A Return To Big-Screen Spectacle, But Not Spielberg's Best

Rating: 7/10 (30 March 2018)

At the heart of this adaptation of Ernest Cline's 2011 novel is a fairly simple premise: the real world sucks, but a virtual reality world called the Oasis allows people to forget about reality for a little while. For Wade Watts (Tye Sheridan), that concept is enough. But there are others who want the Oasis for themselves, and still others fighting to stop them, with virtual consequences spilling out into the real world.
The mainstream appeal to this film, at least based on the advertising alone, is the nostalgia vibe that permeates this film, like so many other films and TV shows these days. And this is certainly a reference-laden film, what with the main character's vehicle of choice being a certain time machine.
However, aside from all the references is a story of a struggle between the little guy trying to keep a good thing going and maybe improve on it for the benefit of the people and an evil corporation who sees only profit in their world, and will do anything to claim the throne.
The key lies in the storytelling, and for the most part this film actually manages to tell a well-paced story that gives just enough technical details to keep you going but doesn't bog itself down in minutia. Though the film does sometimes go out of its way to indulge in a reference, most of the time sticking the landing, the fact is it comes dangerously close to going overboard in its treatment of pop culture references, especially if the same fact is repeated several times in the span of a few minutes.
The main disadvantage of this film is when it leaves the virtual world and enters reality. We as the audience bond to the virtual avatars of our main characters, and beside the villain, who we see more in the real world than the virtual, we see relatively little of our protagonists in the real world, which is a good thing sine the actors and actresses, though competent, really don't engender any lasting connection between character and viewer.
Overall, I would say this film is best appreciated on the big screen, but probably not at full price. Be prepared to do some Googling if you didn't live through the 80s.