With all the adaptations we have had in recent years, we are starting to understand those that flourish the right project of those that we regret having seen. To be honest, Until Dawn So far was part of a gray area. Video game developed by Supermassive Games and released in 2015, he revolutionized the kind of interactive narration by offering an almost cinematographic story, except that the players had the destiny of the characters in their hands.
The objective? Make the most protagonists as possible survive at the end of the night, making the right decisions at crucial moments. Unlike other video game adaptations, Until Dawn So started with a postulate impossible to transpose from one media to another without losing all the essence. When the first trailer was released, Sony Pictures, to whom the project was entrusted, unveiled an unprecedented frame, inspired by video games, but with a real adaptation work to rediscover Until Dawn passively. Has the challenge been brilliantly taken up? The answer in this criticism ofUntil Dawn: endless death.
Enter the circle
Just like in the original work, Until Dawn Follows the adventures of a bunch of friends, young adults going to the heart of a wood as disturbing as it is isolated from the rest of the world. The land conducive to all kinds of supernatural events. While Clover has been looking for her sister for a missing year, she trains her comrades in a deserted tourist center, a trap that closes on them from the moment Nina, one of the heroines, inscribes her name in the register.
Consequently, the 5 characters find themselves trapped in an extraordinary time loop, to which it will be necessary to survive under penalty of being stuck for eternity. They have until sunrise to develop a strategy, noting night after night the dangers that the loop imposes on them.
Unlike many films of the genre, Until Dawn Break the classic concept of the time loop to offer us a variant according to which each night is different from the previous one, putting our nerves to the test when the characters cannot anticipate what awaits them. Despite the quality of the promise on paper, it works a little less well in practice.
There are no bad ideas (are we sure of that?)
Who says temporal loop, necessarily says rehearsal. To counter the monotony inherent in the concept, Until Dawn Try to be everywhere at the same time, but scattered without managing a clear and simple point. During the hour and a half of the film, we see a kind of compilation of everything that the horrific genre has to offer. The Ellipse in the middle of a plot, justified by a collective memory hole, is a technique that allows Sony to go through an ease to present us absolutely all the facets of its paraphernalia.
We end up not knowing if we watch a witch, ghost, vampire, werewolf, serial killer or a psychological thriller. In terms of meaning, the explanations of the different events are always driven by hair and nothing is really consistent put to the end, final revelation included.
Even with all these elements at stake, the behavior of the characters are extremely predictable, just like some of the main scripture springs used by Sony. However, it is clear that the Screamers have their effect. The sudden appearances of enemies of all kinds are among the big strengths of the film, which at least surprises on this point. We draw our hat with the visual effects that have made us hide our eyes several times. Other details surprise, and even promise you a few slices of fun, the word of Flippette. It is up to you to decide whether it plays in favor of the film or not, he who is not intended to be serious either on all levels.
We cannot say that we are particularly fans of the acting. The performances are, so to speak, rather average, except for some exceptions to the rule (thank you to Peter Stormare and Odessa A’zion).
An adaptation which is not a
We knew from the first trailer that the intrigue of the film wanted to be different from the video game. We were not going to be entitled to a loyalty to the extreme as we find it in The Last of Us for example, but rather a free interpretation of the concept ofUntil Dawn. An improper decision since it is absolutely impossible to reply the immense interactivity of a video game in a feature film at the cinema. For that, the project should have been entrusted to Netflix which excels in the art of interactive films.
Unfortunately, the choices made by the writers find it difficult to function in this universe. What in the game is more the representation of a natural temporality becomes in the film a constraint, too present and too real. The hourglass embodies this symbol of “replayability” but does not accentuate the characters at all, since the path changes with each reincarnation. There is therefore no longer the possibility of weighing the pros and cons of each action, or even creating chain reactions according to a subtle change in the behavior of the protagonists.
In terms of intrigue, certain elements effectively remind us of the game. The disaster of the landslide echoes the fatal accident of the mine in the video game title, but is no longer the central point of the plot, which mixes in the psychological frame, until it becomes incomprehensible for spectators. It is used here as an underlying pretext for Clover’s psychiatric study. The real wink will therefore remain the appearance of the chalet ofUntil Dawn At the very end of the film, as if to mean that the characters in the video game are the next ones on the list of Doctor Hill.
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