Ready Player One

Here we are, finally at the finish line with Spielberg's latest film Ready Player One. A visual cornucopia of a film, adapted from the best selling novel by Ernest Cline, offers a unique vision of the future and one that feels incredibly possible. 

The year is 2045 and life in the real world is depressing as society is barely hanging on as much of society is populated within slum-like urban centers. To escape such a dreary existence, people log into an immersive, highly detailed virtual reality world called the OASIS where they can engage in countless activities for work, education or entertainment. It was co-created by James Halliday (played by Mark Rylance) and Ogden Morrow (played by Simon Pegg), but wound up being owned by Halliday after a falling out between the two. When Halliday, passes away, a new game appears made up of three separate challenges. At the end of the game is the Easter Egg, a prize that gives the winner control over the entire OASIS. Wade Watts (played by Tye Sheridan) is one of the many competing to try and win the Easter Egg. As the film starts, no one has been able to beat the first challenge. The challenge is a racing game with an ever changing track that makes the Rainbow Road track in Mario Kart look like a cake walk. Competing in the race is Wade, along with the other Ghunters (short for Egg Hunters) and others known as Sixers, players playing on behalf of the IOI (Short for Innovative Online Industries) headed by a man named Sorrento (played by Ben Mendelsohn). IOI wants to win so that their company can gain control over the OASIS and reap the massive monetary opportunities that lie within it. To help obtain this goal, they will buy out people's debt and make them work it off in one of their service centers across the country. Wade teams up with his friends Aech (pronounced like the letter H, played by Lena Waithe), Daito (played by Win Morisaki) and Sho (played by Phillip Zhao) and another user known as Artemis (played by Olivia Cooke) to ensure that they beat the IOI to winning the Easter Egg.

When Steven Spielberg came on to direct Ready Player One, which the base novel by Ernest Cline is filled with countless 80's and 90's pop-culture references (as those were the days of Halliday's youth and contained clues to help with the challenges), he set out an edict that things from his own films would not be included, with a notable exception that Wade's OASIS avatar was allowed to drive the Delorean from Back to the Future, which Spielberg produced. Considering how much 80's culture he contributed to, this could have turned into a "Greatest Hits" album of a film very quickly. That being said, I have to hand it to the Special Effects folks because they did not follow this directive and sneaked in references to the likes of Gremlins (which Spielberg also produced) and Raiders of the Lost Ark, among others I no doubt missed. But beyond these fun Easter egg references scattered throughout the film, there is a genuinely fun and interesting sci-fi adventure story that I genuinely enjoyed. It centers on a future America where a large segment of the population is absorbed in this online environment where any and all fantasies can come true. The reason why people do that is because the real world has become a real depressing place to live. The environment is in shambles and most major cities are run down slums. Wade lives in a trailer park called The Stacks, which are Trailer home upon trailer home stacked one on top of the other in elaborate I-Beam racks (and the fact that he lives in a trailer park is a nice allusion to the 80's Video Game movie classic, The Last Starfighter.) It is interesting that people get so absorbed into this make believe world and fight so hard to save it and yet show little concern for the real world around them. Of course, the obvious conclusion to draw here is that people are addicted to the OASIS and the limitless possibilities it allows. When you can buy special suits that allow you to feel other characters touching and interacting with your avatar, the line between fantasy and reality get real blurry real fast as well.

The Special Effects in the film are fantastic. For the scenes taking place in the OASIS, everything was shot with Motion Capture technology and then rendered to represent each actor's online avatar. The surrounding areas were then filled in with CGI animation. As one would expect with a Spielberg film, the effects are top notch and downright incredible. From the races of the first challenge, which are rendered to nearly photo realistic degrees, to what turns out to be the second challenge that is such a delightful surprise that I won't dare spoil here except to say that if you're a Kubrick fan, you're in for a treat. Then, to top it all off, the film has a wonderful Alan Silvestri score (Since this film was coming out only a couple months after The Post, Spielberg mainstay John Williams didn't have time to score both films and went with that film instead). Silvestri composes a wonderful original score, but manages to work in a few allusions to his more iconic 80's film scores, especially Back to the Future.  

The acting in the film is great as well. Mark Rylance has a nice supporting turn as James Halliday, seen primarily in previously recorded footage and flashbacks and crafts a unique character that seems equal parts Steve Jobs and Garth Algar (Dana Carvey's character from Wayne's World). It's an interesting performance that really left an impression on me. Tye Sheridan makes for an appealing hero as Wade Watts and does a good job carrying the film, portraying both his character's more quiet and withdrawn real world self and his more extroverted, confident OASIS self. Olivia Cook has a similar arc with her character as well, saying to Wade at one point that meeting her in the real world would be "disappointing", which adds an interesting layer to their growing relationship throughout the film as they more or less mirror one another. I really enjoyed Lena Waithe's portrayal of Aech, Wade's friend in the OASIS who specializes in creating modified items and also repairs other people's vehicles. Ben Mendelsohn makes for a perfectly despicable villain and really captures the types that would populate the 80's movies this film references so perfectly. Simon Pegg pops up in a small supporting role and I, for one, am always happy when he shows up in movies. I'd like to elaborate further on Pegg's role in the film but it would be a spoiler, so you'll just have to take my word for it. 

Overall, I greatly enjoyed Ready Player One. I've never read the book, so I can't really compare on how faithful it was to the source material. However, as a film, it's a fun and exciting sci-fi adventure story taking place in a not too distant future that could very well be possible. I could easily see something like the OASIS becoming a reality. Whether or not it should is another question entirely. But it's one I felt the film explored in a satisfying way, in addition to being another piece of great Spielberg popcorn entertainment.