Free Guy
Year: 2021
Director: Shawn Levy
Starring: Jodie Comer, Joe Keery, Ryan Reynolds & Taika Waititi
Runtime: 115 mins
BBFC: 12
Published: 01/09/21
Director: Shawn Levy
Starring: Jodie Comer, Joe Keery, Ryan Reynolds & Taika Waititi
Runtime: 115 mins
BBFC: 12
Published: 01/09/21
Since its release in October 2013 Grand Theft Auto Online has consistently been one of the most played multiplayer games in history. A game that gives players almost unparalleled levels of freedom to explore the city of Los Santos in any way they please. They can partake in missions, play with friends, buy property and cars, or just cause wanton mayhem. But what is the life like as one of the many non-player characters (NPC’s) that inhabits that world? How do you cope when your everyday life is being murdered and robbed by people, and you have no freedom to do whatever you want?
Guy (Ryan Reynolds) is an NPC in the game Free City. Every day he gets up, goes to the coffee shop and buys the same coffee, goes to work, gets robbed about four times by ‘sunglasses wearers’ who can do whatever they want with no consequence, and then goes to the beach with his security guard friend Buddy (Lil Rel Howery), before going home and doing it all again the next day. That is until Guy meets Molotov Girl (Jodie Comer), a sunglasses wearer who steals his heart. Taking his life into his own hands, Guy steals a pair of sunglasses from their wearer, and vows to level up enough for Molotov Girl to talk to him.
Meanwhile in the real world, Millie (Jodie Comer) is a former videogame developer who is trying to sue Free City developer Antwan (Taika Waititi) for stealing her code to build his game. Unfortunately, she can’t prove it and requires the help of her former partner Keys (Joe Keery) who works for Antwan to help her. But when the two of them realise that Guy isn’t a player, but part of Free City’s A.I script developing and learning of its own volition, they use his inside knowledge of the world to help them find what they’re looking for.
Guy (Ryan Reynolds) is an NPC in the game Free City. Every day he gets up, goes to the coffee shop and buys the same coffee, goes to work, gets robbed about four times by ‘sunglasses wearers’ who can do whatever they want with no consequence, and then goes to the beach with his security guard friend Buddy (Lil Rel Howery), before going home and doing it all again the next day. That is until Guy meets Molotov Girl (Jodie Comer), a sunglasses wearer who steals his heart. Taking his life into his own hands, Guy steals a pair of sunglasses from their wearer, and vows to level up enough for Molotov Girl to talk to him.
Meanwhile in the real world, Millie (Jodie Comer) is a former videogame developer who is trying to sue Free City developer Antwan (Taika Waititi) for stealing her code to build his game. Unfortunately, she can’t prove it and requires the help of her former partner Keys (Joe Keery) who works for Antwan to help her. But when the two of them realise that Guy isn’t a player, but part of Free City’s A.I script developing and learning of its own volition, they use his inside knowledge of the world to help them find what they’re looking for.
Free Guy is a very fun film that takes the concept of other films like Ready Player One and The Matrix and puts a unique spin on them by mixing them with The Truman Show. Where most films about digital worlds with limitless possibilities are usually told from a visitor’s perspective, Free Guy puts us in the shoes of someone stuck inside that digital world without them even knowing that they’re part of a simulation. For better or worse the film doesn’t bog itself down too much with nitty gritty sci-fi philosophies surrounding A.I. as a lifeform, and instead takes a lighter more comedic approach. Whilst this certainly does present some missed opportunities, ultimately Free Guy is more concerned with being a fun family film that you can kick back and enjoy regardless of your interest in sci-fi than a statement about humanity playing God with what it creates.
Much like in Deadpool, it’s Ryan Reynolds’ stellar performance as Guy that makes the film truly as special as it is. His comedic timing, line delivery, and physical performance are all so hilarious that you can’t help but love Guy and everything he stands for.
Similarly, you’re invested in Millie and Keys’ story because of the chemistry the two share. It’s quite surprising really as there aren’t many scenes that Keery and Comer appear in together as most of their conversations happen on the phone, but you can feel the electricity between the two of them and it does help give you a reason to root for them because the characters aren’t all that complex.
You can forgive Guy for being relatively simple because he is a program, though over the course of the story he does develop into his own free-thinking person with wants and desires. But Millie, Keys, and Antwan are just cliché archetypes with nothing else to offer. Millie is the smart girl nobody listens to, Keys is the shy sensitive guy, and Antwan just wants money…that’s all they do in the film, and they don’t grow beyond that at all.
Much like in Deadpool, it’s Ryan Reynolds’ stellar performance as Guy that makes the film truly as special as it is. His comedic timing, line delivery, and physical performance are all so hilarious that you can’t help but love Guy and everything he stands for.
Similarly, you’re invested in Millie and Keys’ story because of the chemistry the two share. It’s quite surprising really as there aren’t many scenes that Keery and Comer appear in together as most of their conversations happen on the phone, but you can feel the electricity between the two of them and it does help give you a reason to root for them because the characters aren’t all that complex.
You can forgive Guy for being relatively simple because he is a program, though over the course of the story he does develop into his own free-thinking person with wants and desires. But Millie, Keys, and Antwan are just cliché archetypes with nothing else to offer. Millie is the smart girl nobody listens to, Keys is the shy sensitive guy, and Antwan just wants money…that’s all they do in the film, and they don’t grow beyond that at all.
But much like Ready Player One, most of the enjoyment in Free Guy comes from the near limitless possibilities for action sequences. Whether it be the terrain changing as the characters move through it, or endlessly spawning bad guys, or even just trying out some of the power ups available in the game. Free Guy has a lot of imagination when it comes to how events play out, so then it’s kind of a shame that events tend to play out in the most cliché and predictable way they can.
Arguably what I enjoyed the most about Free Guy was the attention to detail in the background of almost every scene, or the logic to how the game functions. The way sunglasses wearers move around is often really janky and stiff, a lot of the time you’ll be able to see them walking into walls, spinning around on the spot, or just jumping their way down the street and it really makes Free City feel like a genuine videogame that these players are goofing around in.
The climactic final sequence does test my patience a little bit because the rules of the game world are broken for the sake of dramatic tension, and it just had me wanting to scream “but that’s not how servers work” at the screen because of how solid the film had been in its videogame logic up to that point.
I had a good time with Free Guy and whilst there’s definitely not a lot of substance in the film there is a lot of fun to be had. I’d welcome a sequel, but only if it did bring some unique story ideas to the table, as I don’t think I could forgive something as generic as this another time around. It’s a great idea, but does have some sloppy execution.
Arguably what I enjoyed the most about Free Guy was the attention to detail in the background of almost every scene, or the logic to how the game functions. The way sunglasses wearers move around is often really janky and stiff, a lot of the time you’ll be able to see them walking into walls, spinning around on the spot, or just jumping their way down the street and it really makes Free City feel like a genuine videogame that these players are goofing around in.
The climactic final sequence does test my patience a little bit because the rules of the game world are broken for the sake of dramatic tension, and it just had me wanting to scream “but that’s not how servers work” at the screen because of how solid the film had been in its videogame logic up to that point.
I had a good time with Free Guy and whilst there’s definitely not a lot of substance in the film there is a lot of fun to be had. I’d welcome a sequel, but only if it did bring some unique story ideas to the table, as I don’t think I could forgive something as generic as this another time around. It’s a great idea, but does have some sloppy execution.