Black Mirror: Bandersnatch, Review - Interactive Storytelling in a Movie Done Right

Netflix's Black Mirror: Bandersnatch is an interactive movie about an aspiring video game developer in 1984 trying to finish his first major game release while feeling like his life is spinning out of control. The movie plays like a "choose your own adventure" book or game where, at certain points in a scene, an interface will appear on screen asking you to make a binary choice for the character, which is then played out in the following shots and can lead to a lot of different pathways to over five different endings. As the story continues, the main character, Stefan, begins to realize there are weird forces controlling his life; he begins to relive past traumas, starts having demonic visions and conspiratorial dreams, and slowly descends into a surreal madness as reality crumbles around him, all while struggling with the normal tribulations and speed bumps to meet the deadline to release his first game, Bandersnatch.

For anyone unfamiliar with the series, Black Mirror is a dark science-fiction anthology series on Netflix, a bit similar in tone and style to The Twilight Zone, where each episode explores a concept about the darker possibilities of technology. Iconic episodes deal with being able to "block" people in real life (like on social media), using reality television as a form of criminal punishment, using memory implants for police investigations, and having one's consciousness uploaded to a virtual reality mainframe after you die, among many others. Bandersnatch functions as a feature-length stand-alone episode that can last 90 minutes or more, depending on your choices and how much of it you choose to explore. I don't normally review movies on this blog (although I have on a few occasions, and I used to have my old Video Games in TV series), but this movie deals directly with video game themes and its interactive nature makes it feel almost like a game, so I figured I'd share my thoughts and observations on it for those who're interested.

Movie Roundup: Mini-Reviews

I spent about 20 hours in the back seat of a car this Christmas season, traveling across the country to visit family, which meant I had a lot of free time to kill. In the past I would spend that time playing handheld video games or reading books, but year after year I found myself not having enough time to finish some of those games or books during the trip, and then would never get around to finishing them once I got back home. This year, I decided to take advantage of my big-ass smart phone and download a bunch of movies to watch. I've now watched 11 movies in the past week, including the new Star Trek Star Wars movie on the big screen.

I don't watch a lot of movies, so my critical eye is not trained enough to write a lot of proper reviews for the movies I actually do watch -- with rare exceptions. But, since it's been a while since my last article and it's taking me forever to finish my Thief 2014 review, I figured I'd throw out a bunch of mini reviews for the plethora of movies I watched this week. In the full article, you'll find brief synopses and spoiler-free reviews of, in no particular order: Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Interstellar, Gravity, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, The Mist, Avenged, Forever's End, Exile, Ex Machina, I'll Follow You Down, and Under the Skin. 

Disappointed Movie Review: The Batman Rises

For the first time ever, I'd like to talk about something other than video games. You see, I recently saw the latest Batman movie, the one with the derivative suffix for a title, The Dark Knight Rises. Like most people, I thought it would be nearly impossible to top the excellence of The Dark Knight, and therefore didn't hold particularly high expectations for the third and final installment of Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy. But while I didn't necessarily expect it to be a great Batman movie, I still expected Rises to be a good movie. There's a lot to nitpick here -- plot holes, inconsistencies, illogical character behavior -- but what disappointed me most were ordinary shortcomings in things like structure, pacing, and story.

The movie starts out interestingly enough, but reaches a low point (both literally and figuratively) about midway through where the narrative momentum sort of falls apart. Despite these kinds of problems, Rises is still a pretty good movie that deserves positive praise, marred primarily by the fact that it simply can't outshine the legacy of its predecessor. But whereas most people would simply say "it's good, but not as good as The Dark Knight," my take is more a matter of "it's not as good as The Dark Knight, and not even as good as it had the potential to be."