Ready Player One Review

"People come to the Oasis for all the things they can do, but they stay for all the things they can be!"


Ready Player One was directed by Steven Spielberg (the one and only!) and stars the likes of Tye Sheridan, Olivia Cooke, Ben Mendlesohn, Lena Waithe, T.J.Miller, Simon Pegg and Mark Rylance. The film focuses on the aftermath of the death of the creator of the virtual reality world called the Oasis. On his death the creator of the Oasis releases a video challenging all users of the Oasis to find hidden Easter eggs (not the chocolate type!) in order to win the creators fortune.

Ready Player One is without a doubt a highly entertaining film filled with all the pop culture, video game, film references that anyone can ever ask for (there are honestly so many!), and when you notice them you truly get a buzz from the film (there are probably so many that I missed but I absolutely loved the ones I noticed). One of the strongest aspects of the films apart from all the Easter eggs is without a doubt the visual design of the film especially in the Oasis, which is an absolute goldmine for visual effects lovers. When entering the Oasis the audience just like the characters in the film are really transported to another world (literally a virtual world!), and the use of the Oasis has allowed Spielberg to truly go full out in terms of creativity and nothing is out of limit, whether it be giant car racers to find a hidden Easter eggs through the streets of New York with one of film history's greatest monsters, or to giant full out battle sequences involving some of video games most famous characters. Credit is also due to the actors who give good performances throughout the film especially Mark Rylance, Tye Sheridan, Olivia Cooke and Ben Mendlesohn, whilst their performances are great and highly entertaining in the Oasis, there real world performances sometimes grate on you as the audience (maybe just me!) and don't seem as good but we will get onto that later.

Whilst Ready Player One is certainly a fun and entertaining film with a ton of cool Easter eggs, it certainly does have its fair share of problems. Whilst many fans have criticized the film in terms of sticking to source material, my main problem actually is not with that, but in terms of the portrayal of the real world. Whilst Spielberg manages to show a clear contrast between the depressing real world, where peoples only enjoyment relies around being addicted to living in the virtual world of the Oasis, to a bright and colourful Oasis where anything is possible. For me personally all the scenes set in the Oasis where extremely entertaining and stunning to look at, but whenever we returned to the real world, the film just for me began to drag, and lose any impact on me as an audience member (maybe that's just me but it can be dull at times). Whilst this could be an intentional ploy by Spielberg to really allow the audience to experience the real world as the characters do within the context of the film, but for me any of the real world scenes just felt awkward and dull in comparison to what happened within the Oasis and at times really threw me out of the film. If this was intentional then fair play to Spielberg but it just was not something that I was overall impressed with when watching the film.

Overall Ready Player One is an bright and colourful entertaining film, with all the pop culture, video game and film references any fan can ever ask for, but be prepared for a bumpy ride in terms of entering and exiting the Oasis as it's not all good.

Verdict: 4 out of 5 stars