"GAMER" (2009) (Gerard Butler, Michael C. Hall) (R)
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QUICK TAKE:
Action: In a world where game players use real-life people as their avatars in online battles fueled by mind control, one such participant must survive the violent mayhem as he attempts to take down the system that has imprisoned him.
PLOT:
In the near future, video game players control their on-screen avatars via mind control, but their game characters are real people, thanks to the work of Ken Castle (MICHAEL C. HALL). His pioneering advances in the industry have made him a billionaire and subject of lots of press coverage, including by talk show host Gina Parker Smith (KYRA SEDGWICK) who does a story on his achievements.
First, there was Society, where everyday players control actors in a game of interacting with others. But with the high interest in violent video games, Castle created Slayers, a first-person shooter game where prisoners, such as Freak (JOHN LEGUIZAMO), have volunteered to be controlled as soldiers. If they manage to live through 30 games, they're granted their freedom, and Kable (GERARD BUTLER) is the only one who's gotten close with only a few to go.
Controlled by 17-year-old high-tech gamer Simon (LOGAN LERMAN), Kable is a seemingly non-stoppable killing machine, but unlike the others, he didn't volunteer for the post, just like four years earlier when he was used in a test that resulted in him unwillingly murdering another man. Now that he's close to getting his freedom, Castle has sent in Hackman (TERRY CREWS), a hulking killer who reportedly doesn't have the physical brain control implant and thus is a free agent of sorts whose only desire is to dispatch Kable from the game.
As the reluctant fighter tries to gain his freedom so that he can be reunited with his wife, Angie (AMBER VALLETTA) -- an actor in the Society game where she's used as a sexpot puppet -- as well as their young daughter, Delia (BRIGHID FLEMING), others are working to insure both his freedom and an end to Castle's empire. Consisting of leader Humanz Brother (LUDACRIS) and his assistants, Humanz Dude (AARON YOO) and Trace (ALISON LOHMAN), they repeatedly attempt to infiltrate Castle's network.
With Hackman intent on killing Kable and Castle counting his mounting piles of cash, Kable does what he can to survive the last few games and get revenge on those who've wrongly imprisoned him.
OUR TAKE: 2 out of 10
Our reviewing policy for films that aren't shown in advance to critics is that we'll only provide a paragraph or two about the film's artistic merits or, more accurately, lack thereof. After all, life is too short to spend any more effort than that on a movie that even the releasing studio knows isn't any good (which is why they hid it from reviewers before its release).
Reviewers often complain that many contemporary action flicks play out like glorified, big-budget video games. Granted, many of them are based on just that, and thus the point is somewhat moot. While not based on such a game per se, "Gamer" is about the futuristic world of online, multiplayer gaming and thus -- you guessed it -- comes off like little more than a movie version of just that.
Therefore, we can't complain about its genre trappings, but can regarding just about everything else that's present. And that's because this is an over-edited and over-directed mess brought to you courtesy of the guys responsible for the similarly afflicted "Crank" films.
Essentially just a technology enhanced version of "Death Race," "The Running Man" and any others of their ilk, we have people killing others for the enjoyment of those who don't get bloodied in the process, while one participant ends up breaking free to take down those responsible.
Big whoop, been there, seen it, and had more fun with that sort of story before and without the need for heavy doses of Excedrin and Dramamine. There's an okay, if barely original story buried beneath the mayhem and ADD filmmaking, but no one will care once this cinematic cacophony runs out of quarters or loses its Internet connection. "Gamer" deserves to be infected by the sort of virus that will all but kill its box office potential and, as one of the year's worst, rates as just a 2 out of 10.
Reviewed September 4, 2009 / Posted September 4, 2009
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