Spielberg’s excellent dystopian popcorn adventure
One of my favorite novels of 2011, Ready Player One, is now a Steven Spielberg movie. To be honest, I was both excited and wary about the film adaptation as it’s more often been the case that sprawling novels such as this don’t make very successful transitions to film (look what happened to David Mitchell’s
Cloud Atlas). But I am happy to report that we can wash wary away, as Spielberg has tapped the inner child that still resides within him, and echoing such films as Indiana Jones, Jurassic Park and even Hook, he has come up with an enthralling popcorn movie that captures the essence and spirit of the source material.
Wade Watts (Tye Sheridan) lives in The Stacks of Columbus, Ohio in 2045 — a depressing, downtrodden dystopian future that has people scurrying to the OASIS, a virtual reality refuge, created by the now deceased tech giant James Halliday (portrayed by Spielberg’s latter day muse, Mark Rylance). In the OASIS, Wade’s avatar Parzival is obsessed with Anorak’s Quest, an Easter Egg treasure hunt that Halliday had uploaded before his demise. An obscene amount of money and control of the OASIS is up for grabs; and in the years since the Quest was announced, no one has even come close in securing any one of the three keys needed to secure clues that will lead to the Golden Egg. The desire to gain said
Egg is so fierce that one tech rival, IOI, headed by Nolan Sorrento (Ben Mendelssohn), assembles the best and brightest to solve the puzzles.
Into this scenario, the screenplay gloriously celebrates geek culture, the first-generation video games, as well as movies of the ‘80s and ‘90s; and deftly transitions between the two worlds — the real 2045 and “life” in the OASIS. Thanks to Spielberg’s ingenious handling of the material, we care and empathize with the characters from both worlds. We are charmed when Parzival encounters fellow Gunter Art3mis/ Samantha (Olivia Cooke), and anticipate when real-life Wade finally meets Samantha.
It’s that Spielberg is obviously having fun that makes watching this film such a joyride. For brevity’s sake, some changes are made from the novel, and there is something of an anticlimactic ending. I love the sequence when our “heroes” enter the world of the movie The Shining, and how Spielberg crams the references into every frame throughout every excursion into the OASIS. Literally, it would take a Freeze function for us to fully appreciate the detail and texture employed to bring this book to life.
Welcome back Mr. Spielberg! After a succession of serious films, it’s nice to know you can still “phone home” and treat us to popcorn.