Jump to content

Nerve (2016 film)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 190.24.30.130 (talk) at 18:32, 18 November 2016 (→‎Critical response). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Nerve
Theatrical release poster
Screenplay byJessica Sharzer
Produced byAllison Shearmur
Starring
CinematographyMichael Simmonds
Edited by
  • Madeleine Gavin
  • Jeff McEvoy
Music byRob Simonsen
Production
companies
  • Allison Shearmur Productions
  • Keep Your Head Productions
  • Supermarche
Distributed byLionsgate
Release dates
  • July 12, 2016 (2016-07-12) (SVA Theater)
  • July 27, 2016 (2016-07-27) (United States)
Running time
96 minutes[1][2]
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$20 million[3]
Box office$81 million[4]

Nerve is a 2016 American thriller film directed by Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman and written by Jessica Sharzer, based on the 2012 novel of the same name by Jeanne Ryan. The film stars Emma Roberts, Dave Franco and Juliette Lewis, and revolves around an online objective truth or dare video game, which allows people to enlist as "players" or "watchers" as the game intensifies.

The film premiered at the SVA Theater on July 12, 2016,[5] and was theatrically released on July 27, 2016, by Lionsgate. It received mixed reviews and has grossed over $80 million.[4]

Plot

High school senior Venus "Vee" Delmonico (Emma Roberts) receives an email from California Institute of the Arts reminding her to either accept or reject admission that day. Vee longs to leave her home, Staten Island, for college, but she is afraid to tell her mother about her admission. Her mother (Juliette Lewis) expects Vee to attend a local affordable college and commute home every night, as the mother is still grieving from the recent death of her son, Vee's brother.

Vee's friend, Sydney (Emily Meade), becomes popular in Nerve: an online reality game where people either enlist online as "players" or pay to watch as "watchers". Players accept dares from watchers, receiving money rewards that increase with the danger of the dare when completed successfully. At Vee's disinterest, Sydney and her other friends chastise Vee's unadventurous nature. When Vee refuses to talk to her crush J.P., Sydney approaches J.P. herself and reveals that Vee is interested in him. J.P. rebuffs her, and Vee leaves, mortified.

Furious, Vee signs up for Nerve as a player. The game collects her personal data, including bank information, and explains three rules of the game: all dares must be recorded on the player's phone, earned money will be revoked if a player fails or "bails" a dare, and a player must not report the game to law enforcement. In addition, the top two most-watched players will compete in a highly sought-after final round. Her first dare is to kiss a stranger at a diner for five seconds. Vee kisses Ian (Dave Franco) because she noticed him reading To the Lighthouse, her favorite book. Ian reveals that he too is a Nerve player. The watchers dare Ian to take Vee to the city, as they think they make a good couple. Vee leaves with him while her friend Tommy (Miles Heizer) secretly follows.

After performing a series of dares, such as stealing an expensive dress from a shop, and driving Ian's motorcycle while blindfolded, Vee's friends become aware of her presence on Nerve. Sydney becomes jealous as Vee gains popularity on Nerve and eventually gets more watchers than her. Sydney then receives a dare to walk across a ladder suspended between two buildings. Whilst performing the dare, she drops her phone and due to her becoming scared, bails out of the dare and so loses the game.

Vee arrives at Sydney's party and catches her in bed with J.P. After arguing with Sydney, Vee later discovers that Ian received a dare to make Sydney and Vee argue. Furious that Ian is more interested in Nerve, she ends their partnership. Vee then receives a dare to complete Sydney's dare. Vee then accepts the dare and then walks across the building successfully. After realising how dangerous Nerve is, Vee decides to end it by reporting it to the police, but they don't do anything. As a result, all earned money is drained from Vee's bank account. She is then later taken hostage by Nerve player, Ty (Machine Gun Kelly) in order to keep her in the game.

Vee awakens and finds Ian, who reveals she is now a part of the third category of the game, "prisoners". Ian states that he is a prisoner of the game as he reported the game to the police after one of his friends were killed in a dare. As a result, Ian has lost his identity, and is now a prisoner of the game. Vee is now a prisoner of the game and is forced to perform any dares she receives.

