GAME OF DEATH
Directed by: Sebastien Landry, Laurence Morais-Lagace
Starring: Sam Earle, Victoria Diamond, Emelia Hellman, Catherine Saindon, Erniel Baez,
Eight disaffected millennials are hanging out at one of their homes , getting high and having sex. When one of them discovers an old electronic board game called Game of Death and they decide to give it a spin. However once they start the game, they must finish it, and each of them is facing a horrific death unless they manage to kill 24 people in their stead…
Game of Death certainly has some good ideas and visual flair but there seems to be a missing piece to the puzzle.
The film opens like it’s a knock-off of Larry Clarke's films, with these bored, disaffected youths simply hanging out with seemingly no cares in the world - just drink, smoke and have sex. These guys have a frat-house level of living, using "bitch" as a term of affection, drawing a dick on the face of the kid who falls asleep etc.
While one of the couples are engaged in sex, the girl spots this old game on a shelf (sat atop an old SNES) - next thing we know, the gang are preparing to play. The crux of the game is that 24 people must die, and if the players refuse then the game will start killing them instead. At the start of the game, the machine simultaneously takes a blood sample and injects nanobots into their blood stream.
We soon learn the consequences of not playing as one of the boys' head suddenly explodes, leading the rest to panic, assuming they are under attack. However they soon figure out that the game is real and head out.
There is very little else to the story itself. If does consider the moral implications of having to kill in order to save more lives. I have long been fascinated with the concept of people doing evil things for the Greater Good, and there is an element of that here. These kids only hope for survival is to kill 24 people, but what would that make them in turn?
In an effort to redress the balance with the plot, the directors pull out all of the stops to present an as visually engaging film as possible. The special fx work for the exploding heads is really good, using a mix of practical prosthetics and CGI. Each time one of the gang dies, we are shown cellphone footage of them from earlier in the day, juxtaposing just how messed up and crazy things have gotten over a short period. The film also mixes in footage from violent video games. However it is unclear what the point is - are the gang now living out a violent video game or are we supposed to be so desensitized to violence as a result of these games?
The young cast does pretty well, especially Sam Earl as Tom and Victoria Diamond as Beth. Beth does a good job of appearing completely world-weary while Tom has a cold-hearted streak to his persona. The fact that he carries a gun says a lot about the guy. Whilst in the car, the pair are filmed in super-widescreen to give their scenes more of an epic, Bonnie and Clyde feel compared to the rest. Of all the gang, these two embrace the fate they've been dealt and decide to actively carry out the slaughter to save themselves. There is a point where the film introduces Marilyn, a Forest Ranger. We meet her as she's feeding her dog Winston and she soon encounters the gang after they have made the conscious decision to actively kill people to stay alive. She's given a lengthy intro to try and get the audience to emotionally invest in her fate, but I'm not sure how successful that actually is. I think the idea was to go for a Frances McDormand Fargo kind of character but she feels completely out of step with the rest of the film.
The actual prop of the Game of Death is very good in of itself. It is exactly the kind of electronic toy you would have seen a couple of decades ago with its small Tamagotchi-style screen. However this is part of the issue. The film makes no attempt to provide any backstory or context for the game, how it came to be in the house. Who made it? It looks mass-produced, so are there others? What is its true purpose? It is really frustrating that these questions aren't even asked, let alone answered. The characters have zero curiosity about it.
THE VERDICT
Game of Death comes across like an interesting mix of Jumanji and Battle Royale. There is a lot going for this film from a visual stand-point - the different aspect ratios, the in-camera effects, mixing in video game references - but little between the ears. The physical presence of the game itself, although well designed, is incredibly frustrating in that no one is the least bit curious as to why and how it exists, especially when it starts killing people!