Taron Egerton Is a Game Designer Caught in a Cold War Battle in ‘Tetris’ Trailer
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In the first trailer for Tetris, Taron Egerton stars as Henk Rogers, a man caught in the cold war battle behind the iconic video game.
Opening to Doghouse’s “The Final Countdown,” the three-minute teaser offers a first full look at the actor as the video game designer and entrepreneur whose own failed efforts lead him to discover a title that will change gaming forever.
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“I played for five minutes,” Egerton says as he pitches buying rights to the game in Japan. “I still see falling blocks in my dreams. It’s poetry — art and math all working in magical synchronicity. It’s the perfect game.”
The trailer for the Jon S. Baird-directed and Noah Pink-written film quickly previews the major players in this biographical drama based on a true story, including Toby Jones, Roger Allam, Anthony Boyle, Nikita Yefremov and Rick Yune.
The story follows Egerton’s Rogers, who — after seemingly buying the rights to Tetris, a game created by Alexey Pajitnov in the Soviet Union — attempts to make a deal with Nintendo to get Tetris onto their brand new hand-held gaming system, the Game Boy.
But as corrupt communist leadership catches on to the poor financial deal Pajitnov made with Toby Jones’ swindling Robert Stein and wants in on the potential financial windfall, a simple bid to bring the world’s most popular game to the masses becomes a fight of cold war proportions. It’s a battle further complicated by fraudster and Mirror Group publisher Robert Maxwell, whose own dealings with Stein include rights to the game in America and other major nations.
“Mr. Rogers, have you ever negotiated with the soviets?” Jones’ asks.
“The world is changing and Soviet Union will not be left behind,” one communist leader promises at another point in the trailer.
Tetris is set to premiere at SXSW 2023 and will release globally on Apple TV+ on March 31.
