Successful San Francisco tycoon and control freak Nicholas Van Orton (Michael Douglas) approaches his forty-eighth birthday with some trepidation. For it was at this age that his father fell from his mansion roof and died. Nicholas receives an introduction to Consumer Recreation Services from his younger brother, Conrad (Sean Penn), and is informed that he is now playing 'The Game'. Nicholas soon finds himself losing control and threatened with the loss of not just his company and fortune but also his life. It's not quite as clever as it tries to be, but The Game does a tremendous job of presenting the story of a rigid control freak trapped in circumstances that are increasingly beyond his control. plays a rich, divorced, and dreadful investment banker whose 48th birthday reminds him of his father's suicide at the same age. He's locked in the cage of his own misery until his rebellious younger brother () presents him with a birthday invitation to play "The Game" (described as "an experiential Book of the Month Club")--a mysterious offering from a company called Consumer Recreation Services. Before he knows the game has even begun, Douglas is caught up in a series of unexplained events designed to strip him of his tenuous security and cast him into a maelstrom of chaos. How do you play a game that hasn't any rules? That's what Douglas has to figure out, and he can't always rely on his intelligence to form logic out of what's happening to him. Seemingly cast as the fall guy in a conspiracy thriller, he encounters a waitress (Deborah Unger) who may or may not be trustworthy, and nothing can be taken at face value in a world turned upside down. Douglas is great at conveying the sheer panic of his character's dilemma, and despite some lapses in credibility and an anticlimactic ending, The Game remains a thinking person's thriller that grabs and holds your attention. -- Jeff Shannon Synopsis For the follow-up to his dark crime thriller Seven, director David Fincher decided to remain in a film noir vein. The result is The Game, a fast-paced cinematic roller-coaster ride that stars Michael Douglas as Nicholas Van Orton, a joyless San Francisco investment banker who receives an unusual birthday present from his estranged younger brother, Conrad (Sean Penn). The gift enrolls Nicholas in CRS (Consumer Recreation Services), a company that designs elaborate real-life games for each specific participant. As the game begins, the reluctant Nicholas becomes the victim of a series of pranks that quickly turn malicious and dangerous. Stripped of his finances and convinced that he can trust no one, Nicholas realises that this game may be an attempt to steal his fortune and leave him for dead. In a desperate bid to regain his life, Nicholas infiltrates CRS in order to uncover the secrets of the mysterious organisation. Douglas is perfect playing the uptight businessman Nicholas, cleverly riffing on his Oscar-winning performance as the cold-blooded Gordon Gekko in Wall Street. Fincher's Kafkaesque carnival show is an exercise in taut filmmaking that mischievously pulls a seemingly endless supply of rugs out from under both Nicholas and, even more impressive, the viewer.