Rent Ready Player One (2018)

3.5 of 5 from 1447 ratings
2h 14min
Rent Ready Player One Online DVD & Blu-ray Rental
  • General info
  • Available formats
Synopsis:
Director Steven Spielberg's science-fiction action adventure reveals a chaotic, collapsing world in the year 2045. Salvation lies in the OASIS, a fantastical virtual-reality universe created by the brilliant and eccentric James Halliday. When Halliday dies, his immense fortune is left to the first person who can find a digital Easter egg hidden in the OASIS. Joining the hunt is unlikely young hero Wade Watts, who is hurled into a breakneck, reality-bending quest filled with mystery, discovery and danger.
Actors:
, , , , , , , Philip Zhao, , , , , , , , , , , Antonio Mattera,
Directors:
Producers:
Donald De Line, Dan Farah, Kristie Macosko Krieger, Steven Spielberg
Writers:
Zak Penn, Ernest Cline
Others:
David Shirk, Roger Guyett, Matthew E. Butler, Grady Cofer
Studio:
Warner
Genres:
Action & Adventure, Drama, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Thrillers
Collections:
2018, Children & Family, Children's Books On Screen: Fantasy, CinemaParadiso.co.uk Through Time, Getting to Know..., Getting to Know: Jack Nicholson
BBFC:
Release Date:
06/08/2018
Run Time:
134 minutes
Languages:
Castilian Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1, English Audio Description Dolby Digital 5.1, English Dolby Digital 5.1
Subtitles:
Castillian, Danish, English, English Close Captioned, Finnish, Greek, Norwegian, Swedish
DVD Regions:
Region 2
Formats:
Pal
Aspect Ratio:
Widescreen 2.40:1
Colour:
Colour
Bonus:
  • The '80''s: You're the Inspiration
BBFC:
Release Date:
06/08/2018
Run Time:
138 minutes
Languages:
Castilian Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1, English Audio Description Dolby Digital 5.1, English Dolby Atmos, English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1, Italian Dolby Digital 5.1
Subtitles:
Castillian, Danish, English Hard of Hearing, Finnish, Greek, Italian Hard of Hearing, Norwegian, Swedish
Formats:
Pal
Aspect Ratio:
Widescreen 2.40:1
Colour:
Colour
BLU-RAY Regions:
B
Bonus:
  • Over 90 minutes of bonus content loaded with Easter eggs
BBFC:
Release Date:
06/08/2018
Run Time:
138 minutes
Languages:
Castilian Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1, English Audio Description Dolby Digital 5.1, English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1, French DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1, Italian Dolby Digital 5.1, Thai Dolby Digital 5.1
Subtitles:
Cantonese, Castillian, Complex Mandarin, Danish, Dutch, English Hard of Hearing, Finnish, French, Italian Hard of Hearing, Korean, Norwegian, Swedish, Thai
Formats:
Pal
Aspect Ratio:
Widescreen 2.40:1
Colour:
Colour
BLU-RAY Regions:
B
Bonus:
  • Over 90 minutes of bonus content loaded with Easter eggs
BBFC:
Release Date:
06/08/2018
Run Time:
138 minutes
Languages:
English Audio Description Dolby Digital 5.1, English Dolby Atmos, English Dolby Digital 5.1, English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1, German Dolby Digital 5.1, German DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
Subtitles:
Croatian, English Hard of Hearing, German Hard of Hearing, Greek, Hebrew, Portuguese
DVD Regions:
Region 2
Formats:
Pal
Aspect Ratio:
Widescreen 2.40:1
Colour:
Colour
BLU-RAY Regions:
B
Bonus:
  • Over 90 minutes of bonus content loaded with Easter eggs

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Reviews (16) of Ready Player One

Virtual reality borefest - Ready Player One review by Alphaville

Spoiler Alert
22/08/2018

How much you get out of this depends on how much you like computer gaming, but even fanboys must be disappointed with this Stephen Spielberg kiddies film. Mostly set in a VR world of avatars, it’ like an updated version of Tron and just as instantly forgettable. The plot is irrelevant (the kids have to find three keys to save whatever) and the real-life characters have even less depth than their avatars. Add bog-standard cgi action and the usual relentlessly awful superhero score of orchestral muzak and you have a movie that plays like an overlong Tom-and-Jerry cartoon.

Film buffs will find occasional relief in references to artefacts such as Zemeckis Cube (which turns back time 60 seconds) and brief homages to old movies such as The Shining and Mechagodzilla. 80s fans will also find familiar references, as in the film’s one imaginative sequence – a dance in a zero-gravity dance hall set to Staying Alive. But nothing can overcome the overall grinding drama-free boredom.

It will be no spoiler to learn that our child heroes win through after a flash-bang battle against an array of other cartoon characters. And of course it all ends in the real world… pass the sick bag… with cheering. Please make it stop.

