Geri's Game: The Simple Story

Geri’s Game brings its audience through a microcosm of the hero's journey. In a little less than five minutes, we meet a character, get to know that character, empathize with him in his losses, and then celebrate with him in his victory. It is an emotionally satisfying experience. All of this, and we are only watching one man play chess alone in the park.

Geri is of course the hero of this story, but as soon as things get under way, we are introduced to this other Geri, the Nega-Geri who has the same goal as Geri but is kind of jerk about it. This is our villain. Pixar eased us into the power struggle between these two by having us watch the transition Geri makes after each move. The first time is almost too slow, he first removes his glasses, then we watch the him feebly cross to the other side of the table, and make his move as Nega-Geri. We then watch again as he shuffles back. It’s slow, but it’s important. They are making sure we understand the reality of the situation, because they are about to completely make us question the whole thing. The cuts speed up as Geri switches from side to side. In these transitions we see the emergence of the two different characters. Geri and Nega-Geri. Eventually, these cuts will cross between the two as seamlessly as if we were watching two people interact. We lose track of the time it takes geri to make his switch and are now enveloped in the illusion he has created for himself.

They have done some important things to separate our two Geri’s; a difference of appearance, personality and setting help the viewer separate the two and pick a side, without really thinking about it. Because in five minutes, you don’t have time to think about it. The story needs to flow so seamlessly that the audience is presented with the right information at the right time. If information is out of place, it could either be missed or cause the story to call attention to itself. A lot of good information will sneak under your nose the first time you watch it, that doesn’t mean your experience of the story wasn’t affected by it, instead you were just unaware of how the filmmaker was manipulating you. Geri takes his glasses off and leaves them on the table the first time he goes to switch sides. He makes his move as Nega-Geri and then returns to his first seat and put his glasses back on before making his move. As the transitions get faster, we see less and less of the action until we are left with a cut between a man with glasses and a man without. The glasses are an important character trait. The humble and submissive Geri hunches over the board as he makes his moves while Nega-Geri is decisive and ruthless. The glasses weaken our hero. And that weakness is confirmed as Nega-Geri cuts down all of Geri’s figures, nigh to the point of defeat. With his lack of glasses Nega-Geri is also sitting against a background of red trees. Not only for the sake of separating the two visually, but it adds to his aggressive and bold character. His actions are faster, he is smug and confident, he sits upright against the red background across from his slouched opponent. These two men could not be more different. And once that is clear, it is seemingly too late. All Geri has left on the board is his king. A very unlikely scenario for someone playing chess against themselves. But Nega-Geri apparently plays chess much more often than his counterpart.

So what we have is the Hero, who has crossed the threshold into this world where he is playing chess against a rude version of himself. He has lost all of the trials along the way and is now brought to the climax, the narrow ridge between victory and defeat. Because there is only one character in this story, there are no allies to help him, no mentor, no deus ex machina. Geri defeats Nega-Geri by switching the board on him in a moment of distraction. And because of Nega-Geri’s early onset alzheimer's, he wouldn’t know the difference, I guess. But that being done, Geri defeats Nega-Geri in one fell swoop and claims his prize: his dentures.

What is a very simple story of a man playing chess against himself in park is really beautiful miniature of the hero's journey broken down into its simplest form and executed in a unique way. Because we got to know both Geri and Nega-Geri as characters we wanted a certain outcome as an audience; even though we know that it is just one guy. That is the power of character, when a character has a goal, the audience adopts that goal until they are suddenly strung into the the journey for victory. The resolution to the story gave the audience what they wanted, but not how they expected it. The ending was further validated by having an actual reward for Geri once he had won. Giving us the closer of knowing that there was some kind of motivation. Once it's over Geri sits alone in the park victorious, and the audience snaps out of the illusion and is left to reflect on what they just witnessed.