Dan

Synopsis:
Two prisoners per floor, wondering how much they'll get to eat that day. One inmate has had enough of not getting enough. It's time to send a message.



I saw this at Fantastic Fest back in September. If you like your allegories shoved in your face like delicious desserts, this one's for you.

(I thought it was excellent)

Brian T

Clearly we pick similar movies at these festivals! Saw this at TIFF Midnight and likewise thought it was phenomenal. Everywhere I hoped they might go with their allegories and social commentary, they went, and then some! I guess Netflix was the inevitable destination, as it's becoming for most movies like this. In fairness, that means more eyeballs than it would ever get in a theatrical release, and more minds being exposed to foreign cinema in general, which is great. Still, would've been cool to get a DVD with some special features.

I think this would actually make for a fantastic double bill with PARASITE, which also screened at TIFF last year. While people couldn't snap up tickets for that one fast enough (even the multiple added screenings), this one tackles many identical themes in an equally compelling manner, albeit more as a sci-fi allegory. And that ending . . . whoa!

The woman's line in the trailer sums it up nicely: “If everyone ate only what they needed, the food would reach the lowest level” — and then you realize just how many levels there really are.

As usual, here's my crappily filmed Q&A (translator gets a better mic about a minute into it):

Dan

If I recall correctly, there was at least one film that played at TIFF that Netflix picked up afterwards, but before Fantastic Fest. I'm pretty sure this one was it. And yeah, given the similarities in themes to PARASITE, I'm not surprised they held off on release until that film's hype has started to settle. I think that one will overshadow this one in the long run, but I agree that it's equally as compelling (and equally as entertaining, and equally as well-made, just) different ways
.
Fantastic Fest takes place at a single Alamo Drafthouse location in Austin aside from a handful of off-site events. One of the weird (but overall good) things FF does is they'll simulcast the film on more than one of the screens. This also means the Q&A is a bit weird because on the people at the main screen get to participate, but the live feed is displayed on the other ones. It's a strange experience, but better than missing out on the Q&A entirely because you're in the 'wrong' cinema. However, 5-10 minutes before this film ended, the servers came through the aisles and placed a dessert dish in front of every single person, so when the lights came up, we'd all have a special treat. Since you saw the film, you know what that dessert was. I enjoyed it.

I seem to remember that the Fantastic Fest Q&A for this one was a bit rough. I'm not sure if it got recorded. I wanted to write a bit more about one of the questions that came up, but I think I'll wait until I re-watch the film first. It's one of those things that gets asked a lot about these kind of contained films, but is ultimately irrelevant. I think the director had a good answer, but I can see how others would be unsatisfied with it.

Dan

Netflix should just release this today.

dex14

This is now up.

IBJoel

Thanks for the head's up, dex. I've been wanting to check this out. Although it also seems pretty disturbing and I've been noticing my tolerance for uncomfortable movies disappearing...

Dan

I'd say there's only a couple moments that are outright disturbing, visually speaking.
The entire scenario, and what it represents, is far more disturbing, on a psychological level, if you let yourself think about it too much.

It's a damn good flick. Looking forward to watching it again this weekend.

IBJoel

Yeah, I just saw it. I think Netflix's version was dubbed? It was distracting, but I was also busy with other stuff, so I didn't pay too close attention. I wasn't a huge fan, as it felt that its satire was perverse without really taking a stance. Do the makers believe that this is human nature? Is it a critique of free market economics in general or specifically trickle-down economics (or even command economics, although one character seems to imply that this is not the case)? Is the film a stealth Christian Socialist piece? Or is the message as simple as "sharing is caring?" I can appreciate any one of those ideas, but the repetitiveness within the 90min runtime doesn't allow a fleshing out (no pun intended) of any answers to the problems presented and the makers are given no mouthpiece in the film. The ending:



RichC2

It's dubbed by default on Netflix, the Spanish version is also available on there.

dex14

This was great, obviously.

Dan

Only if you have your language settings with English as default. If you change it to Original, then this shouldn't happen... theoretically.


I re-watched it last night with my wife. She was more disturbed by it than I expected. I also forgot just how gory some bits were (sorry folks).

The movie has a bit of a different feel in this stay-at-home part of 2020, but still makes its point all the same.

Maybe something was lost in the dub, but the film very much takes a stance, and hits you over the head with it about a hundred times

Your other questions are worth some thought, but I'm not sure I can answer them in a meaningful or eloquent way just yet. Re: the ending:

Why So Blu?

A friend said this was like a combination of Cube and The Circle. Cube is great, but I have never seen The Circle and the reviews are terrible for it.

RichC2

The Circle as in the Tom Hanks movie or Circle as in the low budget sci-fi movie?

Why So Blu?

The Tom Hanks one. Granted, Circle can fit that scenario, too, but I don't think that one got much negative press.

dex14

I don't see the Tom Hanks "The Circle" comparison at all. They had to have been referring to Circle, which, from the reading the description, is very much in line with themes in this film.

eXcentris

It's more like a vertical "Snowpiercer", with the twist that people change "level" at the end of each month. I just watched it, it's excellent.

The ending:

eXcentris

The director discuses the ending and his own interpretation of it.

https://www.digitalspy.com/movies/a3...ined-director/

Why So Blu?

I watched it yesterday and it was fantastic!

d2cheer

That is actually sort of what I thought about the ending...but can see it interpreted different ways as

This was pretty good in a bat-shit crazy sort of way. Noting I would need to revisit.

Abob Teff

Wow ... that was excellent. It felt very Edgar Allen Poe-ish ... and very apropos for today.

As I am counting down the days before embarking on a journey that will have me teaching in under resourced schools, this really hit hard with me at this time. I am doing pre-course reading on many of the theories about “helping” in impoverished areas and this film really does a good job illustrating the pitfalls.

Brian T

Good reading there. In all my years of TIFF-going, During the Q&A at TIFF I was soooo tempted to ask the director what he felt would’ve happened to

but as always I stifled myself (a bad habit at these things), but reading in that interview that he actually shot scenes showing what happened really has me jonesing for a DVD or Blu with that as a supplement. I still prefer the movie exactly as it is, and that aspect of it works better left to your own imagination, but seeing the director’s own take on it would be pretty cool. Sounds like this is performing well for Netflix, so I wonder if the producers retained some options for a disc release outside of the streamer, perhaps after a certain amount of time. Hell, I’d import a Spanish disc if I had to!

dex14

Sequel in the works: