addiesin said:
Ready Player One
It perfectly captures both the illustrative imagination and the vapid emptiness of the eighties and media of the time, and manages to emulate some of the charm, but unfortunately has none of the heart. I don't understand the rules and limits of the world and I don't feel the characters behind the avatars, unlike, for example, in Avatar, so it doesn't feel genuine.
jrWHAG42 said:
The book feels much more human. The movie went for more of the large-scale concepts, but as a result you never really get to know anybody. In the book the joy is in the minutia, while in the movie the spectacle is the focus.
A great example is the first puzzle. In the movie, it's a single event that you have to beat to move on. In the book, it's an open ended easter egg hunt with merely a riddle to work from. Wade isn't taking part in some large-scale theatrics, he's instead stuck on the school planet (which they briefly show in the intro to the movie) and only figures out the clues while obsessing over 80s trivia.
I can see exactly why they chose to take the movie in the direction they did, but if you want something a little more grounded (ironically) then definitely check out the book. There's a lot of 80s fluff of course, but the core of it is much stronger.
TMBTM said:
Not a movie, but that Haunting of Hill House TV series was impressive.
I was also incredibly impressed by that show. The moment that pushed me from enjoyment to appreciation was when I realized the entire first half hour of the funeral parlor scene was done in a single take. It just kept going, and going, and going, and then had a goddamned scene change in the middle of it without cutting! I highly recommend this one.