Review: Pixels

Beginning in 1982, we meet arcade gamer Sam Brenner, competing in a tournament, which he ultimately loses to uber-douchebag Eddie Plant (played by Andrew Bambridge), playing “Donkey Kong”. Cut to present day and Sam (now played by Adam Sandler) is now an electronical equipment installation guy. On one such installation he meets, and completely fails to impress Violet (Michelle Monaghan), whose husband has just left her. All of a sudden he gets a call from his childhood best friend and fellow gamer Will, who has become the President of the United States (!) and played by Kevin James (!). It appears that aliens (who viewed video footage of the game tournament that was sent into space by NASA as a cultural artefact, and the aliens took it seriously/literally) are threatening an attack on various cities around the globe. Sam rushes to the White House only to find that Violet is there too, that’s Lt. Col. Violet Van Patten, who will play an important part in the fight against the aliens. Lt. Col. Van Patten is shocked to see Sam at the White House too, but it’s just as well that he is, because he recognises that the alien ships are actually based on the arcade game “Galaga”! Lt. Col. Van Patten and equally bemused Adm. Porter (Brian Cox) are ordered by POTUS to work with Sam to find a way to defeat these aliens, who are clearly challenging us to a game (or several). However, Sam isn’t the only gamer whose services are needed, he also recruits creepy weirdo conspiracy nut Ludlow (Josh Gad), and reluctantly busts the now grown (but still uber-douchy) Eddie Plant out of prison (and now played by Peter Dinklage). The fate of the Earth now rests in the hands of a bunch of grown-up video game nerds, one of whom still lives with his grandmother (who is played by a wasted Lainie Kazan as essentially Mrs. Wolowitz). Jane Krakowski gets nothing to do as the First Lady, Sean Bean plays a Brit military hard arse, Dan Aykroyd appears at the beginning as the emcee of the arcade tournament, Denis Akiyama plays the creator of “Pac-Man”, and the far too petite Ashley Benson is miscast as the living embodiment of Ludlow’s creepy warrior woman video game fantasies.

 

It didn’t do much at the box-office and critics seemed to think even less of it, but like with “Blended” and “Little Nicky”, here’s an apparently unpopular Adam Sandler film that I’ve found myself in the position of defending. Yeah, I really liked this 2015 Chris Columbus (“Home Alone”, “Mrs. Doubtfire”, the first two-and best- “Harry Potter” films) flick. Scripted by Sandler crony Tim Herlihy (who worked on two of Sandler’s better films “Little Nicky” and “Bedtime Stories”) and Timothy Dowling (the below average Sandler effort “Just Go With It” and the even worse spy-comedy “This Means War”), it’s a far cry from the excellent “Funny People” or the rock-solid “Punch-Drunk Love”. However, for a Sandler vehicle based on a short film, it’s surprisingly consistently entertaining and never runs out of steam like you expect it to. So it’s not just a film with an irresistible premise or a film where all of the best bits are in the trailer.

 

To be honest, I came in at the tail end of the arcade game era and the beginning of the PC era, so that I’m much more well-versed in Atari and C64 than I am arcade games, though I do remember playing a few here and there (“Double Dragon” in particular). So I was quite surprised that I did actually know a lot of the references here, including cameos by Paperboy and Missile Command (and I’ve played a Game and Watch version of “Donkey Kong” as a kid, possibly even “Donkey Kong Jr.” as well if my memory serves me correctly). Sure, for a film that starts in 1982 some of the references are actually anachronistic (Cheap Trick’s ‘Surrender’ came in at around the late 70s, and I’m surprised Samantha Fox was even known in the US at all, and she certainly wasn’t well-known before 1985 at the very earliest. Also, no way is Sheena Easton hotter!), but for the most part the film seems to have been made by people with an affection for the era and technology, and it’s just nit-picking to complain about stuff like that. I wasn’t remotely surprised to see that “King of Kong” filmmaker Seth Gordon served as EP here, not just because of the subject matter, but also because there’s a lot of Billy Mitchell (the uber-arrogant star of the aforementioned definitive 80s gamer doco) in the character Peter Dinklage (and Andrew Bambridge as his younger self) plays here, including typically 80s hairstyle. Bambridge, by the way, is so hilarious and spot-on as the younger Dinklage (he sounds just like him!), that he might actually be more entertaining. Whether it’s the younger or older version of Eddie, he’s the most consistently amusing character in the film. Dinklage gets the film’s best line when he meets the creator of “Pac-Man”. I won’t spoil the line, but I laughed way too hard. Also scoring big from his very first moment is Josh Gad as perhaps the most prototypical gamer nerd grown up to be a conspiracy nut. If there’s a threat to Dinklage and Bambridge here, it’s definitely Gad. His claiming that ‘JFK shot first!’ is either brilliant or stupid. Maybe both, and at any rate he’s great to have around. He also has the most surprising moment in the film performing a rather good rendition of the frankly wet Tears for Fears song ‘Everybody Wants to Rule the World’. I’m not sure why Adam Sandler is so obsessed with having people sing 80s songs in his films (Spandau Ballet are referenced yet again, and we also hear the awesome ‘Working for the Weekend’ by Loverboy), but Gad’s a surprisingly decent singer. Speaking of Sandler, he looks a bit happier in this than he seemed in “The Cobbler”, which is no surprise because it’s a much better film.

 

Although I’m not a Kevin James fan, I did find it funny that he played the American President in this…and POTUS is absolutely, positively not popular at all. Funny. The plot itself I actually found hilarious, as was Sandler’s refusal to take Lt. Col. Michelle Monaghan (or hawkish military guy Brian Cox) remotely seriously. Yes it’s very silly, but everyone involved knows it is, and it’s more clever than I expected at times. The running gag about the aliens solely communicating through broadcasts of pop culture icons of the 80s surprisingly doesn’t get old. In fact, the cameo by ‘Hall & Oates’ is hilarious. Sure you know what the final game is going to be almost from the very beginning of the film, but for the most part this really was a pleasant surprise. I’m not just geeking out, either, as I explained earlier I was born a couple of years after most of these games. I’m also far more of a film buff than a gamer. However, as much as I’ve never actually played “Q*bert”, how can you not find the little guy adorable in this? In fact, he’s so adorable he deserves his own movie. I also loved how when Michelle Monaghan watches the action from afar like a military strategist, the screen resembles the screen for a “Pac-Man” game. Brilliant. Also, I know that the real Toru Iwatani (the creator of “Pac-Man”) only turns up in a tiny non-speaking role as a repairman, the character of ‘Toru Iwatani’ (played by Denis Akiyama) was an inspired idea. We also get a funny implementation of “Tetris” blocks at one point, and a truly great cameo by Max Headroom (yes, it is Matt Frewer in the role), though “Frogger” looks nothing like the Atari version I played as a kid, which is a shame. I also think there was a missed opportunity to reference the abysmal “E.T.” computer game. That piece of shit deserved to get roasted in this film.

 

Although not always funny, this is consistently fun, and easily one of Adam Sandler’s best films. I’d say it’s even better than “The Wedding Singer”, “Bedtime Stories”, “Little Nicky”, and “Blended”, but just below “50 First Dates” and certainly not better than “Funny People” or “Punch-Drunk Love”. I’m a couple of years too young to really appreciate the likes of “Galaga” and “Centipede”, but I still managed to get most of the references here. Some of the references may be a tad anachronistic, but the film is entertaining, well-cast, and the visuals are really interesting too. Essentially “Ghostbusters” for 80s gamer geeks, it might be based on a short film, but the material isn’t stretched thin here. How the fuck did this only get 17% on Rotten Tomatoes?

 

Rating: B-