Pixels mishandles nostalgia whilst harnessing the memorability of a dusty arcade machine. As a video gamer myself, my childhood was in the midst of this iconic cultural movement. Pac-Man, Space Invaders, Galaga, Donkey Kong and of course Tetris. So for a film to use these legendary titles, well, the nostalgia should've instantly won me over. But wait! What's this? Happy Madison Productions is involved? The same writer as 'Grown Ups 2'? Urgh. And this is why we can't have nice things in life. An extraterrestrial race misinterpret video games as a declaration of war (oh, a time capsule of a championship was sent out to space for no apparent reason), to which they mimic the characters within the games and send them down to destroy Earth.
A planet hosting an array of powerful nations with the capacity to decimate cities with the click of a button. But you see, the army just can't get to grips with the pattern of Centipede or Arkanoid. They Just aren't trained enough in arcade gaming! So naturally the army recruit a former Pac-Man champion, his video-gaming nemesis, a random conspiracy theorist and the President of the frickin' United States. I do not want to be in a world where Kevin James is the President and Adam Sandler stops an alien invasion. Nope! Anyway, as you would expect from the onslaught of recent films that Sandler's studio pump out every year, it's bad. Not even an entertaining "turn your brain off" kinda way. It's just flat out terrible.
Herlihy's writing was incomprehensibly painful to say the least. No character personalities, no bite to the plot and certainly no humour. The story exists to play on the nostalgia of its audience, without actually going anywhere with it. Colombus' direction is bland and predictable right down to the inner code. The cast were just playing themselves, and Sandler happened to drag fine actors into this mess. Monaghan, Shaw, Cox and Bean, come on you fine actors! Just say no next time. Q*Bert has way too much screen time and is, for some unknown reason, physically communicating in English. At one point, a certain character engages in intercourse with their video game crush. And, wait for it, produces five baby Q*Berts. Five of them! Nope. I'm done. Why the hell is Iwatani involved? Why does Max Headroom look worse?
Aside from the semi-decent pixelated visual effects and Serena Williams being the queen that she is, Pixels is one glitchy affair that is essentially unplayable.
