The Belko Experiment

"The Belko Experiment" (2016, Greg McLean, Metro Goldwyn-Mayer, The Safran Company, Troll Court Entertainment, Orion Pictures, BH Tilt) is a horror movie along the lines of "Battle Royale".

Mike (John Gallagher Jr.) works at Belko Industries; a non-profit of no explained purpose based in Columbia. He and his colleagues (including girlfriend, Leandra (Adria Arjona) and boss, Barry (Tony Goldwyn)) come in to work to find new, heightened security. This isn't the only strange thing to happen that day... With shifty security, a limited, non-local skeleton staff only being allowed entry and a strange voice over the loudspeaker giving terrifying orders, it looks like things might get violent. And, spoiler alert: they do. Really violent.

An intense, savage romp that remains entertaining, but doesn't cover any new ground. The story is not the most innovative, but the action keeps moving and the characters remain three dimensional. The casting is good; especially Wendell (John C. McGinley) who makes an excellent creep and an equally effective office-politics Goebbels.

While I think the creators intended the film to have some deep meaning about office life, human survival and faceless corporations it kind of gets lost in the gory, gory, gorefest that is most of this film. A slimy, bloody, B-movie massacre, but not as cerebral as I had anticipated.

[Image: Metro Goldwyn-Mayer, et al]

Hani

The Scribbler

"The Scribbler" (2014, John Suits, Caliber Media Company, New Artists Alliance) is a film based on a graphic novel by Daniel Schaffer (who also wrote the film, so I presume it must be close to the resource material, but I can't say for certain, having never read it...)

The pulls for me were Whedon alumni, Eliza Dushku and Michelle Trachtenberg, a small part played by The Big Bang Theory's Kunal Nayyar and the fact that I enjoy other graphic novel inspired film and TV (Sin City, The Walking Dead, Watchmen, V for Vendetta...) unfortunately, this film is more of a "Suckerpunch" than a "Watchmen" grade, a film that I think packed as much punch as watching your friends play "Bayonetta" while you sit bored on the sofa and drink most of a bottle of Jack Daniels (my old Friday night plans), hoping that they'll tire of watching the protagonists' voluptuous booty bouncing about while they stomp their opponents with giant footwear. Alas, they did not.

Done in the, now apparently accepted style of 'Graphic Novel-esque', we have the cartoonish tones and shades, quiet scenes, odd characters and an undercurrent of detective novella going on.

The plot is simple, the characters are weird and combined, I'm sure they read to make an interesting and intriguing tale. Unfortuntately, I just found the weirdness of the characters unncessary and the plot to seem to need more explaining... Also, I maintain that this is not horror.

Suki (Katie Cassidy) has multiple personalities. She has been released from the mental institute to prove herself by living in the 'sheltered housing' style tower block. She gets there to find that it's a rundown shithole where people seem to be committing suicide on a daily basis.

As she undergoes her odd shocktreatment which rids her of her extra personalities, one strong personality begins to manifest itself more and more; The Scribbler. This personality cannot speak, has longer hair than Suki and scribbles notes and drawings all over the place.

Suki becomes concerned that The Scribbler plans to rub her out and become the dominant personality and asks her promiscuous pal, Hogan (Garret Dillahunt), to help her.

Unfortunately, another of the inmates, Alice (Michelle Trachtenberg) is out to get her....

Odd and too long, the action scenes and infrequent humour were not enough pay off for the long and arduous wait through all the quiet, so-sharp-it-might-cut-itself, dialogue.

Good cast, nicely shot but on the whole not a terribly exciting film.

[Image: New Artist Alliance]

Hani