Christopher Foliono’s film ‘Gamers’ just ‘Cocktailed’ me. I’ve probably told this story before but my dad tells the same childhood stories over and over again, each time like it’s the first time he’s ever told it, and if it’s good enough for him it’s good enough for me. Years ago I saw Tom Cruise’s terminable ‘Cocktail’, which I believe is only notable because Elizabeth Shue shows her boobs in that flick if I remember correctly. Though I remember the movie absolutely sucking ass, the very last scene in the movie due to an earlier setup made the audience laugh and thus we were laughing as we were exiting the theater thoroughly tricking people in the lobby into thinking we had just seen a good movie. Now ‘Gamers’ didn’t suck ass and was hit and miss funny, but the final scene after the credits, which Foliono tricks you into watching by running some outtake type stuff during the entire credit sequence was so funny that if ‘Gamers’ were able to snag a theatrical release, folks in the lobby would have sworn that the audience was exiting the second coming of ‘Blazing Saddles’. Seriously, it was a really funny scene.

‘Gamers’ is a mockumentary type film which unabashedly is taking a stab at those octahedral dice rolling clowns who like to get down playing Dungeons and Dragons or whatever Role Playing Game is geek chic right now. Paul (Scott Rinker), Gordon (Kevin Kirkpatrick), Fernando (Joe Nieves) and Dungeon Master Kevin (Kevin Sherwood) have been playing the RPG ‘Demons, Nymphs and Dragons’ for over fifty hours a week for the past twenty three years and are actually on the verge of breaking the record for the most time ever playing an RPG. A record that I’m pretty sure some World of Warcraft player will shatter in the next fifteen years or so. The fourth member of the squad is Reese (Dave Hanson) who has only been playing with the crew for only five years and serves as the teams personal whipping boy.

Through the eyes of the unseen narrator, we follow around our heroes the night before the big game of DND and get deeper into their lives and what has led them to this completely worthless goal. The underlying theme for the majority of our heroes is that

they live with their parents and have dead end jobs, though the only set of parents we actually get to meet are Gordon’s swinging parents played with comic glee by John Heard and Beverly D’Angelo. Gordon is also presented as the lightning rod of the group who has come to the stark realization that after twenty three years he and his friends have essentially wasted their lives, and naturally this revelation comes in the form of a pretty girl played by Meredith Zealy who stood up Gordon on prom night some years ago, or so he was led to believe. Regardless, the time for the fabulous record breaking event has come but secrets, conflicts, confrontations and an evil parrot all conspire to put a halt to truly a landmark accomplishment of absolutely no earthly value.

As I said earlier ‘Gamers’ is a film of stitched together sight gags that is largely hit and miss, and I would surmise that the majority of the gags were more miss than hit and often left you with that uncomfortable feeling of not laughing when you know you should be laughing. However despite what I have perceived as the imbalance between the pass / fail rate of the gags, the ones that did end up hitting their mark were so funny, at least to me, that I have to recommend the movie on that alone.

‘Gamers’ also benefits by having a very solid cast of actors, especially the four lead gamers who play their roles so well that I was fairly convinced that they weren’t acting as they gave me this overwhelming urge to beat them up every time they showed up the screen. Also most recommended are the song stylings of Kevin Sherwood which almost all alone make this worth the price of admission… or rental… or however you plan to watch the movie if you plan to watch the movie. Along with John Heard and Beverly D’Angelo dusting off their well honed comic chops, ‘Gamers’ also benefits from a couple cameos from a pair of 80’s legends in the Woman in Red herself Kelly LeBrock – though I’m sure she’s far more memorable to the geeks among us for‘Weird Science’, and ‘The Greatest American Hero’ in the flesh in William Katt who makes the most of his two minutes of screen time as Reece’s Madden addicted boss.

Admittedly I’ve never actually played an RPG, even though I do enjoy a good game every now and then, but if I’m not throwing touchdowns or have to wait more than three minutes before I get to punch somebody in the face I tend to lose interest pretty quickly. ‘Gamers’ pretty much captures the heart of those cats that like to get down playing these types games in a very witty and clever way. True, a lot of the jokes miss their mark, but enough hit it in such a glorious and comical way that I felt my time spent with ‘Gamers’ was time well spent indeed.