Great Modern Day Thriller Movies: “The Game”

Written by John D. Brancat/Michael Ferris, directed by David Fincher The Game does a tremendous job of presenting the story of a rigid control freak trapped in circumstances that are increasingly beyond his control.

What happens when you are a powerful multi-millionaire and have everything you ever wanted? While you and I might feel this as desirable, for Nicholas Van Orton, played by Michael Douglas, it is quite boring to the extent of being miserable. He is a rich, divorced, and dreadful investment banker whose 48th birthday reminds him of his father’s suicide at the same age. However, Nicholas’ brother Conrad Van Orton, played by Sean Penn, bought a gift for Nicholas on his 48th birthday, an invitation to play “The Game”. From this point onward the rather slow beginning of the movie helps us to more fully understand how boring and awful Nicholas’ life is, and further provides an excellent contrast with what happens later in the movie.

Nicholas is in a very upscale restaurant when a waitress (Deborah Unger as Christine) spills wine on his shirt. Christine is fired by the restaurant manager and leaves, very upset. Before you can grasp the moment, a waiter rushes by Nicholas’ table and drops off a note that tells Nicholas’ to follow the girl. Thus starts the roller coaster ride.

Within moments Nicholas finds himself involved with an apparently dying man, then just as quickly he finds he is being chased by the police, and police dogs, and things just get worse and worse. The list of things to which Nicholas is subjected is too long and would leave you with no surprises.

Nicholas tries to figure out how to make all the action and events to which he is being subjected stop. Nicholas can’t handle the loss of control. Further, the chaos of his experiences seems to follow no pattern or order. Eventually Nicholas gets back to where he thinks it all began for a showdown with the characters that he has discovered are all merely actors. The ending of the story will almost surely have you stunned and amazed.

There are several lapses in credibility, but unless you are an obsessive control freak (sort of like Nicholas Van Orton, for instance) you’ll likely consider the lapses minor. This movie ultimately is an intelligent thriller that relies on action only when necessary to heighten Nicholas’ fears and to pull him deeper into what begins to seem like a deeply nefarious conspiracy. The most difficult part of this movie is the relatively slow first part. However, some patience at this stage will pay dividends later – what you learn in the first part helps you to understand Nicholas and to be drawn more fully into the series of chaotic situations depicted in the later part. Nothing can be taken at face value in a world turned upside down. Sympathy with Nicholas and his situation is indispensable to fully appreciate the end of the movie. This is indeed an intelligent thriller that relies on intelligent plot versus guns, fast cars and special effects. Douglas is great at conveying the sheer panic of his protagonist’s dilemma, and The Game remains a thinking person’s thriller that grabs and holds your attention.