top of page
Writer's picturePopEntertainment

Ready Player One (A PopEntertainment.com Movie Review)

Updated: Mar 11, 2020


Ready Player One


READY PLAYER ONE (2018) 


Starring Tye Sheridan, Olivia Cooke, Ben Mendelsohn, Mark Rylance, Lena Waithe, T.J. Miller, Simon Pegg, Philip Zhao, Win Morisaki, Susan Lynch, Hannah John-Kamen, Ralph Ineson, McKenna Grace, Letitia Wright, Clare Higgins, Laurence Spellman, Perdita Weeks, Joel MacCormack, Kit Connor, Leo Heller and Antonio Mattera.


Screenplay by Zak Penn & Ernest Cline.


Directed by Steven Spielberg.


Distributed by Warner Bros. 140 minutes. Rated PG-13.


Steven Spielberg, a director who has shaped so many people’s lives with timeless classics such as E.T., Jaws, Jurassic Park, and Raiders of the Lost Ark, must have loved the opportunity to create a film that calls us back to the era in which his movies were at the peak of their popularity. Sadly, that movie turns out to be Ready Player One.


Not only did Ready Player One not feel like a Steven Spielberg movie, but it didn’t feel like the original book, written by Ernest Cline. We see many movies stray from their source material in positive and negative ways, however, this deviated exceedingly far from the original material, which is surprising since Cline co-wrote the screenplay.


It felt as if Ready Player One went into the studio as a creative movie idea, mixing gaming technology with fun nostalgic references to the 1980’s. It came out as a movie filled with cheesy plot points, unnecessary (not to mention rushed) romantic subplots, and the most clichéd ending a sci-fi action adventure movie could produce.


Though it seemed as if the actors tried their best to bring this adaptation to life, the rushed storyline seemed to even impact the actor’s performances, both in live action and in their voice acting (when they were shown as computer avatars).


The only elements that were impressive in the movie were the score, the animation, and one specific section relating to one of the horror genre’s most well-known films. (We won’t spoil it, we’ll let you find out yourself which classic movie that was.) The score, written by Alan Silvestri, added more depth and character to the film than any of the live action or animated performances. Claire Fleming, in charge of MoCap (motion capture), did an amazing job in utilizing old graphics and interweaving them into the characters and set… except for when they had a mid-air dancing scene.


Long story short, don’t waste your money.


George Seth Wagner and Leni Paul


Copyright ©2018 PopEntertainment.com. All rights reserved. Posted: March 29, 2018.


4 views0 comments

Recent Posts

See All

Comments


bottom of page