Circle (2015)

It holds you, pulls you into it and has you rooting for people. The problem was simple, to be honest. The ending was so flaccid, based on the build up, it leaves you thinking "Come on.." I was surprised , based on how the film ended, at the level of acting in this movie.That was the shining point when you factor in the ending or the lack of context and content. It was nice to see "Rita" after her demise in Dexter, finding a roll and playing it well :) If it had a bit more context, content or a bit more story, I think it would have been a terrific movie. Instead it went down the pseudo- cerebral path and fell on it's face. I Would not recommend this to anyone unless it was a .99 rental at a red-box simply because it is missing the delivery that comes after the build up

Fmovies: There are several movies that have done this sort of thing before. Put a cross section of society in an isolated situation (Desert Island, Hostile Planet, Booby Trapped Death Cube, Reality TV Show etc.), and observe their behaviours to see who is a team player, and who is a selfish aback-stabber.

Circle reminded me of a more extreme version of the TV game show 'The Weakest Link'. Only there is 50 people involved, and each is voting for their own life.

It's a neat premise on paper, but ultimately, the movie doesn't really go anywhere with it.

As a social commentary, we are presented with a broad cross-section of some very unpleasant stereotypes across the spectrum. Nothing was spared, whether race, gender, age, disability, sexuality, the movie provided some very sloppy examples of stereotyping & discrimination.

As a sci-fi movie, there is no character development at all. The movie only has two ongoing questions and they are 'Who will everyone vote for next?" and "Why?". The first question is answered every few minutes, and the second answer seems to be "Isn't it obvious?". - There is a third question "What the hell is going on?" and to its credit, the movie does not have an ambiguous ending. It does actually answer that question, but the answer feels like a tacked-on epilogue that doesn't really tie all the loose ends.

All in all, I found myself getting a bit bored & impatient with the movie to start going somewhere. I continued watching a bunch of people squabble over strategic voting and each round became more telegraphed. Even the 'twist' final rounds were predictable.

There are much better socially based sci-fi movies around The Cube & The Exam, for example, allowed for some character development, and for moral ambiguity.

Overall, I wouldn't recommend this film as an in-depth moral commentary about humanity, but if you are into the whole 'watching people stab others in the back' thing, then this will kill an hour or so.

Typical 'date night' with my wife on a Sunday evening...she wants to watch some scary movie and I cannot stand them because they never seem to live up to the hype and/or only implore cheap "BOO" shots. Not this movie... We picked this out of 100+ on a streaming service and we were very happy we did. The movie very quickly gets going, no long build up and catches your interest from the first 'zap'. And it quickly exposes humanity's almost complete lack of compassion and everyone's brutal opportunistic self. The underlying social and moral values that are revealed are very poignant and on more than 1 occasion we found ourselves asking "What would you do...?"

So I ask you... "What would you do if you were locked in a dark room with 49 strangers of various walks of life, and had to choose who dies every 2 minutes until there is no one left? How would you handle yourself?"

Circle fmovies. If you like car crashes, sex scenes and special effects, don't watch this film.

But if you like thought provoking, intelligent suspense, do watch it.

I was hesitant; there is very little info online about the movie and even fewer reviews, but Netflix offered it, so I had a go.

My wife and I don't always like the same kind of movies, but we both enjoyed this and discussed what we'd do in that situation.

The judgements and discussions that occurred during the film made me realize how judgemental we really all are.

Even though it is very dialogue heavy, I didn't get bored. In fact I couldn't believe how quickly the time passed.

So glad I watched it..... wish I could forget it and watch again....

After reading the synopsis of this film prior to viewing it I thought "Aha! This will suit my penchant for sadistic thrillers." I was hoping for something similar to Cube and instead got a feature length study of human nature. This was fine. What was not fine was the so-so delivery of such an exciting premise. It was messy and just seemed to miss some key element. For a movie that was so dialogue heavy it was disappointing to have it not delve a little deeper. Also the voting system was a little confusing and haphazard which made the whole thing seem a little sluggish, rather than clean and fast paced. Despite these flaws, Circle did manage to hold my attention quite well and had me engaged with the characters at points, as each stereotype of society is represented and played with, however fleetingly. The plot twist at the end was not entirely shocking as it summed up the true nature of most humans quite accurately. I believe the crushing sense of disappointment I experienced after watching this film was at least partially intentional, and for that I give it credit.

Some seemingly random people appear in a circular room, every now and then one of them is executed. They quickly realise there is a way to 'vote off' your fellow circle dwellers in a very terminal way.

It is not long before prejudices and biases start to arise. Someone notices more black people are getting zapped than white people. Coincidence? Some of these biases are played out very professionally with flair and drama, others are handled a bit clumsily leading to some very cringey dialogue.

This film lives and dies by how much you are prepared to invest into it.

If you think about the scenario logically, then a lot of the choices people make seem rash and rather stupid.

But if you can put yourself in the characters shoes, and imagine that you - staring wide eyed down the barrel of a gun - are about to be killed over some scum bag rapist, in reality wouldn't you want that extra two minutes of life over them - just on principle?

This is where the film needs to draw you in. The acting, lighting, effects and sound are all good enough. However, some of the characters aren't, forcing some of the actors into a corner they have to ham their way out off. Then the spell starts to crack.

If you can remove all distractions and try to engage your emotions and blot out the signals coming from the rational parts of your brain then this is very good for Netflix fodder.

I was fully prepared to have one of those stupid no answer endings. I was pleased to get a bit more than I expected.