Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 7.5/10
Cast: Ryan Reynolds, Jodie Comer, Lil Rel Howery, Joe Keery, Utkarsh Ambudkar, Taika Waititi, Aaron W Reed, Britne Oldford, Camille Kostek, Mark Lainer, Mike Devine, Sophie Levy, Vernon Scott, Naheem Garcia, Anabel Plamenco, Kenneth Israel, Michael Malvesti, Colin Allen, Michael Tow, High Jackman, Dwayne Johnson, Tina Fey, John Krasinski, Alex Trebek.
The inevitable love child of The Truman Show and Tron, with more than a little help in being raised by the house of mouse; and yet despite having the backing, the insight and imagination, as well as the decades in the advancement in studio techniques to pull of such a daring story, Free Guy does not have the same appeal to all as its more illustrious parents had when they first hit the cinema screens.
Inevitable but not unwelcome, and when a film such as Free Guy comes along it will no doubt suffer in the comparisons of the bright lights still shining in the big screen past.
Directed by Shawn Levy and written by Matt Lieberman and Zak Penn, and starring the delicious talents of Ryan Reynolds and Britain’s Jodie Comer as the eponymous Guy and the gamer/creator Millie/Molotovgirl, Free Guy is not only a fun romp aimed at a growing community who spend their time in pursuit of living in a virtual world, but its unhidden agenda to focus on the way we have allowed ourselves to become more entrenched in a world not of our making, not so much in bed with big business, but tied down and constantly abused, is vital to the film’s overall direction.
We have become the non-playing character in our own game. It is a state of existence that is surely unbearable to all, watching, sitting back, saying nothing but the well-worn catchphrase and making plans that involve sitting around in bars and pretending that our banter is original, and Free Guy reflects the monotony behind it all, and through Ryan Reynolds’s often sideways glance at the universe, we are shown our true selves in the reflection, and it does not make for an easy watch; our redemption is down to striking beyond the barrier that has been put in place.
Slick and with a huge eye for detail, the issue with the film lays not in its delivery, and not in the script or action sequences, it is to be found in the evolution of the narrative, the unsaid and yet specific motion in which had been portrayed so elegantly and eloquently in The Truman Show.
A determined watch, but one that you cannot help but notice the nods to the past within.
Ian D. Hall