Come Play

This article is about the film. For the Stray Kids, Young Miko and Tom Morello song, see Come Play (song).

Come Play is a 2020 American supernatural horror thriller film written and directed by Jacob Chase, based on his own short film titled Larry. The film stars Gillian Jacobs, John Gallagher Jr., Azhy Robertson, and Winslow Fegley. A gruesome monster named "Larry" manifests itself through smart phones and mobile devices while trying to take Oliver, a lonely boy desperate for a friend.

Come Play
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Jacob Chase
Screenplay by	Jacob Chase
Based on	Larry by Jacob Chase
Produced by	Andrew Rona Alex Heineman
Starring	Gillian Jacobs John Gallagher Jr. Azhy Robertson Winslow Fegley
Cinematography	Maxime Alexandre
Edited by	Gregory Plotkin
Music by	Roque Baños
Production companies	Amblin Partners The Picture Company Reliance Entertainment
Distributed by	Focus Features
Release date	October 30, 2020 (2020-10-30) (United States)
Running time	96 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$9 million[1]
Box office	$13.2 million[2][3]

Come Play was released in the United States on October 30, 2020, by Focus Features. The film received mixed reviews from critics and grossed $13 million against a budget of $9 million.

Plot

Oliver is a young non-verbal autistic boy, who uses a tablet computer and phone to communicate. He is taken care of by his mother, Sarah, while his father Marty spends most of his time at work trying to make ends meet. Sarah and Marty's marriage has become difficult to the extent that Marty moves out.

One night, Oliver notices an app on his tablet, "Misunderstood Monsters," narrating the story of a lonely monster named Larry who "just wants a friend." While reading the story, lights flicker by themselves. At school, Oliver is bullied by his classmates due to his condition, luring him into a field and discarding his tablet.

Sarah organizes a sleepover so that Oliver can become more social, inviting the three boys who bullied him. One of the boys retrieves the tablet and reads Larry’s story. Suddenly, lights go out, and Larry appears, visible only through the tablet's camera app. Larry then attacks Byron, and all three terrified boys blame Oliver for the incident. In the following days, Sarah begins to see the same strange things Oliver did. Through the tablet, Larry expresses his wish to take Oliver away to be his friend.

That night, Marty takes Oliver to his night-shift parking lot attendant job. Larry, revealed as a skeletal creature similar to a ghoul, begins to stalk them. When Marty witnesses Larry picking Oliver off from the ground, he finally believes Sarah's claims of a monstrous creature seeking a friend. Deducing that the monster is from a realm accessible through screens which can turn into a doorway once the story is finished, they break the tablet to prevent Larry from entering the real world and taking Oliver.

Byron is traumatized from the incident at Oliver's house but comes clean on what really happened, absolving Oliver of blame. Byron and Oliver were once good friends, but their friendship ended badly, which also ended their mothers' friendship. They both reconcile at school, with Oliver and Byron becoming friends again.

At work during the night, Larry’s story pops up in Marty’s phone. After scrolling through, Larry invisibly appears and attacks Marty by traveling through electricity. Marty barely escapes but is injured in the process.

Back home, Larry continues to traumatize Sarah and Oliver by forcing them to finish his story. When they refuse, Larry finishes the story itself and emerges, taking physical form in search of Oliver. To prevent Larry from abducting Oliver, Sarah takes him to an empty field where there is no electricity for it to reach them. It is revealed that Oliver’s tablet the boys threw away earlier is in the field, allowing Larry to travel through and encounter Sarah and Oliver.

Oliver, captured by Larry, prepares to take the monster’s hand to enter his realm and become his friend. At the last second, Sarah takes Larry's hand instead, sacrificing herself for her son. In their final moments, Oliver looks Sarah in the eye for the first time, something Sarah has struggled with ever since Oliver was diagnosed. Larry takes Sarah and disappears, leaving Oliver alone.

A short while later, Oliver lives with Marty, and they start to deal with Oliver's autism as Marty gets more involved with Oliver's therapy. One night, the lights go out again and strange noises are heard downstairs. Marty grabs his tablet and sees Oliver and Sarah’s ghost playing happily. Sarah tells her son "I will protect you", as Marty smiles.

Cast

• Azhy Robertson as Oliver, an autistic boy
• Gillian Jacobs as Sarah, Oliver's mother
• John Gallagher Jr. as Marty, Oliver's father
• Winslow Fegley as Byron, Oliver's former friend, who later becomes his friend again
• Rachel Wilson as Jennifer, Byron's mother
• Jayden Marine as Mateo, one of Oliver's new friends
• Gavin MacIver-Wright as Zach, one of Oliver's new friends
• Eboni Booth as Dr. Robyn, a speech therapist
• Dalmar Abuzeid as Mr. Calarco, a teacher

Production

It was announced in February 2018 that Jacob Chase would write and direct a film adaptation of his short film Larry.^[4] In September 2018, Gillian Jacobs and Azhy Robertson were cast in the film,^[5] and in November 2018, John Gallagher Jr. was added as well.^[6]

Release

Come Play was theatrically released in the United States on October 30, 2020.^[7] It was previously scheduled to be released on July 24, 2020, but the release was rescheduled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.^[8] The studio spent "in the high single digit million range" promoting the film.^[9]

Home media

Come Play was released on DVD and Blu-ray on January 26, 2021, by Universal Pictures Home Entertainment.^[10][11]

Reception

Box office

Come Play grossed $10.5 million in the United States and Canada, and $2.7 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $13.2 million.^[2][3]

The film grossed $1 million from 2,183 theaters on its first day, including $150,000 from Thursday night previews. It went on to debut to $3.2 million, over the October 30–November 1 Halloween weekend, coming in slightly above projections and topping the box office.^[9][1] The film fell 45% to $1.7 million in its second weekend, finishing second, after fellow Focus Features release Let Him Go,^[12] and then made $1.1 million in its third weekend.^[13]

Critical response

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 56% of 120 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 5.9/10. The website's consensus reads: "A frightening feature debut from Jacob Chase, Come Play makes up for its uneven tone by adding real depth to its jarring scares."^[14] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 58 out of 100, based on 21 critics, indicating "mixed or average" reviews.^[15] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B−" on an A+ to F scale, while PostTrak reported 60% of audience members gave the film a positive score, with 40% saying they would definitely recommend it.^[9]

David Ehrlich, writing for IndieWire, gave the film a "C−" grade, writing, "merely serviceable, [the film] leaves you with the feeling that a much better game was lost in the shuffle."^[16] The A.V. Club's A. A. Dowd gave it a "B" and called it "an Amblin entertainment in the purest, classic sense."^[17] In Variety's review, Courtney Howard stated, "The title stands as a beckoning call to audiences to join in the devilish delights he's conjured. Yet the scares in the tale fail to scale from a mobile device to the big screen."^[18]