Ready Player One

Ready Player One – In 2045, Wade Watts (like many others) escapes the slums and desperation of life by entering the virtual world of the Oasis, where you can be and do anything you want. Wade’s persona (or avatar) is Parzival and he is desperate to find the ‘Easter Egg’, a promised hidden item that will give the finder control over the whole Oasis. After several years, no-one has come close. With his friends within the game, Wade follows the clues left behind by the creator of the Oasis but as those with a more sinister agenda want control, he soon finds himself in grave danger.

Ready Player One (2018) – Director: Steven Spielberg

By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=54626052

Rating: 12

Running Length: 140 mins

Starring: Tye Sheridan, Olivia Cooke, Ben Mendelsohn

Genre: Fantasy, Science Fiction

REVIEW: ‘READY PLAYER ONE’

Who doesn’t love a movie that indulges in pop culture? ‘Ready Player One’ (based upon the book of the same name by Ernest Cline) doles out references like they’re going out of fashion. Being keen not to isolate its audience just to gamers, it cleverly includes references to film, TV, games and music so that everyone will get something to enjoy. Due to the sheer amount of obvious as well as blink-and-you’ll-miss it references, it is impossible to catch every single one in just one viewing so it’s likely this movie will benefit from those who seek to find as many ‘Easter Eggs’ as possible.

The plot itself is somewhat convoluted with more drama being implied than is strictly necessary. Also because so much is thrown at the audience, its difficult to keep up with everything that’s going on which has the unfortunate side-effect of making the storyline feel more like a strung together framing device designed to link together as many rose-tinted sections as possible. Wade (Tye Sheridan) as a protagonist is a little bland but ultimately likeable and his dire home life makes his need to keep the Oasis going all the more believable. The other characters are good, solid backup for Wade’s almost obsessive need to find the clues to the Easter Egg; the villains, led by Sorrento (Ben Mendelsohn) are generic but maintain a good sinister presence throughout.

As expected, visually ‘Ready Player One’ is spectacular. The computer generated ‘Oasis’ is a neon drenched dream.  Stylistically true to modern computer games yet never jarring and being as close to real life as possible. On the other side of the VR headset, the desperation of the ‘Stacks’ (trailers stacked on top of each other) is tangible with their grey colour scheme and oppressively enclosed spaces.

‘Ready Player One’ is most definitely aimed at a teen audience with its colourful language and pop culture references and therefore will not appeal to everyone but it has enough for those with even a passing interest in 1980’s nostalgia to enjoy. With so much to see, hear and experience, ‘Ready Player One’ is likely to be the movie that all other referential movies will be compared to.

CONTENT: IS ‘READY PLAYER ONE’ SUITABLE FOR CHILDREN?

Early in the movie, Wade (Parzival) goes to an area where computer game characters can fight in death matches for huge rewards. This appears to be a constantly raging large-scale, war zone-like battle where computer game characters injure and kill each other. Characters who die (zero-out), lose everything they have achieved so far. Because so much is at stake, these fights are quick and brutal, characters are seen to be shot, stabbed, engulfed in flames, etc. Whenever a character is hurt, the injured area explodes into dozens of coins which are then automatically sucked into the other character. No blood or gore is seen and characters don’t suffer any pain although the emotional pain of losing so much causes one character to attempt suicide in the real world; he runs towards a window but is pushed aside before he does anything drastic.

A man dies and is seen lying in a coffin with coins over his eyes. He then sits up suddenly and it becomes clear that this was from when he was still alive and he is filming an ‘after my death’ video.

Parzival joins a huge car race which has numerous large obstacles, such as a T-Rex which looms over the racers, stomping on some and picking some up in its jaws; and King Kong which moves and grunts like a gorilla, smashing its fists onto racers and swiping them off the tracks. At one point, a racer is thrown out of his vehicle and is then hit by another, he bursts into coins indicating that the avatar as been killed. This scene is mostly exciting action but it does become intense and therefore it could be quite scary for younger kids.

In the real world, large billboards advertise an all-over body suit which enables the wearing to feel whatever their avatar feels within the Oasis. The actor on the advert lunges backwards and grimaces as lights emanate from their torso, implying that he has been ‘shot’ within the Oasis. Wade purchases one of these suits and then wears it whenever he is in the Oasis. When he has a romantic moment with a young woman, she asks him ‘Have you come prepared?’ When he tells her about his full body suit, she touches his chest lightly and asks ‘can you feel this’. In the real world, Wade’s chest lights up, indicating he feels the sensation of her touch. As they are essentially flying through the air, the woman ‘swims’ between his legs; in the real world, Wade’s crotch lights up and his breath becomes ragged. Back in the Oasis, the woman comments ‘You DID come prepared!’

Parzival and co find themselves inside the Hotel from the movie, The Shining. One character wanders off from the group and comes across the infamous twins whose monotone speaking in unison is very creepy. They are then swept away by the famous river of blood and end up in a room; there is a bathtub in front of them and a woman’s hand appears to pull back the shower curtain. She steps out of the tub, completely naked and begins to silently touch the character who is uncomfortable with what the woman is doing, the woman then turns into an old woman who proceeds to attack the character aggressively with a knife. They then find themselves in an outdoor maze being pursued by the old woman who has become gigantic and wields an axe, bringing it down near the character, trying to kill them. This is an extremely tense and frightening scene, condensing much of the more scary moments of ‘The Shining’ into 5 intense minutes.

CAN I SEE A CLIP?

VERDICT: IS ‘READY PLAYER ONE’ FOR KIDS?

‘Ready Player One’ takes pop culture references and runs with them to a remarkable degree, making the slightly forgettable plot all the more forgivable. Due to the incessant bad language, scary scenes and some moderate sexual references between teenagers, we recommend ‘Ready Player One’ for kids aged 12 and over.

• Violence: 3/5 (most of the violence is in-game and therefore there are little real-world consequences. NAt one point, numerous homes are blown-up in the real world, killing several people, including the family member of one of the established characters)
• Emotional Distress: 1/5 (a woman in the real world is seen to be wearing a VR headset, her young son tries to speak to her but she yells aggressively at him as he is distracting her from her game)
• Fear Factor: 4/5
• Sexual Content: 4/5 (a woman wearing a VR headset is seen in the real world pole dancing, sliding around the pole and running her hands down her body; she is fully clothed. When Wade is first seen entering the Oasis, his voiceover explains about the virtual world. The camera pans over a casino, Wade says that you can get married or divorced there and as the camera pans over a seedy looking motel, Wade says ‘you can go in there…’ implying some people use the Oasis for casual sex)
• Bad Language: 4/5 (frequent moderate cursing. One strong word is used. A character holds up his middle finger to insult another character)
• Dialogue: 3/5 (One character tells another he is impressed by how straight talking he is saying ‘You never lick, you just bite right to the centre of the tootsie pop’)
• Other Notes: Deals with themes of virtual reality, believing in yourself, ambition, friendship, trusting your instincts, not giving up and teamwork.

Words by Laura Record

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