tone ofThe Maze Runner novel they already planned to bring to the screen. Ball was then offered the chance to direct the novel adaptation.[5]
In late 2012, director Wes Ball hired creature designer Ken Barthelmey to design the Grievers. Impressed by Barthelmey's test design, Ball asked him to add a mechanical scorpion tail. Barthelmey's inspirations for the Grievers included coconut crabs, caterpillars and piranhas. Barthelmey also worked on several Maze, Beetle Blade (cut from the film) and Crank designs.[6]
For the role of Teresa,Kaya Scodelario was Ball's first choice as she was "fantastic" and because he loved her in the TV showSkins.Dylan O'Brien, the lead role, was initially rejected by Ball. Ball recounts, "Dylan was actually... I saw him early on, very early on and I overlooked him. It was a big learning experience there because I overlooked him because of his hair. He hadTeen Wolf hair and I couldn't see past that and so we were looking for our Thomas and it's a tough role to make because he comes in as a boy and he leaves as a man, so it can't be like this badass action star that comes into this movie. It's about vulnerability upfront and then he comes out of it and comes into his own and then the next movies are about the leader that emerges from the group. So finally Fox says 'We just did this movie,The Internship. There's this kid that's in this thing. He's like 20 years old. We think he's kind of got something.' So I watched his tape and was like 'Wait a minute, I've seen this kid before.' I looked him up online and there was one picture of him with a totally shaved head and it's this sweet vulnerable-looking kid and I was like 'Whoa, interesting.' I said, 'Wait a minute, he's just so familiar and I looked back at my old audition tapes, which we had thousands of, and there's Dylan. That guy I said 'No, definitely not him.' So we brought him back in and we started to talk with him and I'm like 'he's the coolest dude ever.'"Blake Cooper entered the film viaTwitter. Ball revealed a lot on Twitter, and many kids wanted to be Chuck. Cooper constantly bugged Ball, until Ball told him to give his tape to his casting director, and Ball was impressed by Cooper's tape and cast him.[5]
Principal photography started inBaton Rouge, Louisiana on May 13, 2013,[7] and officially ended on July 12, 2013.[8] Post-production on the film was completed in June 2014.
Composed byJohn Paesano, the soundtrack consists of 21 tracks and was released on September 16, 2014.[9]
The film was originally set to be released on February 14, 2014.[10] On October 5, 2013, the film was pushed back.[11]IMAX theaters released the film on September 19, 2014.[12]
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Eleven character cards for the film were released in July 2013. Starting in January 2014, director Wes Ball released one image from the film once a week, leading up to the film's first trailer released on March 17, 2014.[13] A viral marketing campaign launched by 20th Century Fox began on April 16, 2014. The campaign is a website featuring the main characters while focusing on WCKD, an organization in Dashner's novel series of the same name. The website has the domain wckdisgood.com.[14]
On June 26, 2014, O'Brien tweeted that the originalThe Maze Runner book would be re-released with a new book cover based on the film's poster.[15] On July 29, 2014, the second trailer for the film was released exclusively on Yahoo! Movies.[16]
The film grossed $102,427,862 in North America and more than $245.8 million in other territories for a worldwide total of $348.3 million.[17]
Prior to its release in the U.S. and Canada, box office analysts predicted the film would be a box office success, citing effective marketing, good word-of-mouth publicity and a solid release date. Preliminary reports predicted the film would open with takings of over $30–32 million in North America.[18][19][20][21] According to movie-ticket sale websiteFandango,The Maze Runner was the biggest seller accounting for more than 50% of early tickets sales.[22] The film was released on September 19, 2014, in the United States and Canada across 3,604 locations and over 350IMAX theaters.[23][24] It earned $1.1 million from Thursday night shows,[25] and $11.25 million on its opening day.[26] It topped the box office on its opening weekend with $32.5 million of which 9% of the gross came from IMAX theaters.[27] Its opening weekend gross is the seventh highest for a film released in September,[28][29] and the 18th highest for a young-adult book adaptation.[30] The film earned a total of $102,272,088 at the North American box office becoming the 26th-highest-grossing film of 2014 in the U.S. and Canada.[31]
Outside North America, the film debuted in five countries a week prior to its North American release and earned a total of $8.3 million.[32] The film had a similar success overseas during its wide-opening second weekend earning $38 million from 7,547 screens in 51 markets. It opened in South Korea with $5.5 million—higher than the openings ofThe Hunger Games andDivergent,[33] the UK, Ireland and Malta with $3.4 million behindGone Girl,[34][35] and China with $14.58 million behindTeenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.[36] Other high openings were witnessed in Russia and theCIS ($5.75 million), France ($5.2 million), Australia ($3.4 million), Mexico ($2.6 million), Taiwan ($2.2 million) and Brazil ($2 million).[32][33][37]
It became thethird-highest-grossing film of all time in Malaysia for Fox (behindAvatar andX-Men: Days of Future Past).[38][39][40]
Review aggregatorRotten Tomatoes assigns the film a score of 66% based on 173 reviews, with an average rating of 5.9/10. The site's consensus states: "With strong acting, a solid premise, and a refreshingly dark approach to its dystopian setting,The Maze Runner stands out from the crowded field of YA sci-fi adventures".[41]Metacritic gives the film a score of 57 out of 100, based on 34 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[42] Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film a grade of A− on an A+ to F scale.[43] According to Tim Ryan ofThe Wall Street Journal, critics considered the film better than most young adult book-to-film adaptations due to its "strong performances and a creepy, mysterious atmosphere".[44]
