Series 7: The Contenders

An entertaining romp, sending up those all of those crass reality TV shows. the whole set up is crazy but sort of realistic in the most bizarre of ways. A difficult film to pull off but the concept is strong and not a million miles away from the truth. Concerns a randomly selected group of citizens, who have to arm themselves and then kill actually each other. With comedy, violence and a whole heap of social comment.

SERIES 7: THE CONTENDERS is both a taut thriller and a deft satire on the outlandish lengths TV networks will go to in order to lure viewers. Set in the near future, SERIES 7 is cleverly constructed as a marathon of seventh-season episodes of "The Contenders," a hit reality show in which contestants are selected via state lotteries and given guns with which they're expected to hunt down and kill their fellow contestants (although they're free to use their own weapons and be inventive). The object: to stay alive. The prize: whoever remains alive after 3 Contenders seasons wins his/her freedom from the high-rated program/ordeal. The champ is Dawn Lagarto (Brooke Smith of SILENCE OF THE LAMBS), a pregnant, troubled but essentially decent drifter. Trapped in the program for the past two seasons, Dawn's reluctantly willed herself into becoming a frighteningly efficient killing machine to keep herself and her unborn baby alive. For her third and final season, "The Contenders" sends Dawn to her hometown of Newbury, Connecticut. Her fellow contestants/adversaries include prim but ruthless ER nurse Connie (Marylouise Burke of MUST LOVE DOGS and A PRAIRIE HOME COMPANION); teenage Lindsay, whose well-meaning but overbearing parents (Mom is played by Donna Hanover, TV personality and Rudy Giuliani's ex!) coach her for the show as if she were trying out for an athletic competition; unemployed asbestos-removal worker Tony, who's trying to use this cruel TV twist of fate to unite his family; crazed conspiracy theorist Franklin; and Jeff, an artist who's dying of testicular cancer -- and who also happens to be Dawn's high school sweetheart. The lingering flames of love and resentment between these two, and the reactions of Jeff's long-suffering wife, provide the film's most poignant and suspenseful moments, as well as one of its funniest: clips of the low-budget student film they made in high school, including every 1980s video cliché imaginable and Joy Division's technodirge "Love Will Tear Us Apart" on the soundtrack. SERIES 7's authentically television-like feel is augmented by its story being told entirely through such TV conventions as bumpers, interviews, voiceovers, cutaway footage, dramatic re-enactments of events by doubles, and exciting tag lines ("Real people...in real danger...in a fight for their lives!"). We even meet most of the characters as they're notified of their selection for "The Contenders" on-camera, as the show's masked, armed minions come to the new contestants' homes like sinister Publishers Clearing House representatives. These TV gimmicks create deliciously satirical overtones in and of themselves, and yet the movie's irony and gallows humor works precisely because it's all played absolutely straight, not with the "nudge nudge wink wink" air that too many recent thrillers have overdone in their attempts to be edgy and postmodern. But the film's brilliant craftsmanship wouldn't be nearly as effective without the power of the fine cast's performances, particularly Brooke Smith; her riveting performance makes Dawn the emotional center of SERIES 7: THE CONTENDERS. That said, the film also chillingly portrays the way fear and self-preservation can turn even the most decent human being into a stone-cold killer. This sharp, smart, exhilarating thriller works on so many levels, and it's got one of the niftiest twist endings in ages, too! Somehow, I suspect it's only a matter of time before a real-life reality show figures out a way to go this far... :-)

Series 7 sees reigning champion Dawn pitted against five new contenders in a fight to the death.

I didn't really get into The Contenders until Series 5, which ended with a tense three-way Mexican standoff that, at the time, I thought couldn't be beaten. Series 6 somehow managed to top this with a brutal knife fight between finalists Rick and Daniel guaranteed to satisfy any viewer's bloodlust.

How could Series 7 possibly be any better? Answer: by introducing a romantic angle. It sounds sappy, but by having contenders Dawn (heavily pregnant) and Jeff (dealing with terminal cancer) conflicted by their feelings for each other really adds to the emotional wallop and leaves one reeling at the final outcome.

Series 8 is going to have to come up with something really special to outdo this.

