Incontrol Review: A group of college students discover a machine that allows them to control their peers in this dangerous tech-noir.
Incontrol Review
Incontrol receives its European premiere at this weekend’s Frightfest. It’s not your typical Frightfest film, it’s not a scary slasher or horrifying ghost story, but it definitely still has a place within the festival. The five day event celebrates the dark heart of cinema and the premise for Incontrol taps directly into that mission statement.
Samantha (Anja Savic) is a shy and studious student, working part-time to pay her way through college. Her life is horribly mundane and she dreams of a more interesting life. Then she meets Mark (Levi Meaden), a fellow student who opens her eyes to a whole new world. Mark, along with two others, has claimed ownership of a very strange machine, one that allows you to be transported into the head of a stranger. Here you can live out all your fantasies, and Samantha is soon hooked. As the obsession increases, she finds herself fighting to keep herself sane, can she make it out with her sanity in tact?
Incontrol Review
Described as a low-tech science-fiction film, Incontrol has a very interesting and thought-provoking subject matter. What if you were given the power to hop into someone’s brain? By being behind the wheel of someone else’s body are you committing the ultimate crimes, stripping away their free-will? Would there ever be a valid time to use such a machine? Is this simply extreme voyeurism? It’s certainly a film that will spark post-screening debates.
It can also read as a movie that makes a commentary on society’s over-reliance on machines. Granted, Samantha is using the machine to control those around her, but as she becomes more involved, it could be argued that it’s really the machine controlling her. It’s an interesting message, and one that is very relevant in our technology obsessed culture.
Sadly for a film filled with so many interesting ideas and concepts, the plot doesn’t quite hold up. This is due in part to the film being only 77 minutes long. There just isn’t the time to create something worthy of the ideas on offer. These are things that need to be thought through fully, and here they don’t get that time to ruminate. The end result is a half-baked Flatliners meets Being John Malkovich, interesting enough, but missing that vital spark to stand out on its own.
Incontrol review by Kat Hughes, August 2017.
Incontrol is currently playing as part of the Horror Channel Frighfest 2017 programme. The film sales are being handled by Devilworks.
