After the Dark doesn't work because nothing matters

Besides playing the Netflix game, I wanted to watch After the Dark because I remember watching the trailer when it came out, and it seemed like the kind of movie I would like. But about 20 minutes into the movie, I realized that I would not like it as much as I expected. There are a few reasons for that. Spoilers ahead...

1. Every significant thing happens in the thought experiment, not in real life, and there no real stakes for the characters. 

The exciting parts of the movie are in the thought experiment—how the group survives and the consequences of their choices. But in real life, these students are all just sitting around a classroom. Mr. Zimit, the teacher, threatens a couple of them with lower grades, but that’s it. Other movies have pulled off an alternate space that affects reality. Characters who die The Matrix die in real life. Things go wrong in Inception's shared dreams, and it affects the characters' goals in real life. But it’s difficult to care about what happens to the characters in After the Dark when their classroom discussions have no real consequences.

2. New iterations of the thought experiment don’t propel the story.

We find out more about each character in each iteration, but we still don’t know what the point of the experiment is in the first place. Is this the class’s final exam? Is Mr. Zimit trying to prove something? Is it about character reveals? We don’t know. At the end of the movie, we find out Mr. Zimit wants to be with Petra and was trying to show her that James isn’t the right guy for her. It's the kind of reveal that could work well, but it doesn't here. The writers withheld important information until the end, so we don’t see where the thought experiment is going all along, and that makes it difficult for us to care.

How could new iterations propel a story? Take Groundhog Day for example. We know upfront that Bill Murray’s character wants to stop repeating Groundhog Day. He wants a way out. First, he tries killing himself, but the day resets after each attempt. Next, he tries perfecting the day, and when he finally does, the loop breaks. We know what he wants the whole time—find a way to stop repeating the day—so we can empathize with his situation as the movie progresses.

3. We don’t know who to sympathize with. 

After the Dark has a large cast—20 students plus Mr. Zimit. Down to 10 people in the bunker. And we learn about each character in bits and pieces. All those people and all that information makes it difficult to know who we should be rooting for. It seems like our choices narrow to James, Petra, and Mr. Zimit. Of these three, James is the most likable. He is friendly and honest. He looks out for his classmates. He tries to act in a morally good way. Petra, on the other hand, seems cold, even as she emerges as the leader of the students. We see brief scenes of her and James together and where he is loving and sweet, she is distant and unresponsive. We don’t know if she’s holding back her feelings for James or if she’s lying to him about their relationship. We don’t know what she wants, so we can’t hope that she gets what she wants. And then there is Mr. Zimit who is cast as a villain for most of the movie. He kills the poet, acts impulsively, and withholds information that would help the group survive. We don't know what he's up to, but then at the end of the movie, it seems like we're supposed to feel bad for him.

After the Dark starts with an interesting concept but non-existing stakes, unclear character motivations, and too many characters make it difficult to enjoy the film. You can sit back and watch it purely for the philosophical stuff, but if you think about the story, it feels muddled.

A half-year in movies

Halfway through 2015, and these are the movies I have watched so far:

I'm not going to write about each one, because that would be a long and potentially rambly post. Instead, here are some highlights and surprises.

I knew I would like The Imitation Game, but I am always a little concerned that biopics will be a collection of scenes and lack an actual story. Totally not an issue here.

After I finished Odd Thomas, I immediately wanted to watch it again. I love when a movie has that effect.

I watched The Double after I heard that Jesse Eisenberg was cast as Lex Luthor in Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice. No doubt that he is a good actor, but I couldn't really picture him as a villain until I watched The Double. Still, I'm not sure about him being Lex.

Parallels isn't even a movie but Netflix has it in the movie section, and I didn't know better—it's a pilot for a TV series that never got picked up. Good ideas and then such a let down. 

Everything about Big Hero 6 is stuff that I would like in a movie, but I didn't like it. The animation is stunning and the characters are good. It's a superhero story. From a technical aspect, it's a well-made movie. But something didn't connect for me.

I had zero expectations for Mad Max: Fury Road because I stayed away from reviews, reaction posts, and even trailers. That paid off—Mad Max blew me away. I love when a movie has that effect.

What have you been watching lately? Let me know over on Twitter.

Matt Murdock's ordinary acts

A while ago, I wrote a few tweets tagged #OrdinaryActs, and the idea was that these are little things superheroes do to blend in, to make it seem like they have ordinary lives. For example...

We know a hot cup of coffee wouldn't affect Clark, and we know Peter has excellent hand-eye coordination, but these are everyday moments where they could play up being ordinary.

And then I watched the Daredevil Netflix series and saw that Matt Murdock does these kinds of things too. Even though he has heightened senses and is not in total darkness, he pretends at complete blindness when he is around people in his everyday life.

Small things, like reaching out to touch a door frame or missing someone's hand for a handshake. Relying on his cane as he walks down the sidewalk, but we know he can toss it and run, full-speed, if he wants to.

I love seeing details like that, where Matt acts that way on purpose as part of his disguise.

It's a reversal: He stops pretending when he puts on the mask.

I like the five-star rating system just fine, thank you

Netflix developed a virtual assistant, Max, to make recommendations for the content that you watch. So far, it has been tested on PS3. VentureBeat's article doesn't mention any plans for Max to be part of browser-based Netflix, and I hope it stays that way.

For starters, I don't want a trying-too-hard artificial personality hovering around. Take a look at this video that explains how Max works. It's annoying and unnecessary. Genre-specific recommendations and choosing movies based on the leading actors are already parts of Netflix. Besides pre-recorded quips, the only new thing that Max offers is a randomly-selected title. Netflix can do that with a Random button.

Besides all of that, I'm having bad flashbacks of Clippy.

Except Max is worse, because he makes you play mini games before you choose something to watch.

I like the five-star system that Netflix has—simple, easy to use, and its predictions work really well for me. I like that the rating system is always there, but I can easily ignore it too. It seems like Max is an optional feature, but I wish Netflix would put its efforts toward something more useful, like separate user profiles on one account.


Image is remixed with graphics by Mike Licht (flickr) and Nemo (pixabay).

The Netflix Game

One of my favorite games is The Netflix Game. I haven't talked to anyone about this, so it might be my invention or maybe loads of other people do it too. (Let me know in the comments if you do.)

This is how you play. You choose one element you want in a movie. For example, specific genre, a certain actor, earlier works of a director, John Williams soundtrack...It can be any element you want.

You search for movies on Netflix that meet that one criteria (and that you haven't seen before, if that wasn't obvious). Depending on what your element is, you might have to enlist help from IMDB and/or Rotten Tomatoes. When you find potential movies, do not read the plot summary or reviews or cast listings or anything about the movie.

Find the potentials that are rated at least 4 red stars. Those are Netflix's predictions about how much you will enjoy the movie. Add one of those to your Netflix queue.

When you watch that movie, you have almost zero information on it (assuming you didn't cheat). You might not have any expectations of it (which is fun!) and hopefully, you'll enjoy it because Netflix thought you would, and Netflix's rating system is four kinds of wonderful.

There are no points in this game, but you can consider a "win" when you enjoy the movie and a "loss" when Netflix's prediction lets you down.

So yesterday I played the Netflix Game with Runaway Jury and it was a win. My One Element was John Cusack as a main character. I got bonuses, though, because Dustin Hoffman and Gene Hackman were in the movie too (and I didn't know that until I was watching. More fun when you don't cheat, see?). Netflix predicted four stars for me, and yes, I liked the movie but didn't love it.

It's a good way to spend rainy afternoons, the Netflix Game.