ready player fun

The films we’re desperate to see in a packed auditorium when cinemas reopen.

like most of us in these self-isolation times, Ryan Reynolds – locked down in Pound Ridge, New York – has been craving the communal, convivial atmosphere of watching a huge movie on a huge screen with a huge crowd. He’s been looking at footage on Twitter of fans watching key scenes in Avengers: Endgame, hyped together, cheering and whooping with elation through mic-drop dramatic moments. You’ve probably also watched it with an ache for popcorn in hand, enveloped by darkness, the charge of collective expectation in the air. “Maybe I’m emotional because of everything that’s going on in the world, but I was sobbing this morning watching that. That is some of the most beautiful, big-budget action filmmaking that I’ve ever seen. That’s one thing I’m really looking forward to, and that I really miss – being in a movie theatre and watching a movie that way. It’s a unique experience.”

Reynolds will be missing out on seeing his latest creation consumed that way this summer. , a big-budget, big-scale, big-star comedy actioner following an NPC in an open world game (Reynolds) who decides to change and become a hero within the matrix, was intended as a blockbuster romp for July audiences, but then coronavirus changed life for everyone. It’s now set for a Christmas release, hopefully post-Covid-19, and Reynolds is aware that the world will be re-shaped in every way by then. “I shudder to think that I