Nerve

With great internet power comes great irresponsibility. This is the premise behind "Nerve", a film whose producers must have wet themselves with excitement that the Pokemon Go craze aligned so nicely with the release of their film. I was delighted that at last this summer there is a film with a modicum of originality I can enthuse about.

'Vee', short for Venus (Emma Roberts, niece of Julia Roberts) is an NYC teen living in the shadow of a family tragedy and the claustrophobic presence of her over-protective mother (Juliette Lewis, "Cape Fear"). Always timidly in the shadow of her best friend – the extrovert Sydney (Emily Meade) – Vee pooh-poohs Sydney's compulsion with the new viral internet game 'Nerve': a social media 'Truth or Dare' ("but without the truth") challenge game where you can either be a "Player" or a "Watcher". In real time, Watchers set Players with challenges they have to complete for ever-escalating financial rewards… but "Bail" or "Fail" and you lose all. And "snitches get stitches".

With their friendship at breaking point, Vee is provoked into playing the game by Sydney and teams with fellow gamer Ian (Dave Franco, younger brother of James Franco) – someone with a history that could bring Vee into great danger. However, Vee's geeky wannabe boyfriend Tommy (Miles Heizer) is on the case….

What is so impressive about this film is that the screenplay by Jessica Sharzer (based on a novel by Jeanne Ryan) is genuinely original and is delivered with style and good humor. Sure, you can draw parallels for any film with many other sources: in here there are traces of Hunger Games/Allegiance; the "Simon Says" portion of Die Hard 3; perhaps a soupçon of "Gladiator" and Schwartznegger's "Running Man" in the mix. But this is a novel approach to a teen flick, bang on the topical money in bringing in the frenetically viral nature of social media and aspects of the 'dark web', cyber security and open source programming.

The film manages to generate significant credibility about the impact that a game like this would have among a teen audience. And there is a telling message in the finale: that it is easy to be a troll without responsibility hiding behind an internet ident, but when the masks come off and the message back becomes personal then your responsibilities as an individual human can come home to roost.

The film is delivered with style and verve as well, with innovative graphics (a great title and end title design) and an 'augmented reality' overlay of the action showing Players and Watchers across the city. Many of the challenges are executed really well, with a few seat-clenchingly tense moments, particularly if you have a poor head for heights.

But with all this potential it unfortunately fails to be a 10* classic, smelling at times of 'B' movie. Which is a great shame. Emma Roberts is fine at what she does, but at times I longed for the dramatic depth of a Shailene Woodley or Chloe Grace Moretz, with the scenes with the under-used but excellent Juliette Lewis rather highlighting this differential.

The otherwise excellent script is – for me – let down by a scene of male-on-female violence which I found both distasteful and unnecessary. And a coding 'geeks shall inherit the earth' moment towards the end is a little too glib for my liking.

But overall the directors Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman ("Paranormal Activity 3" and "4") have done a fine job with a $20M budget.

Regular readers of my blog (bob-the-movie-man.com) may recall my use of the "BvS quotient" – the number of films that could be made from the budget of "Batman vs Superman": this one has a BvS quotient of 8% meaning you could make over 12 of these instead of the superhero dud. Yes please! Although if they had doubled the budget and rounded off some of the sharp corners, this could have been a true classic. It's still recommended for a memorable movie experience though, and probably makes it into my draft movies of the year list so far.

(For the graphical version of this review and to comment, please visit bob-the-movie-man.com. Thanks).

I'm the guy who can appreciate Ben Affleck's Daredevil as mindless entertainment...so with that being said I'm not too hard to impress. I liked this movie's concept...it's fun and engaging. The actors did a good job with it for what it was. It's not an Oscar worthy movie by any means, but if you're bored and you're looking for something to mindlessly entertain you for a few hours this will do the trick. A little far fetched at times with regards to the antagonist(s)...but it's a good source of mindless entertainment. I've read people say it tries to actually get into serious themes...if that's the case I missed the memo cause I didn't really see any serious themes other than the availability of information over the internet...