Meanwhile, Sydney is trying to find Vee, having regretted arguing with her. She finds Tommy, and discovers that Vee was taken hostage by Ty. She gets help from some of Tommy's friends, who are specialised hackers. They then try to find Vee by attempting to encrypt Nerve's code.

Vee is given a revolver, and discovers that she is in the finals for Nerve; the two players have to shoot the other player to win. To protect her, Ian completes a dare to make him second in the most-watched players. In the finals, which takes place in an abandoned site full of Nerve watchers, Ian asks for Vee to shoot him so she can win, but Vee doesn't want to shoot him. Ian doesn't want to shoot Vee, to which Ty appears and takes Ian's place.

Vee criticises the watchers, who are wearing ski masks to conceal their identity, and she tells them to reveal themselves and show "nerve" at who they are. The watchers then cast a vote regarding if Ty should shoot Vee. The majority vote for Ty to shoot her and so Vee is shot in the stomach by Ty.

Tommy and his friends then modify Nerve's source code, forcing it through so that it changes the watcher's usernames to their real names, them all receiving a message saying "You are an accessory to murder" which results in the watchers logging out of Nerve and effectively ending Nerve.

Furious at Vee's apparent death, Ian brandishes the gun at Ty, but Vee stops him revealing that the gun contained blanks. She reveals that Ty is also a prisoner of the game who joined with Vee to stop Nerve once and for all. Vee is then reunited with Sydney and they make up after their argument.

A few months later, Vee and Ian are a couple. Ian reveals his real name to be Sam and that he is happy to have his identity back.

Cast

Production

Directors Ariel Schulman and Henry Joost had previously dealt with similar themes in their documentary Catfish.[6] On their attraction to a film based around the Internet, they stated, "Most things aren’t black and white. The Internet is neither good nor bad; it just depends on how you use it",[7] giving the example that the Nerve game could be both "a really empowering game, and it’s also the most awful thing that you can possibly imagine".[7] The directors strived for a PG-13 rating, with Schulman stating "we wanted to make sure that younger teenagers could see it. We think it has an important message and they’ll dig it", with Joost adding "We weren’t interested in making a gross torture movie".[7] In trying to keep the rating down, the directors axed a "sex dare" that "was ultimately just too dark and weird".[7]

The team stated that the fast-changing nature of the Internet made it a tough subject to make a narrative feature about, with Joost noting that the app Periscope came out during the film development, which Joost called " like half-way to being Nerve".[6]

In January 2015, it was announced that Emma Roberts and Dave Franco were set to star in the film.[8] In April 2015, it was announced that Kimiko Glenn had joined the cast of the film, portraying the role of Emma Roberts' character's worried friend.[9] The same day, it was announced that rapper Colson "Machine Gun Kelly" Baker had also joined the cast.[10]

Filming

Principal photography on the film began in 2015, in New York City.[11][12] Production on the film concluded on June 5, 2015.[13][14]

Release

The film premiered at the School of Visual Arts in New York City on July 12, where the cast attended.[5] It was also screened on July 21 at Comic-Con.[15] The film was originally scheduled for September 16, 2016, but was eventually theatrically released on July 27, 2016.[16]

Reception

Box office

Nerve grossed $38.6 million in North America and $41.8 million in other territories for a worldwide total of $80.4 million.[4]

Nerve was released in the United States and Canada on Wednesday, July 27, 2016, and was projected to gross around $10 million in its opening weekend and $15 million over its first five days from 2,538 theaters.[17] The film grossed $1 million from its Tuesday night preview screenings.[18] The film finished 8th at the box office in its opening weekend, grossing $9.4 million (a five-day total of $15.5 million).[19]

Critical response

Emma Roberts' lead performance was praised.

Nerve received mixed reviews from critics. On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 64%, based on 117 reviews with an average rating of 5.7/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Nerve's fast pace and charming leads help overcome a number of fundamental flaws, adding up to a teen-friendly thriller with enough energy to occasionally offset its muddled execution."[20] On Metacritic, the film has a score of 58 out of 100 based on 33 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[21] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A−" on an A+ to F scale.[22]

