It has to be said, without hesitation, that Gamer comes close to out-trumping Transformers 2 as the most pointless film of 2009.
Gamer has been relegated to that interim period between blockbuster and awards season that serves as a black hole for films without the stars to provide blockbuster clout, or a sufficiently interesting storyline to warrant a place among the awards contenders.
Gamer Plot Outline
If you’re not deafened or subdued into an epileptic fit by the film’s frantic opening scene, then it's just about decipherable that Gerard Butler’s character, Kable, is engaged in some sort of real life combat game, from which he manages to come through unscathed. This of course is Slayers, a game which has taken future Earth by storm. It is the brainchild of Ken Castle (Michael C. Hall, Six Feet Under), a Bill Gates-like computer magnate, who’s the world’s richest man thanks to the success of two interactive games which provide unprecedented visceral pleasure to a cyber generation.
The first is Society, a game in which people are able to control the actions and words of actors from the comfort of their own homes in a specially designed computer world where anything goes. It’s a haven for lonely, perverted individuals who get kicks from controlling others and indulging in lewd sexual fantasies.
The second is the aforementioned Slayers; wherein convicted criminals are given the chance to play for their survival and ultimate freedom in a high-octane, real-life combat environment where survival awaits the fittest and most alert. Each participant, similar to Society, is controlled by an on-line gamer via specially implanted computer chips embedded in the prisoner’s brain. Each character is forced to carry out their controller’s commands in a robotic fashion. The marketing edge of this game is simple – ‘Society let you live through others, Slayers lets you kill through others.’
Slaying Machine
The world has been taken aback by one character in particular – Kable. Convicted of first degree murder, he is trying desperately to survive each and every round of Slayers in the hope of returning to his wife and child in the real world. Kable is just two levels from completing the game, a stage never before reached by a prisoner. He’s the ultimate warrior and has slain more enemies than anyone before him and the public are transfixed by his ability. His controller, a 17 year old rich kid named Simon (Logan Lerman), has become a national celebrity due to Kable’s exploits. However, wary of Simon’s success, creator Ken Castle has unveiled a new in-game rival for Kable in the form of Hackman, a man mountain of a killing machine, whose only purpose is to terminate Kable before the end of the game.
Gamer is a Poorly Constructed Film
As well as the ridiculously bad science behind the futuristic gaming industry, Writer/ Directors Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor seem intent on cluttering Gamer with a plethora of characters that only serve to add to the nonsensical nature of the plot. With a mere 90 minute running time (this could be a blessing in disguise depending on which way you look at it) there is little time to develop all or any of the characters and what results is a sense of confusion and a distinct lack of care for what happens to anyone in this movie.
Although Gerard Butler fits the bill as the rough and ready Kable, the back story in relation to his conviction is poorly explored and the inclusion of his wife Angie (Amber Valletta), who is now working as an actress-come-prostitute in the game Society, is as much to titillate the teenage audience that this film is clearly marketed at, as to present a moral reason for the audience to want Kable to survive.
The film also explains little about Simon, the 17 year old who's so masterful at Slayer, and the inclusion of a renegade group of gamers sent to help Kable uncover the truth about his conviction just confuses the proceedings further. Surely this could have been dealt with using half the number of characters?
Gamer Summary
The characters are painfully one-dimensional and there’s very little hidden from the audience in terms of where the story will ultimately end up, not to mention the lack of any credible dialogue in the film. This is demonstrated relatively early by the crass TV presenter and journalist Gina Parker Smith (Kyra Sedgwick), who interviews Ken Castle about his all-conquering empire, a scene which patronises the viewer with its shoddy back story and science behind Castle’s creation. Castle himself is a villain so obviously corrupt that if the viewer can’t second guess what'll happen to him then they really have had their senses dulled by the opening sequence.
The storyline and performances in Gamer are as poor as any computer game narrative, which raises the question as to whether this would have made a better Xbox title than a film.
Verdict: 1.5/5
Gamer’s Low points -
• Kable when questioned about what it’s like in the game world – “a slice of a second out there is the difference between livin’ and dyin’. When I pull the trigger, it’s just me out there.”
• The sound of Marilyn Manson crooning before an image has even been presented on screen will leave you wondering why you never went to see Bandslam or Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs instead.
• A strange cameo by Milo Ventimiglia (Heroes’ Peter Petrelli) as an in-game character entitled ‘Rick Rape’, who, er… does just that.
• Ken Castle’s rendition of Frank Sinatra’s I’ve Got You Under My Skin during the film’s closing stages is bizarre to say the least.
 |
 |
 |
 |
