Taron Egerton Attends ‘Tetris’ Premeire at SXSW Film Festival 2023 Review

Taron Egerton stepped out for the premiere of his new Apple TV+ movie in the US as MarkMeets film critics were in the accredited press area to meet the cast.

The 33-year-old Golden Globe winner hit the red carpet at the world premiere of Tetris held during the 2023 SXSW Film Festival on Wednesday (March 15) at The Paramount Theatre in Austin, Texas.

Joining Taron at the premiere was his co-star Ayane Nagabuchi and the movie’s director Jon S. Baird.

Here’s the movie’s synopsis from Apple: “Based on the true story of American video game salesman Henk Rogers (Egerton) and his discovery of Tetris in 1988. When he sets out to bring the game to the world, he enters a dangerous web of lies and corruption behind the Iron Curtain.”

Taron recently stepped out to honor one of his late co-stars.

Tetris Review: Taron Egerton Fights Soviet Union for Video Game Rights

In theory, “Tetris” — that primitive and highly addictive block-stacking strategy game — doesn’t lend itself to the big-screen treatment any more than Rubik’s Cube or Tic-Tac-Toe might. But Noah Pink has found an ingenious solution to a classic puzzle. The screenwriter realized that there’s more to Tetris than most people knew. Namely, there’s a terrific backstory about how this Soviet-hatched computer software made its way over the Iron Curtain, and telling it could play like a Cold War thriller as three teams of Western rivals race one another to Russia to secure the rights.

Henk offers the actor a natty combination platter that suits his charms: one part biopic, one part spy-ish thriller, all of it hinging on his cowboy-style charm. Henk is a nice dude, kind of a hustler, a big dreamer, and when he buys the rights to Tetris, he hopes it will help build the life he wants for his family (including his wife and partner Akemi, played by Japanese star Ayane). Too bad about all those other guys, who also own the rights to Tetris.

Time for the history: Tetris was created by a Soviet government employee named Alexey Pajitnov (played in the film by Russian star Nikita Efremov, who looks distractingly like “Point Break” remake star Luke Bracey). It was such a lo-fi hit with his countrymen — this thing got shared on floppy disks — that when Andromeda Software head Robert Stein (Toby Jones, doing a lot with a little) came sniffing around, Russia let him license it. And then he licensed it to eventually disgraced media moguls Robert Maxwell (Roger Allam) and his striving son Kevin (Anthony Boyle). And then Henk thought he had the license.

It doesn’t really matter. All these ins and outs will be covered throughout “Tetris,” particularly during an exceedingly long middle stretch that mostly takes place in some of the most depressing Soviet-era conference rooms you’ve ever seen. All you need to know: Henk, desperate to lock the rights to Tetris (especially the hand-held ones, once he gets a lead on Nintendo’s plans for its game-changing Game Boy), heads to Russia to bargain with the people in charge directly.

It goes about as well as could be reasonably expected. The KGB gets involved. There are endless scenes of English being translated to Russian and back again. Every phone is tapped. Gorbachev shows up! Somewhere there’s a kicky portmanteau that describes the film as a combo of “Super Mario Bros.” and “Argo” — “Super M-Argo Bros.”? — at the climax, our heroes run through an airport to escape Moscow on an international flight that’s taking just a smidge too long to take off. It’s a nail-biting moment that does feel an awful like Ben Affleck’s thriller, likely by design.

It’s simultaneously too much and too little (let’s not even get into the sub-subplot about Henk missing his daughter Maya’s school recital, a trope so overused it almost doubles back on itself), but it is a wacky bit of history that is entertaining in fits and starts. No, not all the pieces fit together, and it certainly doesn’t speed up as the game winds on (something it might have done well to emulate from the game itself), but it’s got players worth rooting for and a story that keeps leveling up. It won’t stick in your brain like the game (who doesn’t still see those little blocks floating ever-downward?), but what else possibly could?

Tapping into late-1980s nostalgia — including the launch of the handheld Game Boy console — the movie doubles as a nifty history lesson, reminding audiences of just how tense things were between the Soviet Union and the rest of the world. At one point, Robert Maxwell appeals directly to his friend Mikhail Gorbachev, while Henk tries to pull the corporate equivalent, ambushing Nintendo president Hiroshi Yamauchi. Who knew that little old Tetris was ever such a big deal?

Tetris premieres on Apple TV+ on Friday, March 31.