The Platform

The film offers quite a lot of entertainment for an obviously low budget. What the screenplay couldn't provide in terms of a plot was more than made up for by excellent dialogue. Given that it was a single-location film, I had a surprisingly good time, especially compared to the agony of watching The Painted Bird. A fan of Don Quixote starts fighting the windmills without realizing how futile his efforts are, what a paradox. Anyway, the banquet was amazing. It’s kind of what it looks like in a seaside hotel when a tour of greedy pigs arrives, and they don't even need 333 floors. It took me a while to get over the incredibly idiotic ending. (21/05/2020)

How the final five minutes can drag a film into average territory... That could be the title of this movie. The concept is undoubtedly top-notch; the idea of a vertical prison where the amount of food decreases as you go down is brilliant. Hats off to whoever came up with that idea. At its core, the film offers a simple story, but it’s spiced up with a captivating visual style and genuinely unpleasant explicit scenes (the cannibalism is particularly striking). You should prepare yourself for some stomach-churning moments. These elements elevate the experience and enhance the film. It focuses mainly on exploring human nature under duress, highlighting traits like GREED and SELFISHNESS. The main character is quite likable, and I was genuinely interested in how this intriguing story would conclude. However, then came an absolute creative disaster: as the end credits rolled, I found myself thinking, "Is that it?" It’s probably the disappointment of the year; the potential was so much greater. To waste it like this... I can’t understand it. For me, it’s a weaker three stars... 5.5/10. (01/04/2020)

This is a thriller reminiscent of Snowpiercer about a vertical prison, which also serves as a metaphor for human society and its caste. Together with the voluntarily imprisoned protagonist, we gradually discover the rules of the prison, the multiple floors of which form individual cells. A table with food gradually passes through the cells once a day, from which prisoners can eat anything left over from those above them. The prisoners are moved every month, so we get to see the very different situations on different floors, and this fantastic, distressing, and sinister excursion culminates in the hero's decision to try something no one before him has tried. One would like to know more, but the film does not answer everything and, in its fictional world, it creates its own logic, according to which it is necessary to play and not dispute it too much. This an excellently written, uncompromising, brutal, striking, suspenseful (and sometimes even funny) and engaging allegory, perceiving human society as a collection of hungry selfish people, with clever dialogues, excellent disturbing moments and an innovative environment. It is attractive in its resistance and the clear and simple mechanism by which it is driven. There is beauty in simplicity, and this is certainly true here. (08/10/2019)

The coronavirus would spread like crazy there, brrr! On the one hand, this is a relatively literal social critique with an ending that’s perhaps a bit too abstract. On the other hand, it’s a pretty brutal and nutritious massacre that’s not afraid to go a little beyond the viewer’s comfort zone and be more brutal that most Netflix productions. The result is not fully bulletproof – the role of most of the secondary characters remains foggy – but overall, The Platform has such swag, pace and balls that will surely be remembered as that film “about the weird vertical prison with a platform full of food” that people will talk about. (21/03/2020)

The Spanish movie The Platform is a good study of human nature when individuals find themselves in almost absurd living conditions that take them to the edge and perhaps push them over. Sure, this is a movie similar to the horror of Cube or Saw, although the psychological aspect has been brought to the fore with a form of a social experiment that is unlikely to end well. (08/06/2020)