Director: Steven Spielberg
Writer: Zak Penn, Ernest Cline (Screenplay) Ernest Cline (Novel)
Starring: Tye Sheridan, Olivia Cooke, Ben Mendelsohn, Mark Rylance, Simon Pegg, Lena Waithe, T.J. Miller
Plot: When the creator of a virtual reality world called the OASIS dies, he releases a video in which he challenges all OASIS users to find his Easter Egg, which will give the finder his fortune.
Tagline – A better reality awaits.
Runtime: 2 Hours 20 Minutes
There may be spoilers the rest of the review
Verdict: Visually Pop-Culture Festival Fun
Story: Ready Player One starts in the near future in Columbus of all places, Wade (Sheridan) lives in the stacks, the poor part of town, he along with the rest of the world lives inside the virtual reality world known as the OASIS, created by Halliday (Rylance). The OASIS gives people a chance to live anything they imagine and after Halliday’s death he left an Easter Egg for the players to search for.
6 years have past since this way revealed and nobody has found even the first of three keys, Wade works with Aech (Waithe) Sho and Daito in his attempts to be the one to find it and is joined by Samantha (Cooke) to fight against Sorrento (Mendelsohn) who wants the prize so his company can take over the OASIS selling the space o the players. The battle for the freedom of the game, the world is on and Wade is leading the charge.
Thoughts on Ready Player One
Characters – Wade is the down on his luck scraping a living in the virtual reality world type of guy, in the real world he doesn’t have any friends and his only enemy seems to be his Step-Uncles. In the OASIS he has a close group of friends while never being in a CLAN, he has been searching for the answers to the clues for 6 years like everyone else, only this time he learns something new and ends up leading the players in the battle to save the OASIS from the corporate hands. Samantha is one of the most famous players in the OASIS, much like Wade she is a solo player, joining forces with Wade reveals she is part of a rebellion against the corporate company trying to take over the game which leads her to risk everything to save the OASIS too. Sorrento is your businessman enemy, he sees money in being the owner of the OASIS, he doesn’t understand the pop culture and for sure he will do anything to get what he wants. Halliday is the Willy Wonka of this creation, it was his dream, his ideas and it is his clues people are searching for to take over after his death, guided at heart, determined but anti-social this man’s genius has bought together the world.
Performances – The performances through the film on the overall point of view are good, nobody puts any feet wrong, Tye Sheridan steps up to the lead role with ease after his work on indie films, Olivia Cooke continues to show she is a great choice in the lead supporting female role and Ben Mendelsohn is always going to make a wonderful villain in any movie.
Story – The story breaks down into a glorified virtual reality world treasure hunt, it is the unlikely guy being the one that can unlock the secrets which the business mind people want for themselves. It is by the books, the clues seem too easy to work out, like if someone had taken their time earlier things would have been solved earlier. The idea people rely on this world is never played on enough for my liking, we also don’t focus enough on the punishments that the company forces people to be in the game for their own side, this disappoints greatly because certain parts of the film we see everyday life being normal, but early on we are shown this is the only way to live. If you are watching for pop-culture references it will be hard to keep up with things for the most part too, you will miss some even if they don’t matter to the story.
Action/Adventure/Sci-Fi – The action is massive, in the game is easily the more memorable moments and outside the game it is routine as they come. The adventure sends us on the quest to find the clues, this is what we want to see, so no problems on this end for that. The sci-fi side of the story shows us just what the world could become like if we continue to use technology, it should be a bleaker future but for the sake of this movie it isn’t.
Settings – The real world looks bleaker at times but other times looks like something we normal see. The virtual world creates the wonderful settings for our characters to play in.
Special Effects – This movie will get all the praise in the world for the special effects, they are flawless, making this one of the easiest movies to watch, the team deserves the most praise for this film.
Scene of the Movie – The Shining
That Moment That Annoyed Me – Not sure if this game is the only option for people or not, we get told but what we see later it isn’t.
Final Thoughts – This will go down as the most visually creative movie of the year, we have plenty of pop-culture references, crazy action sequences and overall it is fun, only the story itself hold sit back.
Overall: Fun and enjoyable.
Rating
