Sometimes heart-warming, sometimes heart-breaking ... always heart-pounding ...

Rating: 9/10 (20 September 2012)

It's possible that "The Game" asks too much on the "suspension of disbelief" department, maybe it would be nearly implausible to come up with such a well-crafted, meticulous, and high-scale prank without an incident, that no hazardous "what if" could have made the whole plot fall down, maybe.
Yet it's nearly impossible not be thrilled by David Fincher's "The Game" a film elevated above all the conventions of the action genre thanks to its inventive premise and Michael Douglas' central performance, both are strongly connected anyway. Douglas plays Nicholas Van Orton, and as the 'Van' clearly indicates, he's a rich and influent man. He's also one of these miserable loners leaving not much to envy, celebrating his 48th with one hamburger, a cupcake with one candle, and watching CNN on a big sofa, in a vast mansion where he lives alone, divorced and totally passionless. Acting as cold-hearted tyrant with his employees and servants, he strikes as a man who trusts no one and needs to keep things under his control.
Only Douglas can make the alienating effect of excessive respectability and a sense of desperate misery coexist within the same character. A living paradox, Nicholas Van Orton is like a combo of Gordon Gekko and D-Fens. Yet, the film alternates between scenes where he vents his anger on his entourage and childhood flashbacks. Nicholas' father committed suicide when he was 48 and it surely affected Nicholas for the rest of his life. How do we know? Well, the script wouldn't have bothered to show it right in the beginning otherwise. If it was revealed later in the middle of the life-changing process, we'd have known that Nicholas could change. But we have to know the wound in his heart from the beginning, to understand that not only he can change, but needs to change.
His brother Conrad (Sean Penn) is a more optimistic and down-to-earth character: his name-code to reach Nicholas is Seymour Butts and his gift to Conrad is no less original, a sort of game provided by CRS, a Consumer Recreation Services. The game is a life-changing experience combining fun and self-improvement, two things that cruelly lack in Nicholas' life. Visibly intrigued but not really enthusiastic, Nicholas promises to give a try. Coincidentally, he finds himself near the CRS' new headquarters and hears people talking about it. As one of the managers, played by the90's ultimate character-actor James Hebhorn says, "it's the 'game that comes to you" and we sure had a glimpse. Nicholas is invited to forget his suspicion, to admit he's intrigued (and that's a clever wink to the audience by the screenplay) and that he's got nothing to lose, except one or two hours of medical and psychological tests, that would last longer naturally.
It's so enjoyable to watch a control freak like character like Van Orton, pushed in weird to uncontrollable situations, gradually building the suspense. As soon as the game starts, it's a long descent into one of the most nightmarish cinematic experiences, driven by the growing conviction that anything, a waiter, a taxi cab, a cop, a man sitting in front of you, is part of it. What would you expect when even a TV anchorman talks to you or when you're lured into drinking a poisoned coffee by a woman who was not supposed to be part of the game? The paranoid feeling is efficiently conveyed by Fincher's directing, by borrowing some aspects from "Seven", it does show a more shadowy and menacing face of San Francisco, and the film owes a lot to the subtle yet powerful performance by Douglas that puts us directly in his shoes..
Yet as promising as the idea of a game that puts a client on one deadly situation after another sounds, the film couldn't have handled it for a 2-hour runtime. Indeed, even if "The Game" expects a final twist, it has to mislead the viewer. After all, if a film is supposed to reveal that the bad guy is A, you have to suspect B and by personal deduction. The same goes with "The Game" and proves Fincher's special talent to handle twist endings. If we take into consideration that Van Orton is a wealthy man, and that the whole game is a scheme to steal his money, then everything makes perfect sense. The script hooks us to this certitude until the end, where we realize that it was indeed a game that went wrong  enough to turn out to be successful. Believing that he accidentally killed his brother, Nicholas jumps off a high building and land in the right spot, on an inflated lifesaving cushion. The game is over and all the protagonists are here for a last 'Gotcha!'.
This part is hard to believe for movie purists, but what would they have expected anyway? If you admit that CRS was always one step ahead of Van Orton, and could have predicted his reactions from his tests, if not believable, it seems plausible. Besides, it makes a whole sense to the character's arc, he had to be lonely man who had no other choice than being the way he was after his father's death, , to experience the same act of despair and realize that there's much to life than drowning his past on sad memories, when he opens his eyes, he's given a second chance. It's simple, believable, but the script if not a masterpiece of sophistication, is well-constructed enough to deliver what we'd expect and Douglas' performance turned it into something even more emotionally challenging.
The film started with a man celebrating his birthday alone, and ends up with the same man celebrating his rebirth with all the people that count in his life. And in between, it's all suspense, thrills and mystery, what can you ask for more?