Cast – Tye Sheridan, Olivia Cooke, Ben Mendelsohn, T.J. Miller, Simon Pegg & Mark Rylance

Director – Steven Spielberg

Genre – Thriller film/Fantasy

Running Time – 2h 20m

The Plot

In the year 2045, people can escape their harsh reality in the OASIS, an immersive virtual world where you can go anywhere, do anything, be anyone-the only limits are your own imagination. OASIS creator James Halliday left his immense fortune and control of the Oasis to the winner of a contest designed to find a worthy heir. When unlikely hero Wade Watts conquers the first challenge of the reality-bending treasure hunt, he and his friends-known as the High Five-are hurled into a fantastical universe of discovery and danger to save the OASIS and their world.

Ready Player One is a brilliant conceptual movie that will no doubt lend itself well to most movie fans especially sci-fi, gaming, comic book and general movie watchers with a keen eye for special effects. Mostly shot in a virtual world setting, this movie is visually spectacular and if given the chance to I would strongly recommend watching it in a 3D setting…trust you won’t regret it.

This is every much “a gamers dream movie” with most of it being carried out in a gamified environment. At times, when watching, you can’t help but feel that you are playing an adventure videogame…at least that’s how I felt. Its full of various ideas and elements that I found quite interesting with some clever connotations sprinkled across and a little bit of humour to boot.    

I have watched quite a few sci-fi and virtually based movies before, but I can’t say I have seen anything quite like Ready Player One, and that’s a good thing. What sets it apart is the level of thinking and effort put into it. But even with that said, I wasn’t particularly blown away by it. I can’t quite say why exactly but the impression I had after watching was it’s a cool and fun movie. One is for sure, it’s one I would strongly recommend to my gaming and sci-fi friends.

Ready Player One presents a fantastic idea complete with amazing visual effects that will endear itself to many especially gaming and sci-fi fans. It’s a great flick to go out and enjoy by yourself, family or with a couple of friends. In a 3D, IMAX or B-Box setting, it would be an experience and a half. Officially releasing this week, this flick gets a solid 7 out of 10 rating from me.

Special thanks to Ster Kinekor for the exclusive pre-screening.