Could Anyone Play it?

Rating: 7/10 (19 February 2000)

Like most David Fincher movies, The Game has style and tension to spare. The problem I had with it was that it lay in the middle zone of fantasy; that is, it introduced elements of high fantasy into a low fantasy world. This odd combination prevented this viewer from achieving the needed level of suspension of disbelief. The movie starts with an excellent premise, but the storyline becomes increasingly implausible. Only a puppet could have been at all the right places at the right times, as Mike Douglas's character was. Problem is that this character has an Alpha Dog personality and could never have been manipulated in this way. Beyonf that, many elements of the game were so risky that it is unlikely the player would have lived through them.
Basically, what The Game plays on is the wide-spread belief and/or superstition that there is one or more highly organized group of people in this world that could take total control of your life. I simply couldn't buy this one.