Free Guy (2021)

[Adam Lenhardt]

Title: Free Guy (2021)

Tagline: Life's too short to be a background character.

Genre: Comedy, Action, Adventure, Science Fiction

Director: Shawn Levy

Cast: Ryan Reynolds, Jodie Comer, Lil Rel Howery, Joe Keery, Taika Waititi, Utkarsh Ambudkar, Owen Burke, Kayla Caulfield, Camille Kostek, Michael Malvesti, Cassidy Neal, Ryan Doyle, David Morwick, David Arthur Sousa, Britne Oldford, Seán McLoughlin, Imane Anys, Lannan Eacott, Matthew Cardarople, Leah Procito, Sophie Levy, Brandon Scales, Michael Tow, Kayla Rae Vesce, Ian Wallace, Rodrigo Santos, Ninja, Alex Trebek, Aaron W Reed, Mark Lainer, Naheem Garcia, Anabel Graetz, Vernon Scott, Mike Devine, Ric Plamenco, Kenneth Israel, Colin Allen, Hugh Jackman, Dwayne Johnson, Tina Fey, John Krasinski, Patrick Vincent Curran, Francisco Marquez, Timothy John Smith, Justin Johnston, Jonathan De Azevedo, Destiny Claymore, Charlotte Levy, Octavia Chavez-Richmond, Bob Gilliam, Terri Schwartz, Mariama Conde, Raj Jawa, Charlie Lehmer, Elainy Mata, Jack McLaglen, Rosario Corso, Minh-Anh Day, Lily Steven, Gabrielle Lorthe, Briana Mitchell, DanTDM, Omar Ghonim, C.G. Alexander, Channing Tatum, Chris Evans

Release: 2021-08-11

Runtime: 115

Plot: A bank teller called Guy realizes he is a background character in an open world video game called Free City that will soon go offline.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

I ended up catching a matinee of this today, and enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would. If The Truman Show was a social satire for the dawn of the reality TV era, Free Guy takes a similar approach to the world of MMORPGs. The movie's conceit provides for plenty of exciting, ridiculous, and over the top action, and all the characters -- human and otherwise -- are well-defined and enjoyable to spend time with.

Jodie Comer, the resident scene stealer on "Killing Eve", is terrific as the female lead. She handles the love interest beats -- both inside and outside the game -- perfectly, and she's also compelling and easy to accept as the action heroine.

Joe Keery, so likable on "Stranger Things", brings a similar puppy dog quality to this movie. Lil Rey Howery is also just really likable as the security guard at the most robbed bank in history.

Taika Waititi, mostly known in the US for his work behind the camera, tears through the scenery with aplomb as the truly awful tech mogul who smirks (and at times literally hacks) his way through our protagonists' happiness.

The science fiction elements are very lightly sprinkled through the movie; this is set in a world that's only roughly a minute into our future. The whole thing moves briskly and goodnaturedly toward its inevitable conclusion.

I both laughed and enjoyed myself far more than I expected to going into it.

 

[Jeffrey D]

Cool concept. Hopefully it will be released on BluRay/UHD.

 

[Colin Jacobson]

Cool concept. Hopefully it will be released on BluRay/UHD.

Why wouldn't it be?

 

[Jeffrey D]

Why wouldn't it be?

Ronald posted a week ago that 20th Century Studios is releasing this on UHD.

 

[Colin Jacobson]

Ronald posted a week ago that 20th Century Studios is releasing this on UHD.

Which then begs the question: why did you post with a comment that implied it might not come out on BD/UHD?

 

[Jeffrey D]

Which then begs the question: why did you post with a comment that implied it might not come out on BD/UHD?

I found Ronald’s post after your comment.
I guess I shouldn’t have been concerned- just about all films that are released in theaters end up on physical media (I hope this doesn’t change).

 

[Mark Booth]

Looking forward to watching Free Guy when it hits streaming on Tuesday.

Mark

 

[spshultz]

Bought this on Prime Video today and absolutely loved it, far more than I thought I would. I hope it did well in the theaters and hope that it does well on physical and streaming. This move will have repeatability with me.

 

[Jake Lipson]

I've been a lot more selective about what I see in theaters during the pandemic than I would be otherwise. Free Guy fell in the category of "It looks fine, but I'll wait until it streams" category. Then, I wasn't interested in paying $19.99 for a 48-hour viewing window when it was a premium title.

Now that the Blu-ray release is available, the rental price has lowered to $5.99, so I did that the other night.

Like other people have said here already, I liked this a lot more than I expected. I thought the worldbuilding was great, and the characters were so much fun. It was a blast. I wanted to buy it as soon as it was over, so I'll be picking up the disc later today.

If anyone else hasn't seen this yet and is on the fence, I would highly recommend seeking it out. It is much better than I thought the trailers implied.

 

[Jeff Cooper]

I loved the

Spoiler

Chris Evans cameo

!

 

[Jake Lipson]

My favorite cameo was

Spoiler

Alex Trebeck. Seeing him back on the Jeopardy stage again now, almost a year after his unfortunate real-world passing, made me surprisingly emotional. Yes, it was just for one clue in a scripted movie, but I'm so glad he was able to film this before he died and that we got that one extra moment of him as the host of Jeopardy as part of this movie in perpetuity. I knew he was in the movie but I wasn't expecting his appearance to make me feel quite so much.

 

[Jeffrey D]

Watched the UHD yesterday. Liked it. I may be off base, but I thought it was sort of a combination of The Matrix and The LEGO Movie.

 

[krisamarin]

Been hearing great things about Free Guy ever since it was released in theatres and finally managed to catch it on Disney+ last night, it was much better than expected. As usual, Ryan Reynolds delivered a stellar performance with the right amount of comedic lines that made the film entertaining throughout.

 

[Tino]

and finally managed to catch it on Disney+ last night,

Huh? It doesn’t hit Disney+ until February 23.

 

[AlexF]

We've had it on D+ here in Canada for a few months now...

 

[Edwin-S]

Free Guy wad put on D+ in Canada while it was still playing in Canadian theatres. Saved spending 10 bucks on it at the theatre. Turned out to be better than I thought it would be considering Hollywood's track record with video game themed films.

 

[Tino]

Is there a charge to see it?

 

[AlexF]

Is there a charge to see it?

Nope. I think it's under the 'Star' banner on there, but not 100% certain on that front.

 

[Brian L]

I haven’t seen it yet, but it is on both regular HBO and Disney+ right now.