Without a consistent writer or director with a tangible style (a James Gunn or a Taika Waititi, perhaps), watching the movie is an exercise in identifying all the familiar screenwriting parts as they’re pulled from the shelf. Meanwhile, we wait patiently (or not) for Holland’s character to acquire the lived-in quality that propelled the games’ strong reputation.
Read MoreThe movie obviously revels in depicting the mayhem of a GTA-style game, and constructs elaborate set pieces around game physics, ridiculous weapons and items, and the grinding that some players undertake to level up. But there’s roughly a 80/20 accuracy split; the bulk of the observations line up, but every so often there’s a painfully awkward trope.
Read MoreSo what was Spielberg and his team to do? Arguably, there are two routes: engage with Wade’s freaky behaviour and lay his flaws bare, or trim out the objectionable stuff and make a piece of entertainment. Spielberg and screenwriter Zak Penn, perhaps unsurprisingly, go with the latter. So was this the right move, or a missed opportunity to drag Cline’s problematic ideas into the light?
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