Well... crap. This is it, the search is over. I think we have it. It appears to me that we have the video game movie that's closest to possible perfection to exist. So far, at the very least.
The promotional material
Before I cover the plot of the film (in which I'll do my best to not spoil anything, because I want people to see this film), I think I need to explain something else: The marketing campaign for this film is absolutely genius. It's got regular movie posters, but it also has posters that parody some of the most famous video games of all time, and some of recent years. Here, have a quick gallery.
When I saw these posters, I immediately had a hunch that the people behind this movie legitimately knew what they were doing. Okay, let's be completely fair, the marketing department actually had a lot of time to came up with these; the film was originally planned for released in July of 2020... which was no time for movie releases. And these posters actually show the current release date, which makes me think they were thought up after the movie's release was delayed. This was only a sign that this film was going to do things right.
The story
Guy (Ryan Reynolds) is probably the most average person ever. Every single day of his life, he wakes up with a big smile on his face, says hello to his goldfish Goldie, suits up and heads out to work as a bank teller on this island known as Free City. He stops for a coffee on the way, greets his friend Buddy the security guard (Lil Rel Howery) on arriving, and gets in place, ready to face the daily challenges: Stamping documents, allowing loans, and the inevitable attack by sunglass-wearing weirdos pulling a heist and stealing all the money. Every day.
You see, Guy is not a real person: He's an NPC, a basic programmed A.I. tasked with doing these mundane things. The world of Free City is actually a multiplayer action/crime game developed by Soonami, a large game development studio in the real world. Free City is inspired by Grand Theft Auto Online, but has shades of other similar games as well. It's also incredibly popular, with lots of gamers and streamers taking part in the various criminal missions made available.
In spite of that, Guy was also programmed with aspirations: He dreams of meeting the perfect woman for him. And one day, as he comes back from work with Buddy, he does: A sexy woman (Jodie Comer) in sunglasses walking past him, mouthing off everything he's about to say, like she knows him. There's just a little problem: He's an NPC, and in Free City, those who wear sunglasses are player characters... This chance encounter causes Guy to put into question everything, including his daily routine. Until one day, where he gets his hands on a pair of sunglasses and puts them on, revealing to him the gamers' HUB displays all over the place, and the artificial nature of his world. He sets out to find the mysterious woman again and, perhaps, change his world for the better with this newfound knowledge.
In the real world, Soonami Games also employs Walter McKeys (Joe Keery), who used to co-own an indie studio with his friend Millie (also Jodie Comer). Their greatest project, before getting bought out and incorporated into Soonami, was a game in which the A.I. of NPCs evolves and improves over time. Unfortunately, the hotheaded director of Soonami, Antwan (Taika Waititi), is in a rush to release Free City 2. This, however, would mean shutting down the servers of the original Free City, meaning the end of Guy's world...
The review
I kept thinking about this movie on the ride home, wondering if there was anything negative I could actually find to say about this film. The only things I could think of were spoiler-based, and I am trying to avoid spoilers as much as possible for this review (most of what I say in the synopsis here was already covered in the trailers). Aside from a tiny handful of things regarding games as escapism, I don't actually know if there's anything I can actually mention.
The shining point of this film, and I've already brought it up earlier, is how it feels like it understands, and attempts to properly portray, every category of people that it features in some way, shape or form. I felt a deep sense of respect towards all parties involved, and that was actually really good. The groups of people that got represented quite well, in my opinion, are:
-Gamers, obviously;
-Game developers, be they programmers, coders or 'moderators' of online communities;
-Geeks in general;
-Millenials (you'd think that goes hand-in-hand with some of the previous categories, but there's that edge of social commentary to the film where the Millennial-aged characters can't help but reflect on the crappier elements of their world, showing social conscience);
-And people who make video game-related content (YouTubers, Twitch streamers, etc.; some famous content creators on both platforms even make cameos).
While less respectful but still 100% on-the-nose, the film also represents game directors and studio heads: Taika Waititi is hilarious as Antwan, perfectly representing the kind of asshole we kind of imagine big-name studio directors to be nowadays. Have a reminder that this movie was filmed before the massive controversies about Ubisoft and Activision/Blizzard made the news.
Free City itself is, as I mentioned, heavily inspired by GTA Online, but it also has references to Fortnite and likely makes nods to other games (some of which I won't spoil, but let's just say: They friggin' get their references right). It's also unabashedly, proudly geeky. Lastly, I felt like there were a LOT of jokes about coding, programming, and the various steps of designing a game, which is normal seeing as it's a movie about the inner workings of a video game. So, when something isn't quite right (like a character who isn't able to do something, or one who's missing lines of dialogue), it's doubly hilarious all while making complete sense.
Yes, this is, quite possibly, the best video game movie to exist at the moment. I do not make that statement lightly; I spent the last 7 years basically studying the evolution of video game films through this blog, and no other film that came before this one compares. I don't know whether we'll ever get anything better than this when it comes to using video games as the core of a movie. I strongly recommend it. Go see it in theaters, put a mask on (this pandemic may be on its last legs, but it's still around), and check this film out. It's money well-spent, an awesome two hours.
