Rating: 3.5/5 stars

“Tetris,” like the game, is a really fun movie. The story tells of not just the development behind the game, but of every party involved. The likes of Japan’s Nintendo and Bulletproof Software, fought the British Maxwell corporation over the Soviets’ mystifying game. 

Set during the end of the Cold War, Taron Egerton plays Henk Rogers, a larger-than-life business man in the video game industry trying to make it big. After a not-so-great run at the Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas, Henk spots his co-host playing his competitor’s game. Coming over to see what was the big deal, he starts playing the game and is immediately hooked. Tetris, as they called it, would be a hit if he got his hands on it. As if by fate, this moment would spark the capitalist battle for the communist game.

The thriller genre gives the movie some leeway in its depiction of the story. If you are looking for an exciting, accurate retelling of the history of the perfect game, you are in the wrong place. If you are willing to ignore the changes and watch a feel-good movie with a decisive good and bad guy, then this is for you. The plot is rather par for the course when it comes to this genre. The movie opens up to a zoom into the monitor of a Macintosh SE, which was not important to the story and was likely there because Apple backed this film.

Fairly shallow subplots demonstrate the level of corruption in the Soviet Union. The pixel art usage feels unfaithful. In one scene, an IBM-compatible port of Tetris is shown running on a Nintendo Famicom, which felt lazy. It was clear that the movie focused on dramatisting the interactions between gaming conglomerates rather than attention to detail. There are even times where characters feel a little too cartoonish. Once again, as a thriller, this is expected, but as a fan of the game I could not help but feel a little disappointed. 

That being said, this movie is based on a real-life story. It is an incredibly fascinating tale of one of the few times media from the iron-shut U.S.S.R. made it out of the country. Like many other adaptations, the movie takes many creative liberties. Some of the decisions made on the script are a little jarring. In particular, the order of events are swapped around to make a more compelling story. The real-life story comes from the excellent documentary, “The Story of Tetris,” by Norman Caruso who goes by Gaming Historian on YouTube. 

The Tetris movie makes comical adjustments to the story. I think all computer science majors can get a laugh out of this: Rogers magically creates the GameBoy version of Tetris in a matter of seconds upon first sight of the handheld. He simply asks if the demo copy of Super Mario Land presented to him was programmed in C and then proceeds to reprogram his copy of Tetris from the Famicom to the GameBoy. This is truly every programmer’s dream moment. 

Another significant deviation is the introduction of Sasha, a fictitious character that serves as KGB agent spying on Rogers. Sasha would ultimately serve as the redeeming protagonist that puts an end to her also-fictitious mafia-like boss, who is trying to steal money from the Tetris deal so he can selfishly thrive after the fall of the U.S.S.R.

“Tetris” deserves a watch. While it will not catch on like the game, I think many will find its humor pleasing enough to come out happy. 

Image from Apple TV via YouTube