Ive heard about this film, and just recently I saw a trailer for it. At first the idea seems too farfetched and I had quite a few WTF moments. The “simulation” of the people controlling the avatars looked about as cheezy as the simulated gameplay of Xbox in Michael Bay’s “The Island”.
But then…it got serious. Death Row Inmates can suffer 30 different times being controlled like an MMO avatar and get their freedom unless the gamer fails on their behalf to win the games they are in. Okay…..Now as much as that is a twisted sarconic setup for these prisoners, it got me interested in the film. VERY INTERESTED. Remember, alot of video game movies…or mostly all of them suck. This one may draw the line, its video game based in story to a degree. So I looked up some info about this movie and discovered it’s written/directed by Brian Taylor and Mark Neveldine, The Crank Series guys who also wrote Pathology. Okay, these guys may have a bit of a looseness when it comes to logic from the bit of the first Crank that I watched. But they really are creative and have the unique opportunity of having a video game movie where they can’t disappoint a legion of gamerfans except for fans of their stuff. And I doubt their fans will be disappointed.
Alright so we got guys with some credit to being unique and entertaining, although I am not a fan of their work…yet. Lets see, we got Gerard Butler. Good. Milo Ventimiglia. Good. John Leguizamo. Good. Aaron Yoo. I like him for some reason. We got some very dynamic characters here. And the idea that maybe one of these gamers sympathizes with the prisoners and seems to (as the trailer suggests) want to end this ridiculous and cruel bargain got me perked up a bit.
They might REALLY have something here. But oh darn no release until September 4th. Thats okay with me because i’m likely not gonna see it, I am not their biggest fans. But I do have to say the video game stigma shouldn’t apply here, but it really pushes on gamers imagination.