Gamer

Dir: Neveldine/Taylor
Starring: Gerard Butler & Michael C. Hall

"Hey Kable, I'm Playing You"

Gamer is the first film, outside of Crank & Crank: High Voltage, from the collective minds of Mark Neveldine & Brian Taylor. It stars 300 actor Gerard Butler as death row inmate Kable & Dexter Morgan himself Michael C. Hall as Uber Billionaire Ken Castle.

The premise of Gamer revolves around a game called Slayers. Slayers lets the player take control of a "icon" and play as them in a game to the death. The only problem is, these icon's are death row inmates, who if they can survive thirty rounds get set free.

Slayers is the brain child of Ken Castle, who designed Slayers after his last experiment Society proved to be a major hit. Kable is chosen to take part in Slayers and is on his 26Th consecutive win when we begin Gamer.

Kable looks like he's come to the realisation that he is in the game for the long run and only hopes to see his wife and daughter again one day. Simon is the kid who's playing Kable. He's soaking in all the glory of playing as the most successful Slayer in the world at the minute. He's every Game Boy's role model. However everything goes wrong when Kable goes rogue and leaves the confines of the game.

That's all I'll say on the plot because as usual I don't want to give away to much. Honestly, I enjoyed Gamer. There were a few moments where I thought meh. But it was a fun action packed thrill ride which makes for good viewing with a bunch of friends. I went to see it with my Girlfriend and 3 other male friends and all but one of us thoroughly enjoyed it.

The linear narrative is very easy to follow but the only thing that is a little confusing to look at is the slanted camera angles and strange camera shots in the beginning of the film. Gamer does have a lot of T&A in it which is good for the single guys out there but there is a lot of action sequences with provides a good alternative for the taken guy who "swears he wasn't looking" I also really enjoyed how the ended the film with a screen saying "Game Over" and "Insert Coin"

I thought Gerard Butler gave a strong performance as Kable but, not just because I'm a Dexter fan, I think Michael C. Hall gave the best performance in the film. He was very undermined in this film though as he doesn't receive as much screen time as I would have liked. Terry Crews has a good showing as one of the film's villains but I urge you not to have White Chicks or The Longest Yard in memory when you see this film, it'll dampen any chance Crews has of scaring you.

Look out for Michael C. Hall's dance number. This is why he should make more movies.

Overall Gamer gave me a fun time at the cinema. There's a scene where Kable meets the Anti Ken Castle group Humanz which reminded me a lot of Children Of Men which made me happy as it's is one of my favourite films.

I enjoyed Gamer more than Hancock & Jumper but not as much as 500 Days of Summer but i suppose that's because their from different genre's and what not. I have contemplated what star rating I am going to give Gamer, either a 3 * or a 4 *. I was advised to scrap my belief of not giving half stars and go with 3 1/2 *'s but i am not going to do this. I'm gonna go out on a limb and say:

****

P.S - This will be my last review until about mid next week unless things change. I'm moving to University and have packed over 100 DVD's all of which will be reviewed.

(All reviews can be given a maximum of 5 *'s and i will not give 1/2's and 1/4's. I will write reviews on films i have recently seen and will review other films upon request)