Shawn Levy, Joe Keery, and Jodie Comer on Free Guy, video games, and Mariah Carey

Free Guy may be a video game movie, but it’s not just a movie for people who play video games. As director Shawn Levy tells GamesRadar+, it’s bigger than that. 

“I confess I was a casual gamer at best before I made Free Guy,” Levy says. “In fact, in my first conversation with Ryan, I was like, I don’t know that I’m the guy, because I’m not hardcore, as far as gaming. And Ryan was like, ‘Well, neither am I. That’s why it’s perfect. Let’s just get it right, but make a movie that’s bigger than a video game.’ And I think one of the keys of directing is admitting what you don’t know. So I spent months consulting with and talking with game designers, coders, video game publishers, really learning about the details of that industry and of that culture.”