Hello,
and welcome to this all-new installment on Planned All Along,
VGFlicks! In this new segment – which replaces the reviews of Game
Boy Advance games – I will be reviewing movies related to video
games. Oh, it can be a film adaptation of a video game, but it can
also be a movie in which video games play a part in the plot. All
that counts is that there are video games somewhere in there. Can't
chase that from the blog.
Video
games are often misrepresented in cinema due to the two formats being
very different. A game can be played for days while a movie should
be, at most, three hours long. Some games contain so much material
that you cannot squeeze all of it in a single film.
Adaptations of video game franchises tend of be of lesser quality due
to this. We all know about the failure that was the Super Mario Bros.
Movie. That's without mentioning adaptations that leave out too much
and, as a result, the plot is impossible to understand. On the other
side, games that are adaptations of films can feel short, either
because the developers had little to work with or couldn't think of
something to increase the play time. And then we get films that
aren't based on existing video games, but deals with video games and gaming in general, yet you gotta wonder if
the director even played video games – or talked to video game players –
to know what it's like.
You'd
think Gamer, released in 2009, with such a clear title, would
be an enjoyable ride. Mmmmmnnnngyyyeaaaaaahhhhh NO. NO NO NO NO NO. It's a cluttered
mess that tries to put too much at once, at the detriment of a plot
that can be followed. So bear with me, we're starting VGFlicks with a
movie that is pretty damn hard to explain and even harder to watch.
This is Gamer, everyone. Pray for me.
Warning:
Spoilers ahead.
Also, the world has gone crazy with advertising. There's even some on the PYRAMIDS. No, really. |
One
thing you notice from the first seconds of this battle scene: The
editing in this movie is awful. Maybe they were going for a stylistic
approach with these quick shots interspersed by video game static and
screen lines in the "gaming" scenes, but the result is just a pain for the eyes. It's
supposed to make us understand that it's inside the video game. The
hectic montage doesn't slow down, so it becomes annoying after a
while. Also, we're sometimes seeing into Kable's head, where save
points seem to pop up on the battlefield every once in a while (why?
If he dies it's instant Game Over anyway, why bother with save
points?) As if that wasn't enough, the editing also makes it harder
to understand what's going on during these fights. Dammit, only three
minutes in and I already dislike this film! It's gonna be a fun
ride...
Kable
makes his way through the war zone until he reaches a higher point,
killing multiple slayers on the way, and even more once he's up
there. He asks for someone to turn him around... and moments later,
he does just that, shoots incoming slayers and then avoids a barrage
of bullets from the men who stayed on the lower floor. After jumping
down to avoid an explosion, he struggles to reach a flashing zone,
through which we finally get the title: GAMER.
Next
we see the remaining fighters on their way back to... the prison?
Anyway, time for some (much needed) exposition! Apparently, in these games, the
shooters have to reach numerous save points and follow a path until
they find the last save point, which is a victory on the current
match. Also, Kable – whose real name is revealed to be John Tillman
– has reached the final save point and is now three victories away
from freedom. Why, you ask? In Slayers, all the players are very real
men, actually prisoners, who are on death row and volunteer to
play. They can get infected by nanites, tiny robots which can be
implanted into a person's brain, after what someone else can take
control of the person. So basically, these prisoners accept to be
controlled by gamers into death matches that play out like
first-person shooters. If any prisoner reaches 30 victories, he earns
his freedom. Kable now has 27.
All that black behind? Scenery this guy has chewed already. |
I had to censor a breast. ON MY BLOG! This movie will pay for this! |
What
kind of implications, you ask? Well, for starters, that poor people
volunteer for Society because they need the money, and are thus ready
to suffer injuries, be disfigured by tattoos or piercings or body
paint at their controller's will, and even to have sex with random
strangers because THEY AREN'T IN CONTROL OF WHAT THEY'RE DOING. Next,
the implication that playing Society is expensive, so we can assume
only upper-class people in that world can actually play the freaking
game. After which Ken Castle gives them a whole human being to take
control of. Rich people literally taking controlof the poor. Then we can wonder if the people in Society suffer any
long-lasting trauma from their experience as controlled people:
Psychological trauma, wounds, illnesses (because of all the screwing
around)...
Slayers: Where you go if you wanna be an accomplice... to MURDER! |
After
an interview with Castle, a TV network's studio gets hacked by a
group called the Humanz (yes, with a Z, because the S is so twentieth
century). So, first Castle's world-saving ideas, then the nanites,
then Society, then Slayers, then the Humanz... you see why I said
this had too much going on at once? This film doesn't take one
concept and rolls with it, it takes a few and tries to have them
coexist in the same hour and a half. As a result, each idea doesn't
get the attention it deserves. That bit with the Humanz? We only get
two minutes of it for now.
Last I checked, prisons weren't as white, they weren't as open, and oh yeah, they weren't in a desert-like land! |
My God... all these stupid haircuts, these stupid clothes, these stupid outfits we put on our video game characters... Man, we got proof: It would look even worse on real humans. |
All
that last paragraph happened in less than ten minutes. Told you that
this movie went too fast for its own good. We're just at the
twenty-minute mark here. There's enough in this movie to fill a
trilogy! Wouldn't be a good trilogy, it would suck big-time, but it would be a full trilogy for sure.
Also mister Trans Fat over there. Yes, he is the one controlling the woman with neon blue hair. Be grateful you don't see his hands. |
We
see the next Slayers game, as Tillman/Kable is shooting in an even
more dangerous war zone, what with helicopters flying around
shooting, and flaming cars getting flung at the characters... and we
finally get to see Simon Silverton in action, using Kable. The
shooter's only ally, a woman (wait women sentenced for death can
volunteer as well?), gets shot and Kable then keeps walking towards
the next save point, through streets covered in blood and guts, while
explosions go off around him. There's even people on fire! ON FIRE!
You
know what's the worst part in all of this? Slayers, Society... No,
it's not that it happens. It's not that creepy fatsos and spoiled
brats can take control of real humans. It's that other people can pay
to be spectators to the decadence of Society, and others can also
watch the massive destruction that occurs during every Slayers match.
All while fully knowing that the people they're watching are real
humans, poor people in need of money in the first case, prisoners
sentenced to death for the second. Either way, they're watching real
people, some of which are disgraced to an extreme, others dying on
the screen. In other words, people in that world are voluntarily
paying to watch a snuff film.
Being A Douche In A Holo-Room, with Simon Silverton, your host. |
At
the same time, Ken Castle reveals that he will enter a new character
in the next Slayers games: A black man named Hackman (Terry Crews)
who will not be controlled by anyone and is, therefore, able to react
faster than the others, who would all be controlled by other humans
and therefore restricted in their movements. Hackman quickly meets
with Tillman in prison, and promises he'll try to kill Kable in the
next game, that Sunday. That moment – and the one before, where
Tillman tries out new weapons – go at a much slower pace, building
up the dramatic tension, which is a nice change from the too great
amount of crazy editing in the rest of the film. It's good to have
some calm in this hyperactive movie. But it speeds up again after
Hackman implies he'll also try to kill Tillman's wife and daughter,
even though Tillman's daughter has been adopted by someone else after
he went to prison for shooting a guy in the head.
Wait,
another plot point? No wait, two? Is that three? SLOW DOWN, MOVIE!
Man, this is getting way too complicated. Tell you what: We'll
continue this review Monday. But I really fear the rest of this
film... My idealism is getting severely damaged by it... Please, pray
for me... pray for me...
...pray
for me...
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