Launched on Netflix in March of 2020 (unbelievably good timing for a film about individuals confined to an inescapable jail whose design pits insatiable self-interest in opposition to the general public good), Spanish filmmaker Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia’s “The Platform” is an anti-capitalism allegory whose obviousness is its biggest energy. Like so many streaming hits, the style train resonated as a result of its high-concept premise advised a compelling story unto itself.
The movie’s most and solely memorable character is “The Pit” the place it takes place, a slim concrete tower (or “Vertical Self-Management Center”) with a giant sq. gap in the course of every flooring — a gap simply giant sufficient to suit the huge smorgasbord of meals that’s lowered down the constructing’s 333 tales every day. The 2 inmates on the highest flooring are handled to a royal banquet, however solely a few errant scraps stay when the movable feast reaches the fiftieth stage under them; anybody randomly assigned to the underside half of the constructing is nearly assured to starve to demise by the tip of the month-to-month rotation… except in fact they eat their cellmates alive. The barbarism of our social hierarchies had seldom been placed on such clear and pungent show, and “The Platform” stays one of many few motion pictures to make the failures of trickle-down economics appear much more self-evident than they’re in actual life.
The one drawback with such a intelligent premise is that the remainder of the story has to disturb it, and whereas the jail in Gaztelu-Urrutia’s movie grew extra intriguing with every new element we discovered about it, the individuals desperately looking for a manner out of it didn’t. Neither did their more and more feverish escape plans. Crafting a metaphor for capitalism is one factor; fixing it within the span of an independently financed dystopian thriller is one other.
Watching the primary half of “The Platform 2,” it might appear that Gaztelu-Urrutia has recognized the place his earlier film went unsuitable. As an alternative of specializing in the design of the jail (and, by extension, how its quirks is perhaps exploited into exits), this Netflix-funded sequel instantly shifts its consideration to the techniques which may permit the movie’s inmates to outlive it, a resolution that enables Gaztelu-Urrutia to deepen the franchise’s Stanford Jail Experiment-like examine of human nature.
The place its predecessor instructed individuals to be the change they wished to see within the Pit, “The Platform 2” considerations itself with the solidarity required for everybody to remain alive. Alas, individuals are finally prisoners to themselves (to their desires, and to their wounds), and never even essentially the most idealistic of techniques are proof against the foibles we sow into them. Just like the primary film, which “The Platform 2” expects you to recollect in delusionally specific element, this sequel breaks down in tandem with its social order.
A lot as Gaztelu-Urrutia reaffirms his reward for mixing Cartesian-like philosophy with “Saw”-inspired aesthetics, he additionally reaffirms his wrestle to leverage that mash-up into a story value telling. If “The Platform 2” iterates on the unique concept in a manner that proves this property’s franchise potential, it falls aside in virtually the very same manner because the earlier movie, abandoning the broadly representational nature of its premise in favor of the maddeningly particular mythology of its foolish non-characters. Besides this time it’s a little bit worse, as a result of that mythology — already boring to start with — is now consecrated into a legend of pseudo-religious significance. Just like the platform itself, this sequel is overflowing with scrumptious issues to chew on when it begins, solely to get picked aside because it descends into darkness from there.
It’s laborious to inform how a lot time has handed because the occasions of “The Platform,” however steely-eyed new heroine Perempuan (Milena Smit) has been there lengthy sufficient to be taught the ropes. A guilt-ridden artist who begins the movie on the twenty fourth flooring, she instructs her barrel-chested and continuously shirtless new roommate Zamiatin (actor, comedian, and former boxer Hovik Keuchkerian) on how issues have labored because the revolution that appears to have resulted from the ultra-nebulous ending of the primary film.
The Pit is a lot fairer now, with the holy legislation of share and share alike seeping deeper into the tower with every rotation. Galvanized by the Christ-like story of a prisoner who fed different individuals along with his personal flesh, every inmate eats solely the dish they personally requested upon arrival, theoretically making certain that nobody starves to demise. The residents of the Pit implement this legislation with excessive prejudice, with a few of them going as far as to homicide (and worse) anybody who has even a single chunk of another person’s meals. That crucially contains any potential leftovers, as nobody ought to ever profit from the homicide of a comrade.
There are nonetheless a few weak hyperlinks within the chain, however the system is beginning to work; a few scraps of meals made all of it the best way right down to the a hundred and seventy fifth flooring over the last rotation. Par for the course of this emergent franchise, “The Platform 2” is at its greatest throughout its table-setting levels, as Perempuan regularly convinces the oafish Zamiatin — who’s smarter than he appears — to observe the principles, and the solidarity they show with their fellow prisoners sparks a real friendship between them. Perempuan even affords to shave Zamiatin’s again.
Alas, the tip of the month arrives proper on schedule, and Perempuan finds herself relocated to flooring 180, together with a one-armed new roommate (“Game of Thrones” actress Natalia Tena) who’s all too acquainted with the model of holy justice that has begun to unfold via the Pit. It is going to solely be a matter of time earlier than that fundamentalist zeal — administered by an eyeless prophet named Dagin Babi — threatens to develop into even deadlier than the each man for himself strategy it sought to switch.
That battle is compelling sufficient as long as it shines a dank and disgusting gentle on the recognizably ugly truths of sustaining a society: The legislation is simpler to respect for the individuals on the high, and people individuals in flip have a better duty to observe the principles that it units. When somebody on the fortieth flooring decides to behave in their very own self-interest, it’s the prisoners on the 293 flooring under them who stand to endure the implications… except the prisoners above them comply with mete out a becoming punishment.
However Gaztelu-Urrutia loses his grip on the combat to create a future the place nobody has to kill anybody, because the competing arguments behind that battle quickly give approach to the practicalities of surviving it. The place a extra nutritious movie might need turned that into a social commentary of its personal, “The Platform 2” can’t appear to determine if it ought to handle the battle that begins to drip down the Pit as a literal disaster or a philosophical one, and so — echoing the final film — it hedges between these two approaches in a manner that makes all of it however unattainable to care about both of them.
The scraps of character element we get are ridiculous in a manner that cheapens the fact that Gaztelu-Urrutia is attempting to construct round them, and the obscure flashbacks he pads them out with solely serve to unmoor from the horrors of Perempuan’s state of affairs. There’s sufficient squelchy awfulness on show to maintain horror followers engaged till the third act (the acolytes devise some uniquely Pit-centric torture strategies), however the movie grows tired of the bounds and implications of its personal metaphor, and its tendency to develop into extra high-minded because it sinks decrease into the jail forces it to ditch its human drama in favor of sloppy abstraction.
Ranging from such nice heights, “The Platform 2” descends into a boring and delirious sludge of colour gels, non secular iconography, and head-scratching callbacks (which proceed effectively into the tip credit), none of that are even half as fascinating as the fundamental premise of the plot they’re all working so laborious to dilute. There’s room to maintain increasing on this world, and the ending of “The Platform 2” means that Gaztelu-Urrutia intends to just do that, however “The Platform 3” wants to offer us a lot extra to chew on in an effort to justify one other stint within the Pit. The prisoners there is perhaps fortunate to seek out something left on their plate, however Netflix subscribers hungry for ham-fisted sci-fi allegories are nothing if not spoiled for alternative.
Grade: C+
“The Platform 2” shall be accessible to stream on Netflix beginning Friday, October 4.
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