Series 7: The Contenders, is a very twisted black comedy about six contestants on a reality show. The premise of the reality show is that the contestants are given weapons and have to murder each other in order to win. The contestants include a mentally insane man living in a trailer park, a cancer patient, a religious nurse, a high school teenager, a middle-aged father, and (the reigning champion) a pregnant woman. The film is structured as a marathon showing and is played as a series of episodes strung together each following these contestants. The film depicts these people as normal and everyday people who are forced into this terrible situation against their will, but the real meat of the film comes in when we get to learn about the histories of some of these characters. That's the point of the film where the film grows out of being a spoof of reality shows and begins to manifest into a social commentary. The high school teenager has parents who encourage her every step of the way and help her suit up for the murders that she is about to commit. The pregnant woman has been disowned by her own mother due to past incidents. The middle-aged parent has his own troubles at home. There's a lot more going on here than at first glance. This is an angry and dark satire that really challenges some of the concepts of reality and the satire of itself.

There's a lot here that I truly admire. For starters, the performances. They are pretty awful in a way that, at times, seems cringe-worthy. However, when you take a look at reality television shows such as Survivor and The Real World, the acting in those is even worse. It's supposed to be reality, yet the people in them are not believable. That's what makes reality television such a joke, and so in a roundabout way of saying things the performances here are good because the actors are good at capturing the melodramatic mannerisms of the contestants at large. I particularly enjoyed the performance of Brooke Smith as the pregnant woman. She is ridiculously cold and cruel and monstrous, and you can really feel the bitterness that she feels. Yet her mannerisms are so sarcastic and almost pathetic. The same goes for the rest of the cast, but Smith has a visual presence to her that I've always admired. She's a terrific actress. Nobody can forget her performance as the kidnapped victim in The Silence of the Lambs. I've seen some of her television work as well and she almost always sticks out in a good way. Merritt Wever and Glenn Fitzgerald do an equally good job as the teenage girl and the cancer patient, the former being the most likable person in the cast and the latter having all of the best lines and being the most interesting of all the characters.

My favorite thing about this film, however, has to be the momentum of it. Series 7: The Contenders is almost never boring and there's always something going on. It's virtually impossible to stop watching once you've started, even if you pick up in the middle of it. I think this was done intentionally. I think a lot of televisions shows have that same kind of watchability factor, and what I appreciated the most about this film is that there were no commercials that cut into the action. The satire of the film itself is simple and clever, but even if you put all that aside, you still have one hell of a captivating film. Putting the climax of the film aside, you do get to care about almost all these characters and you don't particularly want to see any of them die really.

If you want my personal opinion on the film, I cannot say that I like it too much. I don't personally find the film itself to be very funny. I like dark humor, but I thought that this was too sick, really, to be funny. I also really don't like the ending. It felt like I was being beaten over the head by the satire. I also find that the film itself isn't exactly re-watchable. Once you know how it all ends, you really don't have any desire to ever really sit down and watch it. There are films out there that are sick and that you never really WANT to watch again, but at the same time you feel you should and can't help but feel the need to sit through it, but Series 7: The Contenders plays all of it's cards in one sitting and as a result you really don't feel any desire to absorb any of it. It's more the type of film that you just appreciate rather than like and enjoy. I can imagine a lot of horror fan and readers of Fangoria would love it to pieces or at least get a huge kick out of watching it. In my opinion, as brilliant and as clever as it is, I definitely wouldn't advise mainstream moviegoers to watch this. I thought it was a brilliantly directed film in a lot of ways, and the satire was effective, but I can't exactly recommend it. I'm glad I saw it though.

These days it is difficult to satirize reality TV and reality video because material like THE LITTLEST GROOM, THE AMAZING RACE, BOOT CAMP, SURVIVOR and BUMFIGHTS already exist.

SERIES 7: THE CONTENDERS is an ultra-efficient rendering of the imagined next step in reality programming in which "contenders" must kill in order to survive.

To their credit, the filmmakers never step outside the game itself.

Clever graphics, voice-overs and reality-style camera-work achieve a high level of illusion. The "contenders" themselves are well characterized and we get to understand the complexities that drive them.

As entertainment SERIES 7 is seductive and exciting. As satire it is sharp and black as pitch.