The marketing efforts for Steven Spielberg’s Ready Player One have been considerably muted compared to the scale and scope of the film. Among the major pieces of promotion involved so far include a Hall H presence in San Diego Comic Con that led to the debut of the film’s teaser, followed by the unveiling of another trailer and a poster that was heavily criticized for an off-proportionate leg. One hopes with the movie’s release just over a month from now, Warner Bros. will kick-off full-fledged promotion for the movie soon. Earlier today, Warner Bros. released a brand new poster for the movie which might as well be a step in that direction.
The poster is heavily influenced by the all-encompassing 80s one-sheets that released back in the day, including posters for Spielberg’s own movie Back To The Future. It shows all the major players of the movie as well as the avatars of the five leads – Parzieval, Art3mis, Aech, Daito and Shoto along with looks as Ben Mendelsohn’s Nolan Sorrento, the chief of Innovative Online Industries hellbent on taking over the OASIS, Mark Rylance’s James Halliday, the creator of the OASIS and his partner Simon Pegg as Ogden Morrow who retires from the business following Halliday’s obsession with the virtual world. There’s also the classic DeLorean featured on the poster flanked by the main players. The font and style itself resemble the classic old poster vibes. On any ordinary day, such a poster would attract the ire of critics but the fact that it deliberately references the decades gone by makes it an instant classic.
Ready Player One chronicles the journey of Wade Watts into the OASIS, a virtual world created by James Halliday which acts as a safe haven and escape for people from the real world which is in ruins from an energy crisis. After Halliday passes away, he leaves behind his fortune for anyone who can find the elaborate easter egg planted by him in the OASIS. The key to finding it of course, lies in studying and understanding everything its creator was interested in, who incidentally grew up in the 80s. This kicks off an intense fascination with 80s pop-culture that is reinvigorated in everyone’s desire to be the first to locate the egg. The plot gathers steam when Wade Watts deciphers the location of the first of the three keys to unlocking the egg. The movie sees Spielberg return to the blockbuster genre after being the one to have given birth to it with movies such as Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, E. T.: The Extra Terrestrial, Indiana Jones and Jurassic Park.
Ready Player One stars Tye Sheridan, Olivia Cook, Ben Mendelsohn, Simon Pegg and Mark Rylance among others and hits theaters March 29.
