Netflix has released a curious anthology of short films ascribed to horror and science fiction led by Neill Blomkamp, responsible for ‘District 9’ and the imminent ‘Demonic’, presented in Sitges
“Neill Blomkamp is a really exciting young director,” once commented Peter Jackson, serving as Blomkamp’s producer and mentor. His debut feature, ‘District 9’, so far his best work, was based on a short film, a low-budget mockumentary entitled ‘Alive in Jo’burg’ that was shot in a shantytown in Johannesburg and had a stir at festivals. . Aliens appeared in the piece, joining the area’s own cultural miscegenation. The project to extend the suggestive idea, also allowing comparisons to be made with some realities of our time – issues such as racism, integration, tolerance, the greed of the human being, political and military power, large corporations …-, took flight when the head of the film saga of ‘The Lord of the Rings’ extended his hand to the emerging South African filmmaker. Clearly inspired by the classic science fiction cinema, the proposal was a breath of fresh air in the genre, especially for its mockumentary aesthetic. There were action scenes, dramatic moments, suspense, horror, and adventure. The story reproduced 24 hours of information in real time that was fed by the media, both television and the internet or the mobile phone. The dividing lines between cinematographic styles were blurred. The tone of a social parable remained a commendable feature in his next film, ‘Elysium’, a festival of action and visual effects serving a story starring an undeniable cast led by Matt Damon and Jodie Foster. This time it is the year 2159 and the world is radically divided into rich and poor. The first live in a space station enjoying all kinds of luxuries while the rest survive as best they can on an overpopulated planet whose resources are running out.
The station gave the film its name, Elysium. Preserving the full-fledged way of life of the wealthy staff is the highest priority of its users, but the inhabitants of the Earth, fed up with so much decadence, desperate, seek equality between two opposing layers. A seemingly normal man, played by Damon, needs to penetrate the aristocratic fortress. Undertaking such a dangerous mission leads him to confront the villain of the show, to whom the famous Foster puts a face with charisma. The forces under his command are relentless. As in ‘District 9’, Blomkamp portrays in ‘Elysium’ the separation between classes, but the result left a lot to be desired and was revealed as a pastiche, just like ‘Chappie’, an unconfessed remake of ‘Short Circuit’ meeting with ‘ Robocop ‘with the musical group Die Antwoord as the icing on the pre-cooked cake. Neill’s career behind the camera is lurching, given the terrible reception of his latest film at the recent Sitges festival. ‘Demonic’, a horror film with a minimalist plot, filmed with few means and few ideas, did not convince fans of the genre very much, with a poor staging, an uninspired cast and some directing decisions worthy of a telefilm of desktop. The result confirms the theory that some filmmakers can get lost when they don’t have a great team behind them and move away from the mainstream.
‘Demonic’, filmed during the pandemic in secret, will premiere shortly on our billboard. Meanwhile, Blomkamp has launched an anthology of short films on Netflix, also available for free on YouTube for a long time, that continue to be inspired by alien invasions and the rebellion of the machines. Ten pieces are presented under the Oats Studios label, with irregular results, which we quote below from best to worst. Some proposals seem like teasers of possible audiovisual projects, even fragments of a film that require demos of visual effects techniques to sell their images.
Dated in 2017, like most of the titles that make up this batch rendered to horror and science fiction, ‘Cigoto’ is light years away from the rest of the proposals that make up Volume I of Oats Studios, whose supposedly experimental nature does not always sneak in . Here Blomkamp, who is to be applauded for his intention to maintain some independence in production, presents an extreme situation in which the only two survivors of a massacre on a space base are confronted by a monstrous creature. With ‘Alien’ and ‘La cosa’ as clear references, the story grabs you, highlighting the work of actress Dakota Fanning. The awe-inspiring design of the menacing being is worthy of applause, like a gruesome vignette by Junji Ito or Hideshi Hino. Twenty intense minutes with well-integrated gore moments.
It is not very original, for a change in Blomkamp’s filmography, which again has the undeniable talent of Sigourney Weaver, as he did in ‘Chappie’. His fetishism with the ‘Alien’ actress is evident. In fact, he seems to have been traumatized when his intentions to revive the Eighth Passenger saga collapsed, according to some statements in recent interviews where his relationship with Ridley Scott does not leave a good place. ‘Rakka’, with a dark message, makes up for its hackneyed premise with effective visual packaging and eye-catching visuals that portray the resistance of a group of humans against a voracious alien invasion. It can be understood as a trailer for a movie that does not exist. It is worth mentioning that the initial idea of these shorts was to offer them for free online and that the audience supported the project through crowdfunding. But setting up a collaborative project by crowdfunding, apart from the big studios, is extremely complicated. Perhaps that is why they have ended up in the hands of Netflix, which seems to want to continue with this release in the wake of ‘Love, Death & Robots’.
25 minutes that are not long, they even leave you wanting more, with the Vietnam War as the stage. It is not a closed story, of course, and it is incongruous, but it offers the viewer some glimpses of wit that do not appear in the rest of the anthology with such clairvoyance. A soldier faces an unknown force, as in ‘Predator’ but in a paranormal key. Perhaps the most terrifying bet.
God is a boring guy who watches humanity from a pedestal, over his shoulder. The human being is not his favorite animal, but he contemplates his little feats as if he were in front of a board game with miniature figures that move by grace of CGI. Like a naughty child, he sends meteorological phenomena that make life impossible for the inhabitants of planet Earth. In comic sketch format, it is viewed in Monty Python. They are two pieces united in two different scenarios.
Made entirely in CGI, as if it had been extracted from a video game, it is a chilling sequence of just five minutes that can be understood as a demonstration of the good level of animation technique. Visual artist and illustrator Jakub Różalski inspires medieval beings and creepy creatures that are pretty bad vibes. The most puzzling of the Oats Studios pack.
More than one will wonder what is the reason why the first installment of this mini-trilogy is not in Volume I of Oats Studios on Netflix. It can be found on the internet legally, under the title ‘Adam’, written and directed by the Swedish artist Veselin Efremov, crafted with the Unity engine. Blomkamp extends this idea with two difficult-to-understand shorts that attract attention aesthetically. Good animation quality for the exposition of a post-apocalyptic world where robots suffer like humans.
A fun idea, too long that connects with the imagination of the magnificent ‘Starship Troopers’. Made by computer graphics, it describes the turbulent experiments of unscrupulous scientists who test their creations on prisoners who end up fatal. The ways in which they die are creative, giving rise to laughter, as long as one boasts, as an audience, a granite stomach.
It seems like a glob in the selection, a succession of repetitive sketches that pervert the typical telemarketing advertisement, taking it to the realm of black humor. A cook tests different gadgets for cutting and preparing food in front of the camera. The show always ends in fatality.
Bad president: oil spill / whole topic
It is the same as the aforementioned reference, with even less grace. An overly silly political satire attempt that has nothing to do with realization. Jokes on account of an apparent caricature of Trump, a vicious and ill-faced president who does not hide his corruption in front of the cameras. The inclusion of this piece makes clear the randomness of an anthology that was not born as such and lacks a clear conceptual spirit. These last two pieces of this mixed bag are left over. Without them you can find greater coherence to an easily digested uneven set.
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