A triumphant return back to the silver screen for legendary director Steven Spielberg (Jurassic Park, Schindler’s List, Raiders of the Lost Ark), this time taking on an adaptation of a beloved science fiction novel by Ernest Cline. 2018’s ‘Ready Player One’ not only manages to capture that classic Spielberg whimsy all these years later, along with having plenty of breathtaking visuals and thrilling action sequences to-boot. But through its many, many references and appearances to/from iconic properties and characters from all types of media, ‘Ready Player One’ soon becomes a sweetly nostalgic adventure for any age.

Plot Summary: In the dystopian future of 2045, humanity spends their days inside ‘The OASIS,’ a virtual world where the only limits are your own imagination. Until on his death bed, the original creator of: ‘The OASIS’ makes a posthumous challenge, promising his entire fortune as well as complete control over his virtual world to the lucky ‘OASIS’ user that finds his ‘Golden Easter Egg.’

As its story may imply, ‘Ready Player One’ follows its novel counter-part closely by structuring its narrative half in the real-world, and half within ‘The OASIS.’ Having all of the scenes set within the virtual world be comprised entirely of CGI, whilst reality is presented through live-action. While many viewers may initially be quite cautious of this (myself included), fearing a barrage of phoney-looking CG set-pieces, Spielberg actually pulls this idea off very well, as the film never feels as if its CG visuals are being overused despite them taking-up most of the runtime. Interestingly, Spielberg teamed-up with effects company Industrial Light & Magic for most of: ‘Ready Player One’s imagery, the company that previously worked with him for the first ‘Jurassic Park,’ so the Tyrannosaurus Rex that appears in the film is recreated using the same base-model made for the original film.

Best known as ‘Cyclops’ in the new incarnation of the ‘X-Men’ series, Tye Sheridan does a decent job at portraying the film’s likeable protagonist: ‘Wade Watts.’ Alongside Sheridan, Olivia Cooke as ‘Wade’s love interest: ‘Samantha,’ as well as Mark Rylance as ‘Halliday’ and Ben Mendelsohn and T.J. Miller as the film’s antagonists are all fine throughout the film. Yet whilst every member of the cast is trying here, the performances in ‘Ready Player One’ are made more impressive considering the film’s extremely weak characters. As unfortunately, nearly every character we meet within the story is mostly one-note, being nothing more than your traditional hero, companion or villain etc.

Although an enormous amount of the cinematography by Janusz Kaminski is visually striking, having a large number of moving shots where the camera soars through the limitless world of: ‘The OASIS.’ It’s difficult to judge it in its entirety, as a good majority of the camerawork is obviously CG due to half of the film’s story being set within a virtual world, and whenever we cut back to reality, the cinematography usually feels quite bland. However, I do appreciate the gloomy colour palette that’s utilised when the film returns to the real-world, as it contrasts well against the incredibly colourful visuals of: ‘The OASIS.’

Even though the film’s original score by Alan Silvestri is a serviceable and uplifting score in its own right, sounding subtlety like a Steven Spielberg classic. The film’s score was originally going to be composed by longtime Spielberg collaborator John Williams, but as a result of a scheduling conflict with another Spielberg film, Williams left the project to Alan Silvestri. Making ‘Ready Player One’ only the third film where Spielberg didn’t collaborate with Williams.

Many of the main problems I find hard to ignore with ‘Ready Player One’ mostly revolve around its weak writing, as although not continually noticeable, the film has a number of cheesy moments/clichés scattered throughout its story, in addition to many moments of humour which fall completely flat. Some viewers have also taken issue with the enormous amount of characters from other media appearing in the film, seeing it as pandering and meaningless. I don’t agree with this criticism, however, as the original novel is full of many of its own (unique) references. Personally, I also feel many of the film’s flaws are made-up for by its brilliant action scenes, from the opening race to the explosive final battle, to even a scene where the characters travel into the classic horror film: ‘The Shining,’ every set-piece is both creative, and enjoyable to watch.

Overall, ‘Ready Player One’ definitely has its faults, in particular, when it comes to its screenplay. But even with its problematic writing in mind, I’d still say the film is a great addition to Spielberg’s huge line-up of family flicks. As while it may not be on the same level of classics like ‘E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial’ or ‘Hook’ for example, ‘Ready Player One’ overcomes its weak characterisation and occasional corny dialogue to become an exciting sci-fi/fantasy odyssey, and a film I’d recommend a trip into ‘The OASIS’ for. Final Rating: high 7/10.