Series 7: The Contenders

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.

`Reality TV' is founded on P T Barnum's famous dictum `Nobody went broke underestimating public taste.' `Series 7 – The Contenders' simply takes the idea to its extreme – a program where contestants hunt each other down, not in the wild, but in suburbia, the survivor being declared the winner (oddly, the only prize seems to be survival).

Obviously this is satire, and there are some genuinely funny moments, such as the parents of a teenage contestant urging their daughter on, as, armed with a rifle, she attempts to take care of an elderly opponent on a golf course. When the same girl, taking the gun into a shopping mall, is challenged by a security man, she says `its all right, I'm from The Contenders' and he lets her pass. The two main characters, Dawn (Brooke Smith) the champion from the last series and Jeffery (Glenn Fitzgerald), an opponent and former boyfriend, are sympathetically drawn. Dawn is pretty aggressive, but also eight months pregnant, and filled with emotion on returning to her home town. Jeffery, an artist, is suffering from testicular cancer, and though cared for by his devoted wife, wants to die. Needless to say, it becomes pretty hard for Dawn to pull the trigger on Jeffery when she gets the chance. The other contestants are not so sympathetically drawn, but they are by no means monsters, even if Connie the ER nurse with the deadly needle, goes to confession before stepping out to kill someone.

I formed the distinct impression that the contestants were not actually volunteers, being selected at random from something like the list of social security numbers. If that were the case, and I was selected, my first priority would be to wipe out the producers, not my fellow contestants. The Gladiators of ancient Rome were not volunteers of course, and perhaps that's the parallel the producers of the film seek to draw, or perhaps with the military draft for Vietnam.

Occasionally, reality TV makes good television, as in the case of the Australian `RPA' about the day to day workings of a large Sydney hospital. But the contrived ones, like `Survivor', `Boot Camp' and even the quiz show `The Weakest Link' depend on (vicarious) fear and humilation, not to mention voyeurism for their entertainment value. Freak shows such as `Springer' add loathing to the mix.

The director here (Daniel Minehan) does a good job of demonstrating just how nasty the premises are behind these sorts of shows but don't really sheet home the blame. I don't mind seeing a few of the high and mighty humiliated in public but I do object to ordinary mostly decent people being chewed up for entertainment purposes. Dawn and Jeffery deserve our sympathy, not our revulsion, a point the film makes reasonably well. It also illustrates that P T Barnum's dictum has lost none of its force.

This movie is for people who like their comedies so black that the light from the screen can barely escape the film's gravitational pull.

Fortunately, I'm one of those people, and I found the film to be hilarious beyond my wildest dreams. The main thing that makes the movie's premise work is that the movie takes itself seriously. It's similar to Christopher Guest's mockumentary style in that the people in the movie are for the most part unaware of their own ridiculousness. Now, that being said the acting in the movie is excellent. There is very nice character development of the main characters, and Brooke Smith's character has to be the most appealing and interesting assassin I've seen on screen ever. Most importantly, the movie is presented exactly like a reality show which eventually draws the viewer into suspending their disbelief and accepting the ludicrous world these characters inhabit. Even the bad parts of reality shows are accurate, the narrator's overly dramatic voice, the cheesy melodramatic music to inject some false drama, the corny stock footage of the flying bird. It's all so accurate it's wickedly funny. It even parodies cop shows during a car chase. Finally, the icing on the cake is that as ridiculous as everything is, you realize that American society isn't too far off from this extreme today, and that gives the film the added bite of seriousness that propels it above being simply entertaining and makes it a true satire, This film is even more impressive considering the fact that the idea was conceived 5 years ago before the reality craze began.

I encourage people to watch Series 7 once, it's destined to become a cult classic. The last line of the movie is also laugh-out-loud funny.

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... :-)

This is the ultimate show of its kind - six people play a 'Survivor' game, but this is real survival - they will kill one another until only one survives. They are selected by chance, we have no clue why, and there seems to be no price. The only thing the winner earns is getting enrolled in another mortal round.

The formula works pretty well for the first half. Good, fast filming, credible acting, interesting characters. The problem is that by the second half the needed development of the characters does not happen, and for lack of anything else the script falls into previsible melodrama. It's a miss, but still the film is worth viewing, and it really says something about our sensation thirsty society.