Scott Tobias of Uproxx gave the film a positive review, writing: "Though the ending surrenders to a tsk-tsk-ing morality play that turns on the mob the game (and the film) has so smartly orchestrated, Nerve is the rare virtual thriller that understands how social media actually works and the addictive little subcultures that can spin out of it."[23] Dave Palmer of The Reel Deal gave the film 7/10, saying, "It is a lot of fun, and not even in a turn-your-brain off kind of way. The film actually has some smart things to say about teenagers, their phones and what people will do to get internet famous and it is all delivered in a colorful little package."[24]

See also

References

  1. ^ "Nerve (15)". British Board of Film Classification. July 18, 2016. Retrieved July 19, 2016.
  2. ^ "Nerve". Lionsgate. Retrieved June 12, 2016.
  3. ^ "Box Office: Dave Franco, Emma Roberts Thriller 'Nerve' Scores $1.1 Million on Tuesday Night". Variety. July 27, 2016. Retrieved July 27, 2016.
  4. ^ a b c "Nerve (2016)". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved November 10, 2016.
  5. ^ a b "'Nerve' premieres in New York City (NYC) - Photos - UPI.com". UPI. July 13, 2016. Retrieved July 16, 2016.
  6. ^ a b Puchko, Kristy. "Nerve Directors On Technology Advancements & Future Projects". Screenrant. Retrieved July 13, 2016.
  7. ^ a b c d Bell, Crystal. "NERVE DIRECTORS REVEAL THE VOYEURISTIC DARE THAT WAS TOO 'GROSS' FOR PG-13". MTV. Retrieved July 13, 2016.
  8. ^ Kroll, Justin (January 27, 2015). "Dave Franco and Emma Roberts to Star in YA Thriller 'Nerve'". Variety.com. Retrieved January 10, 2016.
  9. ^ Pederson, Erik (April 17, 2015). "'Married's Kimiko Glenn Joins 'Nerve'; Kino Lorber Acquires 'Gueros'". Deadline.com. Retrieved January 10, 2016.
  10. ^ Halperin, Shirley (April 17, 2015). "Machine Gun Kelly Joins Emma Roberts, Dave Franco In 'Nerve'". TheHollywoodReporter.com. Retrieved January 10, 2016.
  11. ^ "Emma Roberts and Dave Franco begin filming 'Nerve' in NYC on April 13". onlocationvacations.com. March 31, 2015. Retrieved April 27, 2015.
  12. ^ "Emma Roberts and Dave Franco spotted filming 'Nerve' in NYC". onlocationvacations.com. April 18, 2015. Retrieved April 27, 2015.
  13. ^ Joost, Henry (June 5, 2015). "Last day shooting #NerveNYC 😢 #davefranco #denim #triplets 📷 by @orleeroses". Instagram.com. Retrieved January 10, 2016.
  14. ^ "On the Set for 6/15/15: Martin Scorsese Starts Shooting "Free Fire", Matthew McConaughey Finishes "Free State of Jones" & More". SSNInsider.com. June 15, 2015. Retrieved January 10, 2016.
  15. ^ "Emma Roberts-Dave Franco Thriller 'Nerve' To Sneak At Comic-Con". Deadline.com. July 19, 2016. Retrieved July 18, 2016.
  16. ^ Busch, Anita (May 10, 2016). "Lionsgate Moves YA Title 'Nerve' Into Summer, Schedules 'The Woods'". Deadline.com. Retrieved May 10, 2016.
  17. ^ "'Jason Bourne' Should Lead Box Office, But Not Ladies Looking For 'Bad Moms' & 'Nerve' – B.O. Preview". Deadline.com.
  18. ^ "'Nerve' Box Office Starts With $1M In Tuesday Previews". Deadline.com.
  19. ^ Brad Brevet (July 31, 2016). "'Jason Bourne' Tops Weekend with $60M; 'Star Trek Beyond' Suffers Big Second Weekend Drop". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved July 31, 2016.
  20. ^ "Nerve (2016)". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved September 11, 2016.
  21. ^ "Nerve reviews". Metacritic. Retrieved August 26, 2016.
  22. ^ "CinemaScore". cinemascore.com.
  23. ^ "'Nerve' Finds The Creators Of 'Catfish' Crafting A Social Media-Savvy Cyberthriller". Uproxx. July 26, 2016. Retrieved July 26, 2016.
  24. ^ "'Nerve' Colorful, Manic Summer Fun". TheReelDeal.com.

External links

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Nerve_(2016_film)&oldid=750265321"