"Ready Player One" Review

When “Ready Player One” was released in theaters on Mar. 29, no one should have been expecting accuracy to the book. What I’m trying to say is that this movie has little semblance to the book, so if you are expecting a word-for-word portrayal, the movie is not worth watching. However, movies aren’t supposed to be like books; they are their own entities and  from an outside perspective, the movie was quite an achievement. Admittedly it wasn’t perfect, the plot was flimsy and incredibly derivative. The characters were not relatable and seemed like they were straight from a comic book, not seeming like a possible future at all. This really takes you out of the movie and gets you to care less about every other aspect, giving the central conflict little to no gravity.  Yet it was also very clear that the plot and story was not the movie’s focus, the film was meant to entertain. In a movie about a world meant to amaze, the focus ended up being the visuals of the virtual world, the Oasis. The concept of the Oasis is anything you want it to do or be, you can do or become. This result is a sea of characters from everyone’s childhood, ranging from the Iron Giant to Freddy Krueger. Many popular movies in recent years have relied on this nostalgia effect, recalling movies or aesthetics from the audiences’ youth to reel in viewers. This is a movie that takes this concept and turns it to the max, having over 106 outside references all referring to the audiences pleasant memories.  The movie was good in every aspect it needed to be. The film was supposed to entertain viewers, and in the way that Spielberg wanted to do that, it was ultimately successful. It’s a good eyesore as a movie, and deserves the praise that it has gotten.