Thrillers with the name "The Game of Survival": reviews of the paintings of 2012 and 2015

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

"The Most Dangerous Game" was the name given to a man by the protagonist of the 1932 classic thriller The Most Dangerous Game. French director Jean-Baptiste Leonetti and Hollywood debutant Heitor Dahlia offered the public their variations on this theme, releasing two projects of the same name - "The Game of Survival" - three years apart. Reviews of both tapes are diverse.

Paranoid Thriller Gone (2012)

The work of the Brazilian director Heitor Dahlia, who made his debut in Hollywood with English-language cinema, is positioned as a successful thriller with a large number of suspects and an insane victim. Dahlia's The Game of Survival received neutral reviews, with an IMDb rating of 5.90.

Among the undoubted merits of the project, reviewers single out the lead actress Amanda Seyfred. The actress plays a girl who is convinced that her sister was kidnapped by a maniac, from whose clutches she managed to escape in the recent past. The police do not believe her, in desperation the heroine decides to fight the serial killer on her own. However, there is a chance that the character is prone to bouts of paranoia.

Also, critics did not ignore the participation in the film of category B action movie star Michael Pare. But the majority limited themselves to remarking that Dalia's creation is a movie of one actor, highlighted by a faint flicker in the background of colleagues in the shop. Although it's a shame that most of the star members of the ensemble cast were shown frankly nondescript.

Movie for one or two times

The film "Survival Game" has mediocre reviews also due to the fact that, according to the respondents, the atmosphere came to the fore in the film: incessant rain, heavy and gloomy locations, impulsive and disturbing musical accompaniment. All components together cause almost psychosis in the faint-hearted viewers, and hardened fans of the genre are tuned to a minor wave, the expectation of surprise.

According to film critics, "The Game of Survival" is a thriller for one or two viewings. As not the worst example of the genre, he keeps the audience in suspense, but the grip, alas, is not steel. But the original ideas of the screenwriter Allison Barnett and plot twists, from which the viewer will not be able to fall asleep in the cinema, do not allow to unequivocally negatively assess the film.

Impressions of one day

Viewers in reviews of "Game of Survival" were at leastcategorical. In the absolute opinion of the majority, the tape does not focus on feelings and the psychological background of actions. For 91 minutes of running time, Amanda Seyfried, as Jill, runs across rough terrain, and her character is driven by fear. In fact, the picture is a demonstration of the impression of one day of the heroine suffering from an exacerbation of paranoid personality disorder, and is created as if there had never been a film about the vicissitudes of an altered consciousness before.

The director uses all possible genre techniques to the maximum, deepening the heroine's fears as darkness falls so that at the moment of culmination in the movie there is practically no air and light left. The denouement of the story is, of course, interesting to know, but almost unimportant. After all, whether Jill invented a maniac or not, you can watch a movie about how much a girl is afraid of men, almost in the same breath.

Minimalist thriller Beyond the Reach (2015)

The film by Jean-Baptiste Leonetti is based on the work of writer and screenwriter Robb White. The novel was already filmed in 1974, but due to the fact that copies of the tape have not been preserved, there is nothing to compare the movie of 2015 with.

In fact, the picture is based on the competition of representatives of opposite social strata, a game not for life, but for the death of the rich and the poor. The hero of Michael Douglas is an oligarch, a corporate shark, he does not recognize the rules and laws. Jeremy Irwin's character is a young man in need of money.

Although the rating of the tape on IMDb is 5.60, according to filmmakers,expressed in the reviews of The Game of Survival, there is nothing to watch except Douglas in the cinema. The suspense is not forced to the desired level, there is no psychological subtlety at all. One hero poisons the other for most of the time until he, driven to the limit, goes into active combat.

Horror style

At the same time, mediocre directing cannot be called the key problem of the film. Rather, it is the fault of the poor choice of a young actor who does not have powerful charisma. Jeremy Irwin ("Retribution", "War Horse") in Leonetti's project impresses only with physical data and a taut figure, which he manages to demonstrate when Douglas' character makes his hero get naked. The young British performer was discovered by the great Spielberg, he is in great demand, but he has much less charisma and skill than the wiser Douglas. Therefore, in the tape, he is perceived as an unfortunate rabbit, whose teeth erupt when the script requires it.

According to the authors of the reviews, "The Game of Survival" can hardly be watched until the finale, and the final part is already perceived not as a dressed-up climax, but rather as an optional horror-style epilogue. There are too few characters in the tape and potential situations in which the heroes could find themselves if they did not stop their "war". You can’t call the action boring, but it’s also particularly exciting. Therefore, from the whole picture, only the traditionally magnificent Michael Douglas is remembered.