Tetris (2023)

Director: Jon S. Baird

Starring: Taron Egerton, Mara Huf, Miles Barrow

The story of how one of the world’s most popular video games found its way to players around the globe. Businessman Henk Rogers and Tetris inventor Alexey Pajitnov join forces in the USSR, risking it all to bring Tetris to the masses.

‘Tetris’ could easily have been a very boring movie – especially to those unfamiliar with the game – but thanks to director Jon S. Baird’s wonderful vision and exciting narration, this film is very entertaining.

‘Tetris’ happens to be my favourite game, so needless to say I was interested in seeing how it all started. I never realized the behind the scenes story was so involving, and also life threatening. This film is a detailed telling of how the game started, and how it became the phenomenon it is, and the race against time for companies to license the rights to the game. This was sensational!

Taron Egerton is fantastic in the role of Henk Rogers from Bullet-Proof Software – the only good guy in the race for the rights. He was prepared to risk everything for the sake of a game, and he went to Russia during a turbulent time in the country’s history. He met Tetris inventor Alexey Pajitnov (Nikita Efremov) and together they tried everything in their power to introduce the game to the rest of the world – regardless of the implications and threats.

The film gave me a sense of ‘Argo’ – especially during the film’s nail-biting finale. ‘Tetris’ is a beautiful, uniquely made film with stellar performances, a great script, and an awesome soundtrack. There’s just something about hearing Europe’s ‘The Final Countdown’ in a film that gives you goose flesh all over!

‘Tetris’ is a fascinating film that should appeal even to those not into computer games. I loved it, loved it, loved it!! This was stunning! And guess what, immediately after the movie, I played the game on my console!

Would I watch it again? Yes!