Game of Death

A French-Canadian production that played the film festival circuit and runs a scant 73-minutes, Game of Death is, at the very least, more edgy and interesting than most of the Blumhouse productions that capture the teen horror market these days.  Built around the concept of a Jumanji-type board game that forces its players to kill-or-be-killed, it's loaded with gore and expendable millennial characters, staging the resultant murder spree with Tarantino-meets-Tobe Hooper style.

 

When their house party gets a bit dull, seven 20-somethings discover a piece of retro entertainment called Game of Death.  After a surprising finger poke, an onscreen countdown begins and instructs the players that 21 people must die before time runs out or a sacrifice will be chosen among their group at random.  It only takes a couple of exploding heads for our characters to realize the game means business.  Siblings Tom and Beth plan to survive at all costs, hitting the road in search of easy victims.  While Ashley and the drug-dealing pizza guy, Tyler, pursue in hopes of preventing a massacre...even at the cost of their own lives.

 

Credit where credit is due, Game of Death has one hell of a concept.  While the characters are nothing more than rough sketches - with an inexplicable incest angle for Tom and Beth - they serve well enough to set the plot in motion.  After an almost intolerable social media-style intro, co-directors Sebastien Landy and Laurence Morais-Lagace settle down to tell their story in a more traditional fashion, getting to the good stuff quickly and turning the moral screws.  The "game" itself is a marvel of nostalgic production design, looking a bit like a mix of Parcheesi and Nintendo.  And the violence is a seamless blend of CGI and practical effects that pulls things off better than some studio productions.

 

As clever as the film is in concept, its nihilistic approach becomes a bit tiresome.  There's no perspective, no surprises and no humor.  Most of this springs from a lack of compelling characters and the aforementioned brief running time, but, with a bit more self awareness, Game of Death could have knocked this grim idea out of the park.  Who knows, maybe Blumhouse will remake it after all.

 

Meanwhile, MVD's DVD presentation (there doesn't seem to be a Blu-ray available) certainly looks good enough to attract some attention in the horror crowd.  Extras are limited to a trailer and behind-the-scenes slideshow. 

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