Board Games Make Great Movies! Right?

What's better than playing some of your favorite board games? Well, watching someone else play them of course! And what's the best way to watch anyone do anything? Why, on the silver screen. That's the thought
between Hasbro and Universal Pictures' arrangement to turn some of the toy behemoth's best-known (or, in Stretch Armstrong's case, nearly forgotten) properties into movies. Yeah, thanks for that Transformers.

Hasbro Inc. (HAS) and Universal Pictures formed a six-year strategic partnership to produce at least four motion pictures based on brands such as Monopoly, Candy Land, Ouija, Battleship, Magic, the Gathering and Stretch Armstrong. Hasbro, a Pawtucket, R.I., producer of entertainment products, said the first movie will be released in 2010 or 2011, and Universal Pictures, a division of Universal Studios, will release at least one film a year thereafter.

So while Monopoly and Candyland both sound like Rowan Atkinson joints, and Ouija can only promise to pale in comparison to 1986's table-top terror Witchboard, Magic the Gathering!? Monsters, swords, magic! Throw in a few actual characters and they might be on to something here. Think Peter Jackson might do this if we all promise to trade him our mint condition Black Lotuses?