Rafer Guzmán ofNewsday gave the film a three out of four and described it as "solid, well crafted and entertaining".[45] Christy Lemire ofRogerEbert.com said she found the film intriguing, writing that "it tells us a story we think we've heard countless times before but with a refreshingly different tone and degree of detail".[46]The Seattle Times's Soren Anderson said the film was "vastly superior to the book that inspired it" and gave it a score of 3/4.[47] Tony Hicks of theSan Jose Mercury News was "hooked by the combination of fine acting, intriguing premise and riveting scenery".[48] Matthew Toomey ofABC Radio Brisbane gave the film a grade of A−, giving praise to its intriguing premise saying that "it held [his] attention for its full two-hour running time".[49] Justin Lowe ofThe Hollywood Reporter said it was "consistently engaging",[50] andElla Taylor ofVariety wrote "as world-creation YA pictures go,The Maze Runner feels refreshingly low-tech and properly story-driven".[51]
Michael O'Sullivan ofThe Washington Post said "The Maze Runner unravels a few mysteries, but it spins even more", giving it a 3/4.[52] Stephen Whitty of theNewark Star-Ledger wrote "it does leave you wanting to see the next installment. And that's one special effect that very few YA movies ever pull off".[53] Isaac Feldberg ofWe Got This Covered awarded the film 8/10 stars, calling it "dark, dangerous and uncommonly thrilling", while extolling it as "one of the most engaging YA adaptations to hit theaters in quite some time."[54] Rick Bentley ofThe Fresno Bee praised Wes Ball's direction, saying that he "created balance between a thin but solid script and first-rate action—and he doesn't waste a frame doing it".[55] Bill Zwecker of theChicago Sun-Times called it "a well-acted and intelligent thriller/futuristic sci-fi romp".[56]Bilge Ebiri ofNew York magazine said he "was quite riveted".[57]Michael Sragow of theOrange County Register gave it a grade of B and said, "Ball is deft, though, at evoking claustrophobia of every kind, whether in the open-air prison of the Glade or the actual tight spaces of the Maze. And he elicits a hair-trigger performance from O'Brien".[58]
Claudia Puig ofUSA Today said "a sci-fi thriller set in a vaguely post-apocalyptic future must create a fully drawn universe to thoroughly captivate the viewer. ButMaze Runner feels only partially formed", giving it a score of 2/4.[59]Time magazine'sRichard Corliss said "likeJean-Paul Sartre'sNo Exit-tentialism, but more crowded and with the musk of bottled-up testosterone".[60]Wesley Morris of the websiteGrantland said "I think I have a touch of apocalepsy—excessive sleepiness caused by prolonged exposure to three- and four-part series in which adolescents rebel against oppressive governments represented by esteemed actors".[61]Steven Rea ofThe Philadelphia Inquirer gave the film a 2.5 out of 4 rating and said "it's bleak business, and as it hurries toward its explosive, expository conclusion, the film becomes nonsensical, too".[62] Film criticEthan Gilsdorf ofThe Boston Globe said "teens should eat up this fantasy's scenery-chewing angst and doom, and the hopeful tale of survival and empowerment (to be continued in the inevitable sequel or sequels)".[63]
| Year | Award | Category | Nominee(s) | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2014 | IFMCA Awards[64] | Best Original Score for an Action/Adventure/Thriller Film | John Paesano | Nominated |
| 2015 | MTV Movie Awards[65] | Best Breakthrough Performance | Dylan O'Brien | Won |
| Best Fight | Dylan O'Brien andWill Poulter | Won | ||
| Best Hero | Dylan O'Brien | Won | ||
| Best Scared-As-Shit Performance | Dylan O'Brien | Nominated | ||
| Teen Choice Awards[66] | Choice Movie: Action/Adventure | The Maze Runner | Nominated | |
| Choice Movie: Breakout Star | Thomas Brodie-Sangster | Nominated | ||
| Choice Movie: Chemistry | Dylan O'Brien and Thomas Brodie-Sangster | Nominated | ||
| Choice Movie Actor: Action/Adventure | Dylan O'Brien | Nominated | ||
| Choice Movie Actress: Action/Adventure | Kaya Scodelario | Nominated | ||
| World Soundtrack Awards[67] | Public Choice Award | John Paesano | Won | |
| 2016 | Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Awards[68] | Favorite Book | James Dashner | Nominated |
On October 11, 2013, it was reported that Twentieth Century Fox had acquired the rights to the second book,The Scorch Trials. A screenplay was written by T. S. Nowlin, with director Wes Ball supervising the scriptwriting.[69] The sequel was released on September 18, 2015.[70][71] On July 25, 2014, Ball announced atSan Diego Comic-Con that filming for the sequel would commence sometime between March and May 2015, shouldThe Maze Runner become a success when it hits the theaters.[72] However, two weeks prior to the film's release20th Century Fox decided to move ahead with the sequel and pre-production began in early September 2014 inNew Mexico.[73] Cast membersDylan O'Brien,Kaya Scodelario,Thomas Brodie-Sangster,Ki-Hong Lee andPatricia Clarkson reprised their roles for the sequel, as did director Wes Ball. It was announced thatAidan Gillen would be joining the film to play Janson ("Rat-Man"),[74] as wasRosa Salazar who portrayed Brenda,[75]Jacob Lofland who starred as Aris Jones,[76] andGiancarlo Esposito who played Jorge Gallaraga.[77]
A second sequel,Maze Runner: The Death Cure was released on January 26, 2018.
On February 27, 2020, South Koreanboy bandBTS released their music video "On", which referenced set pieces fromThe Maze Runner. The homage was noted by source book author Dashner on Twitter.[78]
Anson Lo said the opening of his 2022 song "King Kong" music video paid tribute toThe Maze Runner. He is the director of the music video.[79]
Quotations related toThe Maze Runner at Wikiquote