I'd sort of go the other way with this and say it doesn't really take itself too seriously...which I think is a good thing. I do feel like the ending was a little meh and a little bit of a letdown...but I can't think of a better way to end it off the top of my head so I really shouldn't complain. This was an OK movie with a really good premise for nerds like me.

This was a movie that I thought had a very cool premise, but at the same time, its trailer appeared to leave no surprises to be discovered.

The Good This film's premise is definitely a fun one, and at the least, this movie was almost constantly entertaining. The dares that these people are forced to do as well as the reasons for why people are playing this game are things I found very fun and interesting.

Emma Roberts and Dave Franco both give solid performances in this film, and they each work well off of each other. Roberts as Vee accurately depicts a high school senior struggling with social problems as well as college, even if Roberts herself looks like she graduated from high school six years ago. Franco's character was also an intriguing one, and he grew on me the more the film progressed.

I enjoyed nearly every moment when a legitimate dare was being done, as they were handled very well and created tension excellently. The style of this movie is also a reason as to why this film feels original, as the sleek visuals create some very cool scenes.

The Bad Nerve can be very fun when it wants to be, but the problem is that it also takes itself way too seriously in many scenes. This movie tries to get serious towards the end and become dramatic and have important themes, but it all comes across as incredibly dull and tedious.

Speaking of the ending, no matter how serious the movie thinks it is, it is absolutely stupid. The whole plan doesn't make much sense at all, and there are way too many unanswerable questions to just let go how convoluted it is.

While I did like Roberts and Franco, I had a massive problem with Emily Meade.

Whether it is the design of her character or the performance, Meade is completely unlikable and lacks any sense at all, and that would be okay if we are supposed to be against her. Instead, the movie expects us to feel sorry for her, which I found impossible to do.

My biggest fear coming in was that the trailer gave away too much of the main plot.

I wouldn't say the trailer gave away too much, I would say the trailer gave away everything. Every single scene, besides two, in particular, I saw coming a mile away because of one individual trailer, and I think it completely ruined my film going experience. Nearly every dare, every important conflict, and even the plot twist can be found within this movie's official trailer, and I highly recommend avoiding that trailer like the plague if you have any interest in seeing this movie.

Conclusion Nerve has good performances from its two leads and a unique visual style, and it certainly has its fair share of entertainment. However, though it might not be fair, the trailer absolutely ruined my experience by giving away the vast majority of the plot. Even besides that, there are issues in the film's storytelling, and whenever the movie tries to be taken seriously, it falls flat on its face. Nerve has its moments but falls apart towards its conclusion.

4.5/10

'Nerve' is one of those films that quietly went under the radar at the cinema, but seem to catch on via word of mouth.

Truth is it's a decent film, inspired by a YA book. It also acts as a vehicle for up and coming talents such as Emma Roberts and Dave Franco, who both give good performances.

Roberts in particular shines in every scene, and it is her character of Vee who goes through the biggest journey throughout.

The plot doesn't hold up to much scrutiny, but it is an action packed film, that proves entertaining.

If you can stomach the fact that it's really just people doing lots of irresponsible things then you'll enjoy the film. Parents thinking of letting their teens watch it should be wary though.

Good idea that failed in execution. If you saw the trailer and read the reviews you might think that there's some depth hiding in the actual movie, but unfortunately, you'll be wrong to think so. The actors are the only bright spot. You'll see some well known and rising star faces who's acting was on point. The movie tries to win you with likable characters, scenes that show familiar problems to most internet users (e.g.Skype call glitching) and with a cute little morale story at the end but fails as it provides no depth to be discovered. Some scenes are super cringe worthy and left me feeling uncomfortable about my movie picking skills.

It's just one of those films you watch and forget about in a day, doesn't leave you questioning some character's decisions or the way it ended which left both me and my girlfriend disappointed. Overall 5/10.