That the book on which the film was based was optioned before it was even published says much about today’s mainstream Hollywood output. As for Spielberg’s involvement, one can only hope this was an aberration brought on by his love for the 80s.

4 out of 4 members found this review helpful.

Possibly the worst film of the year! - Ready Player One review by CS

Spoiler Alert
02/09/2018

Spielberg falls back on old ideas for this one. I get the impression that he was attempting to pay homage to Sci-Fi films and games of the past, but just ends up creating a horrendous mash up, both in storyline, ideas and visuals. Lots of Bladerunner, Tron, Ping Pong, Mario Bros, oh you name it and it's probably in here somewhere! The plot is as thin as a piece of tissue paper. The CGI and Special Effects are not so special and the imagery just comes across like a teenage kids bedroom wall full of cuttings from comic books. I was bored throughout and didn't feel that there was anything new or original here at all!

3 out of 3 members found this review helpful.

Imaginative and different. - Ready Player One review by NC

Spoiler Alert
24/09/2018

Was dreading it, another freaky kids film gone wrong, but actually quite enjoyed it. The Shining sequence was good fun. Something a bit different. Hunger Games meets Thor.............

2 out of 3 members found this review helpful.

Critic review

Ready Player One review by Mark McPherson - Cinema Paradiso

Ernest Cline is an author so infatuated with pop-culture he wrote an adventure novel theorizing what it’d be like to have a Willy Wonka factory with all his favorite toys. Steven Spielberg took a look at Cline’s book and said: “hey, I have all of those toys.” And so the two joined forces to grab a big bucket their favorite properties, dump them out on the rug, and build them up to craft their ultimate monument to geek. There’s nothing all that profound about its construction, not with intent at least, but as someone who adores the sight of a Gundam fighting Mechagodzilla, I just couldn’t resist.

The world of Ready Player One is a dystopia where the world has descended into a wasteland of pollution, unemployment, and housing so cramped trailers are stacked on top of one another. And so the populace retreats to the OASIS, a virtual reality game where you can be anyone, do anything, and maybe make a living. There’s an increased interest in the program when the game’s creator, James Halliday (Mark Rylance), dies and leaves the keys to the company hidden within the game, only to be discovered by those that can master his riddles and clues in the game.

Of course, per the Amblin model of adventure, the one hero to make these discoveries will be the poor, young, and excited Wade (Tye Sheridan). In real life, he’s a teenager without much to look forward to in the future. But in the OASIS, he is Parzival, the silver-haired hero that looks like he stepped out of the Final Fantasy character mold. Wielding the DeLorean as his vehicle and taking fashion cues from Buckaroo Bonzai, he’s a dork just obsessed enough with the game to unlock creator’s many puzzles. His pop-culture obsession has turned him into the ultimate detective of not only solving the hidden easter eggs of the game but peeling back the sordid history that led to the creation of the OASIS.

Naturally, the villain seeking this buried treasure is a greedy CEO, Nolan Sorrento (Ben Mendelsohn), of a rival company. He wants control of the OASIS to load it up with enough ads to make a profit and choke out the fun. Nolan doesn’t understand enough pop-culture to uncover Halliday’s fortune but has hired a whole team of researchers to make him the hippest old man in the game. While Nolan might have his employed culture contributors and even a farm of virtual slaves financially imprisoned, Wade has plucky young allies to aid him and fulfill that Amblin model of kids besting adults.

I must admit that it’s hard to talk about Ready Player One without going into full-on geek mode, getting giddy at the explosion of genre properties on screen. Much like those old Frosted Mini-Wheats commercials, there’s an adult and child raging inside me. The adult realizes that such a dystopia never truly tackles the essence of the obsession of nostalgia and its damaging effects as the cultural landscape shifts to the colder virtual world. But the child just can’t get enough of that spot-on Shining parody and The Iron Giant charging into combat. Perhaps the adult in me is merely on a futile hunt for vitamins in the sugary adventure of CGI world and pop-culture trivia that is literally listed off in many scenes.

Less I turn this review into a listing of my favorite references - the best probably being a Rubick’s Cube dubbed the Zemeckis cube that can turn back time while playing Alan Silvestri’s notes - I can only throw my hands up and admit my coo to the kaleidoscope of cool. There’s nothing of grander value to Wade’s journey, a lacking of character definition, and a few plot holes that I’m sure will make some heads spin. Mine is firmly in place because my eyes can’t leave the screen for its dazzling special effects where Spielberg pulls all his tricks out of the bag. And unlike other directors that struggle to be hip with the kids, Spielberg has proven he still hasn’t lost a step in his filmmaking for young people thirsty for adventure. Or young at heart, in my case.

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