Ready Player One (2018)

Rating: 3/10 (5 October 2019)

Directed by Steven Spielberg. Starring Tye Sheridan, Ben Mendelsohn, Olivia Cooke, Mark Rylance, Simon Pegg, Lena Waithe, Hannah John-Kamen, Philip Zhao, Win Morisaki, Ralph Ineson, Susan Lynch, (voice) T.J. Miller. (PG-13)
Shortly after the creator (Rylance) of a massive--and massively popular--virtual reality program dies, his avatar announces a contest of sorts involving clues, keys, and a literal Easter egg, where the victor can claim full ownership of the fantasy world. Enter teenage Sheridan, who teams up with several other players to uncover the secrets before ruthless businessman Mendelsohn can. Clumsy storyline full of plot-holes and confusing "rules" populated by unexciting, ill-defined characters with a series of third act climaxes that drag on and on, yet its major failure is in the nearly non-stop parade of cluttered, garish digital effects, a stupefying assault on the eyes (and brain, trying to process all the soupy information). It's hard to complain that it all looks so flagrantly phony--it's not a real world with real people in it, after all--but the film is set a few decades in the future, so why are the graphics so outdated even by current PC/console standards? Exists solely as a pellet feeder for nostalgia and pop culture references (ooh, there's the time-traveling DeLorean...hey, I've played "Halo"...oh, did you spot the Gremlins?), but rarely with any context or substance to warrant interest. One can find the occasional appreciable moment (a few wry lines from Miller, the surprising use of the Chucky doll as a weapon, etc.), but sorting through the chaotic farrago to find them isn't really worth the taxing effort.
31/100