The Gerard Butler Sci-Fi Action Movie On Netflix That Is Ridiculous Fun
If you’re looking for a solid summer blockbuster, but prefer the comfort of your living room over a trip to the movie theater, then you might want to consider adding Gamer, starring Gerard Butler, to your Netflix queue.
This dystopian science-fiction action film is set in the not-so-distant future, and is an action-packed cautionary tale about gaming technology being used for all the wrong reasons. Though Gamer was met with mixed reviews, and was neither a critical or commercial success, it’s still one of those films that you’ll have a lot of fun watching if you just sit back and let it happen to you.
The best way to describe Gamer would be a dystopian version of The Sims mashed together with Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome. In other words, Gerard Butler is our Mel Gibson, and John “Kable” Tillman is our Mad Max in many ways. Unfortunately for fans of the original Mad Max movies, there is a disappointing lack of Master Blaster in this film, but we’re willing to look past this one glaring flaw.
Gamer is set in the year 2034, and centers around a new video game called Society created by Ken Castle (Michael C. Hall), a wealthy computer programmer. Castle becomes the richest man in the world after the worldwide success of Society, a game in which players are able to control paid live actors as their avatars through the use of Castle’s Nanex technology.
Though Gamer was neither a critical or commercial success, it’s still one of those films that you’ll have a lot of fun watching if you just sit back and let it happen to you.
Piggybacking off of his success, Castle creates a new game called Slayers, which introduces us to Gerard Butler’s Kable character, who is a death-row prisoner with a military background, making him an excellent fighter.
The reason for the Beyond Thunderdome comparison is for the arena-style fighting that Slayers’ gameplay delivers. Just like in Society, players are able to manipulate real people, but the stakes are a lot higher because the characters in Slayers are unpaid death-row inmates who are promised freedom if they’re able to survive 30 matches.
We quickly learn that Gerard Butler’s Kable has won 27 matches, and will soon secure his freedom if he continues to maintain his intimidating winning streak.
The best way to describe Gamer would be a dystopian version of The Sims mashed together with Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome.
Feeling threatened by Kable’s winning streak, Castle introduces Hackman to the battlegrounds. Hackman is not like any other character in Gamer, because he isn’t controlled by another human, but rather able to navigate himself through the game play without guidance.
If you consider how jacked Gerard Butler got for the movie 300, which was released a couple years prior, you’d think that Kable would be able to easily overpower Hackman, but we’re presented with a game play issue that complicates matters.
For every reviewer that suggests that Gamer is a throwaway film, there’s somebody else saying that it’s one of the better Gerard Butler films they’ve seen.
Every Society and Slayers character is handicapped by a slight delay between a player’s command and their character’s actions. Since Hackman’s movements aren’t hindered by any lag between idea and execution, he has the upper hand in many ways.
Meanwhile, an activist organization known as the Humanz are taking extreme measures to topple Castle’s empire because they fear that he’ll eventually use his Nanex technology to enslave all of humanity. We also learn that Kable’s estranged wife, Angie, and his daughter, Gina, are in danger.
Though we wouldn’t mind Gerard Butler just doing his thing, and fighting other inmates to the death, the fact that his family’s safety is in jeopardy gives Gamer an emotional through line that is very much needed to break up the excessive violence.
Despite its interesting plot and great casting choices, Gamer was not a well-received movie. On the commercial front, this Gerard Butler film failed to break even, and only pulled in $42 million against its budget of $50 million.
Critically speaking, Gamer received mixed reviews, with a critical score of 30 percent, and an audience score of 39 percent on Rotten Tomatoes. But when you read the reviews, it becomes clear that we’re talking about a film that’s quite polarizing.
For every reviewer that suggests that Gamer is a throwaway film, there’s somebody else saying that it’s one of the better Gerard Butler films they’ve seen.
While critics have voiced some particularly scathing reviews, the combination of Gerard Butler’s action sequences, the advanced weaponry, and the game play aspect of this movie make it a unique journey into a world where you don’t play to live, but rather live to play.
With a run-time of 95 minutes, which is nothing compared to some of the action movies that are coming out today, you really don’t have anything to lose by firing up Netflix and giving Gamer a watch on a rainy day. Like most science-fiction action movies, you have to suspend a healthy amount of disbelief, and just enjoy the show.
