Thank You For Playing

A documentary film by David Osit and Malika Zouhali-Worrall.

When one-year-old Joel is diagnosed with terminal cancer, his father Ryan begins working on an unusual and poetic video game to honor Joel's life. Following Ryan's family through the creation of the game and the day-to-day realities of Joel’s treatment, Thank You For Playing is a thought-provoking testimony to the empathetic power of art, examining how we process grief through technology in the twenty-first century, and the implications of documenting profound human experiences in a new artistic medium: the video game.

news/press

Today.com, The Daily Mail and Time Magazine cover the premiere of Thank You For Playing at the Tribeca Film Festival.

Nonfics/FilmSchoolRejects names Thank You For Playing one of its Top 8 Films at the Tribeca Film Festival with a 4-star review: "Instantly effective... takes the experience of Ryan, Amy and their family and artistically expands it out to a universal audience. The beauty of its experience comes, therefore, not from the bluntest of melancholies but rather through a much more layered meditation on art."

"Memo To Distributors: Buy These 10 Tribeca Film Festival Movies" by Eric Kohn at Indiewire. "Powerful... a fascinating take on technological innovation and a stirring look at its ability to address personal experiences. It's a remarkable window into universal challenges through a distinctly 21st century filter."

National Post review of Thank You For Playing at Hot Docs Film Festival: "An elegant, heart-wrenching documentary statement that games are art."

Indiewire's Anthony Kaufmann calls Thank You For Playing one of his 10 Top Docs at Tribeca: "David Osit and Malika Zouhali-Worrall's remarkable film accomplishes the impossible: It avoids easy sentimentality."

VICE Motherboard: "Thank You For Playing captures an artist’s compulsion to create a meaningful aesthetic work constructed out of the joy and ruin of his own life."

ReelNewsDaily's 22 Best Films at Tribeca: "...truly important and thoughtfully crafted."

ScreenComment reviews Thank You For Playing: "As a document of the video gaming industry achieving new artistic and intellectual heights of innovation, Thank You For Playing is vitally important. As an exploration of the human spirit, it is indispensable."

Flixist reviews Thank You For Playing at the Tribeca Film Festival as an Editor's Choice film: "a chronicle of a family's sadness along the lines of Kurt Kuenne's Dear Zachary."

The Upcoming gives Thank You For Playing a 4-star review: "...an intelligent, brave and authentic meditation on grief and the artistic process."