This film is a member of three genres: Neo film noir, virtual reality, and video game. As Neo film noir, this film is rather very good as it steamy and focuses on the darker side of humanity. It debates the moral issue of killing a man deliberately and weather it it is morally to kill a wife beating abusive man in order to protect the child or mother. It explores insanity too and obsession.
As a virtually reality and video game thriller genre, this better then over half of them sense it is not over the head obvious that is what is really going on here. Believe me, I have seen a lot of them virtual reality films: like all three of "The Matrix" movies, "Tron", "Virtousity" "Spy Kids 3: Game Over", "Cloak & Dagger", "Brainstorm", "Altered States", "The Cell", "The Truman Show", "Dreamscape", "Jumanji: Welcome to The Jungle" and several more, and including all the virtual reality episodes of "Star Trek:The Next Generation". In those movies, is oblivious you are in a virtual reality world and not in the real world and rather hitting you over the head childishly in most of them. But in this film, the virtual world is realistic with very few shots in the first act to suggest that something is not what it seems: like the beginning shot of the eyes with a zoom into the iris of one of them to reveal a boat on the ocean, of the man running into the ocean while dressed in a suit, or the scenes of a kid sitting at a computer or the constant promps to "Catch That Fish" over the radio. You have to figure it out before it gets revealed to you in end of the second act. That is what makes it better than half of those films. And since most of the films are aimed at children or family fare, it is refreshing to see this squiarely aimed at adults. Yes, this is an adult move.
As for acting, Anne Hathaway doesn't give a particularly strong performance as McConaughey and Hounsou do. In fact, I was surprised and entertained to see Hounsou again. It is Clarke who plays The a dive wife beating husband who is naturally rich is the one who comes off rather cartoonish and steriotyped.
The direction and story telling is crisp and clear and moody which is a plus since vagueness and murkiness are usually annoying and clumsy if handled by a director and editor who doesn't know how to handle them that well.
