Title: Escape Room
Release Date: January 4, 2019
View Time: February 3, 2019 - 10:20 P.M.
Running Time: 100 minutes
Format & Location: Standard - London SilverCity Masonville Mall
"Talking about immersive!" - That's right, welcome to the greatest challenge in your life!
Two years ago, a friend of mine in university successfully completed an escape room right here in London with her team "Dundergrads" (yep, she graduated that summer), and with ONLY THREE SECONDS LEFT!! Escape room is a game for the mind, and from there it branches off to several essential skills in life: partnership, problem solving techniques, ability to work under pressure, etc. I never have the courage to go anywhere near an escape room, which is why, to this day, I'm still deeply impressed by the achievement of Team Dundergrads!
Sony has become the king of adapting popular entertainment in recent years. From 80s retro arcade games to Angry Birds , from emojis to Slender Man. Although most of them are not showing a lot of promising efforts, I still would like to give out a round of applause to Sony for keeping our popular and retro cultures relevant by presenting them on the big screen! Not surprisingly, their newest creation Escape Room did not become a hit, but still walked out with a ten-fold profit ($9 million budget vs. $97.8 million box office) a month after its release. This movie is on the bottom of my watch list for January, and I managed to give it a try in the final week it was shown in London.
[SPOILERS START IN THE NEXT PARAGRAPH]
Escape Room follows the six so called "chosen ones" from all walks of life, as they are all invited by Minos Company to try out their newest escape room that promises to be the most immersive to date, and the person finishes all rooms will get $1 million cash prize. It does not take long for all six of them to find out that they are situated in actual life or death situation, and that the company dug into their tragic past and designed these rooms specifically for them. After several rounds of torture, accidents and sacrifice, the two lead chracters walk out of the rooms alive and defeat the room maker. Finally, they decide to go on the journey to expose company's secrets after finding out they have made fake news coverage to cover up those who died in the escape room. (Wait, doesn't this sound familiar to anyone? We will come back to this later.)
I have recently learned a term in my Women Filmmakers class called "Comme Si Comme Ça", which is a French term for describing something that is neither good nor bad, and this is exactly what I have to say about this movie. The trailer sets it up as a thriller, and it is like that for the opening, which shows Ben trying to find clues for the penultimate room while the walls are closing on him. Ben's reactions, the ambience, the soundtrack, everything gives off a terrifying atmosphere even for anyone who is not claustrophobic. (I cannot remember the last time I was clenching my teeth during an opening sequence, It (2017) perhaps?) But then, the title shows up, the characters are introduced, they are put into escape rooms, going through fire and snow challenges... the same level of tension is never seen again. Maybe a little intensity here and there in the upside-down bar scene where everyone plays a game of "musical chairs" with floors falling off, and the part with the EKG machine where they have to escape the room in five minutes before poison gas coming in, but that is pretty much all there is. In terms of storytelling, the movie starts off at a great height, but then it sleighs down on its bumpy way to the abyss of generic young adults adventure.
Now to introduce the challengers, we have: Zoey Davis, a smart physics student who is shy to share her ideas in public (kind of like me sometimes); Ben Miller, a storage guy in the supermarket with a desire to get out of this mess; Jason Walker, a young trader heading off to a successful career. After they come to Minos company, they are joined by war veteran Amanda Harper (who is afraid of fire), former miner Mike Nolan and escape room enthusiast Danny Khan (probably the only comic relief of the group). Some of them come here to challenge themselves as they work together to solve the puzzle, while the others have their eyes locked on the $100000 reward. But at the end, four of them die from accidents, sacrifice and clinging onto their self-interest and ambition way too tight. Out of all of them, Zoey is the only one who thinks outside of the box by disobeying the rules of the game and actively approaching the game maker. Ben is the one who has the most character development by transitioning from protecting himself to protecting others. Since they walk out of there alive, I guess this movie is trying to tell us the victory belongs to the free-spirited outcasts whose mind and heart are their most powerful weapon? The protagonist's aura may also comes into play!
Before I go any further, let's just take a moment to talk about the cast. The movie does not sell itself on star power, I barely knew any of the actors in this movie before watching it , and I guess they will not suddenly become world wide sensation for their roles in this movie. ALTHOUGH, there are two things that I think that are worth mentioning. Taylor Russell and Logan Miller, who plays Zoey and Ben respectively, both worked with Zoey Deutch (Maya from The Suite Life on Deck) in Before I Fall. Also, Logan (both the actor and his character in this movie have the same last name, so I'll refer to him by his first) was in Love, Simon as Martin Addison, Simon's classmate who blackmails him and reveals his sexual preference to the public, which is, in my opinion, a total d*** move. His character in Escape Room may start off as an ignorant person, but he has redeemed himself by saving and walking out with the female protagonist at the end. If you think Logan's Martin character in Love, Simon is a horrible bully, go watch Escape Room, it will calm yourself right down.
When sitting in the dark theatre as the time approached midnight, I could not stop making connections between this movie and The Maze Runner. There are a lot of similarities between the two. Here, let me show you with a checklist:
- Characters get put into a life or death situation? Check!
- Everyone must work together to overcome the potential danger? Check!
- The death of someone motivates the others to move forward? Check!
- Breaking the rule and go after the mastermind that is usually in higher class? Check!
- Being told that they are special by the challenge's creator? Check!
- Thinking that they have outsmarted their opponent while really walking into the next step of their plans just before end credits roll? Check!
- Presence of relationship of ANY kind that is beyond the friend zone? AHA!! Now that is something different!
In the epilogue, which takes place six months after the main storyline, Zoey tells Ben that she has found newspaper clips with the stories created by Minos Company to cover-up the deaths in the escape rooms. Even though Ben is initially hesitant, he still goes on the journey with Zoey to reveal the truth to the public. However, we as audience find out that they are actually placed into the next stage of the company's scheme. The relationship between Zoey and Ben is mutual at best, there are some moments where they care for each other, at the end they are still just partners. This is probably a move by Sony to prove that this movie can be different from the other ones out there, which always include a romanticized relationship (either implied or revealed) that is slowly getting old at this point.
[END OF SPOILERS]
Even though most of Escape Room is like any other movies with teenagers trying to get out of a sticky situation only to find out they are the chosen one, it brings just enough fresh air to the common trope to be considered as an average flick. Do I think this is a magnificent movie? Probably not. Will I watch it again even if just for parts? Most likely! Zoey is the kind of character that I always admire and without her, this movie would have been a potential trainwreck. My suggestion for you is to get the movie in the least expensive way (Pirate Bay, rental, Netflix etc.), watch the first 30 to 40 minutes, and then decide if you should finish it.
This marks the last review I have for movies that are released in January 2019. This month, check out reviews for The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part, Alita: Battle Angel, How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World and more! PLUS: A special review of Blue My Mind, which will be released exclusively at TIFF Next Wave Film Festival (February 15 - February 17).
Escape Room is now available on Blu-ray and DVD.
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