I thought I was going to spend 106 minutes watching some five ‘yoots’ typing on a keyboard. Any writer or director making a film about internet chat is stuck with this difficult problem – how do you turn an inherently un-cinematic idea – as two strangers sitting apart typing at keyboards (not relating to one another but to words on a screen) – into something dramatically picturesque and exciting?
Most films try to compensate by having the characters read what they are typing aloud, You’ve Got Mail (1998) – or by printing the words in 42 point font so that they are easily readable.
After watching Chatroom, you can only imagine how much all the others fail at even approximating what chatting involves on an emotional and psychological level in the seedier and sleazier parts of the internet, where anything can happen, and where violence (although entirely psychological) can be very, very real. Chatroom is a visual metaphor on the mysteries surrounding our fast changing digital world!
Chatroom is brilliant and the people effortlessly jump from real life to the chatroom which is portrayed as a run down hotel where all chatrooms are represented by different doors. It is stylishly shot. The visuals are tight and expert, while the film is greatly aided by a dense techno soundscape.
It is a movie worth seeing about a topic worth discussing. I would say it rivals Darren Aronofsky’s Requiem For a Dream!
Some reviewers billed it as ‘The Anti-Social Network’. Why? I guess as a way of likening it to ‘The Social-Network’ or saying it is not to par. But this description is only infantile and serves to only underscore my perception that a lot of these reviewers lack the basic understanding of our modern day’s world wide web. One reviewer said:
It is this film’s misfortune to appear at around the same time as The Social Network and Catfish, two hugely sophisticated and insightful films about the internet and the digital age. In comparison, this silly drama from Japanese director Hideo Nakata, scripted by Enda Walsh, looks naive, prurient and condescending about the web and young web users.
I honestly have no idea what this reviewer just said. I only insert it here as a warning to all those who think film critics and IMDB should influence what they see. Some even claim The Social Network is more of a Social Commentary than Chatroom. Dios mio! Maybe if it was called The Social Chatroom then they would see what a fabulous social commentary Chatroom is!
Plus, IMDB has the bravura to give this exquisite piece of art a 5.3 rating? Well, Jack and Jill, this is where I upset the applecart. Chatroom is a fine piece of Cinema and you should see it!
One challenging problem for any writer/director is adapting a play. You are like what? But check out For Colored Girls (2010) and The Sunset Limited (2011) and you will know what I mean. Chatroom does not only do this very well, but it’s able to navigate through characters pretty impressively. Like Mo (Daniel Kaluuya), who admits to sexual impulses for an 11 year-old girl, but is at the same time not demonized and continues to be treated sympathetically throughout the rest of the story, even if the movie never particularly addresses the wider moral and psychological angles of his desires.
Chatroom introduces us to a group of five troubled teens, each with their issues. This includes Mo, Emily (looking for attention from her family), Eva (lacking respect from her friends) and finally Jim and William who are both clinically depressed. Recognizing the easy mark, William singles out Jim, played by Matthew Beard who was last seen as Graham in An Education. Once Jim reveals he’s been taking anti-depressants William urges him off them, opening the emotional floodgates. The main topic here is isolation, all these kids have problems and the forlorn William manipulates them via the chatroom. He gets into their heads and influences their lives with devastating effect.
Chatroom becomes even more striking when Hideo Nakata tries to visualize other familiar features of internet chat – like the paedophile that tries to enter the chatroom and keeps flickering back and forward between being a teenage girl and a middle-aged man after William exposes him.
I don’t quite understand why Chatroom was billed as a horror film especially in the way it is sold. It is probably something that comes with Nakata’s long and famed associations with the sensational Japanese horror hit The Ring (1998) and its sequel The Ring 2 (1999).
But since then, Hideo Nakata has made several films that attempted to move beyond horror with Chaos (1999), Sleeping Bride (2000) and Last Scene (2002), but unfortunately to no particular appeal. He bounced back with the subsequent horror hit, Dark Water (2002) and then missed the boat entirely with subsequent genre entries Kaidan (2007) and L: Change the World (2008). Chatroom is the second English-language film from the Japanese director.
This is a Psychological Thriller folks! And it is quite a fine piece of Cinema!
[sws_blue_box box_size=”580″]Genre: Drama | Thriller
Director: Hideo Nakata
Writers: Hideo Nakata and Enda Walsh
Stars: Aaron Johnson, Imogen Poots and Matthew Beard
Release Date: 11 August 2010 [/sws_blue_box]
Am definitely checking out this movie tonight and let you guys know what I think.
I enjoyed the movie too and thought the idea of visualizing a chat room was very innovative. Never knew it was adapted from a play. And Nakata is a very busy director, look at all those films!
I saw this a couple of days ago and yearr, the IMDB thing is crazy, I can’t believe they gave the movie a 5.3! That is just pretentious. I mean, pretending this is not a good movie? What do they want? What with the talk about social commentary? That’s complete boollsh*t. You need to do more reviews here about more movies so other people can have a different perspectives.
This a a great movie right here! All grease to Nakata’s elbows.
I have watched this movie and i must confess that it is one of the most exciting pieces of cinema i have seen in my entire life. And I can say that because I am quite old enough to make such a claim – a claim that deserves the respect from others. This movie is a good one. Not even once was I bored. I loved every scene no matter how slow the beginning took to build. I love this movie and I hope people will bring themselves to watching a fine piece of cinema.
This movie is on point. People really need to see this!
This movie was whack. Who want to watch a movie about chatroom. The thing is so outdated. Nobody even knows about chatrooms anymore because they are outmoded. Making movie about some outmoded stuff is seriously a lack of creativity in my book. You sit down one morning and you decide let’s make a movie about some pristine idea. Who does that. No wonder it got a 5.3 on IMDB. I am sure it will keep going down further. ‘Trial’ did it on the topic of the Kafka Parable and it did not work. archaic ideas don’t make good movies so keep this in mind.