Today I went to see “Iron Lung” with grandson prime. He is a big fan of the writer/director and star of the movie Mark Fischbach or as he’s known on YouTube, Markiplier. Mark has about 35 million followers on YouTube and leveraging that much support he was able to make the movie with his own money (~ three million dollars) and get it distributed to over 3,000 theaters in the United States. It’s been in the theaters for a couple of weeks and has made already something like thirty million dollars. Estimates say it’ll end up at forty million dollars. After giving the theaters half of this he’ll get twenty million dollars which is six times what he invested; an unheard-of return on investment for a motion picture in this day and age.
All very interesting. How was the movie?
(Spoiler Alert – Skip down to last paragraph to avoid spoilers and read recommendation)
Full disclosure. This movie is not for anyone who doesn’t know the background “mythos” from the video game of the same name. The visuals, the dialog, the “easter eggs” that the story revolves around will be difficult-to-impossible to understand without prior knowledge of the plot elements that only the die-hard fans of the game know beforehand.
The plot revolves around a convict being promised a reprieve if he will allow himself to be welded into a small submarine and dropped into an ocean of human blood that has been found on a “moon” somewhere out in interstellar space. And this is being done in the hope that the convict will find something in this ocean to help explain and potentially remediate the result of the “Quiet Rapture.” And what this refers to is the sudden and inexplicable disappearance of all the planets and stars that humanity had colonized in interstellar space. The only humans remaining are one that were off-planet in space stations and ships. This remnant of humanity is attempting to marshal its remaining numbers and resources to attempt to save the human race from extinction.
Once the prisoner (Simon) is submerged he looks for anything that could help explain the rapture. And during his voyage he encounters harsh working conditions of the craft, hostile life, proof of the bad intentions of his mission handlers and the existence of some malevolent intelligence that is undermining his grasp on reality and even his sanity.
Eventually we discover that his handlers really never intended to rescue him at the end of the mission and we also discover that the intelligence he senses emanates from contact with the extra-dimensional creatures that killed off humanity and eliminated the stars and planets of our universe for the sake of their own plans for our space. And the ocean of blood is all that remains of the murdered human race.
At the end, as both Simon and his handlers face destruction at the hands of these malevolent beings all he can do with his last efforts is eject from his submarine a flotation device carrying the records of what he’s discovered for the sake of some follow up mission that might try to use the knowledge gained to help mankind in some unspecified and apparently hopeless effort.
Wow, bleak! As I said earlier, no one but fans of the creator of this movie will know what’s going on. It’s too confusing and intentionally cryptic. And talk about your depressing story. This is the ultimate. But at the same time there is a huge and enthusiastic fan base for just this story. Mark’s viewers and the video game’s players are literally LEGION! So, if you’re not in those categories you won’t and probably shouldn’t go to this movie. And if you are you almost certainly will go and maybe several times with friends of the same persuasion for company. And as I’ve said before this may be the beginning of a new way to make and target entertainment. Gen Z likes its own things. And they aren’t as interested as the Millennials in being preached to by movie studios about what they should like and what they shouldn’t. And good for them. The interesting thing is that Mark Fischbach wants to create more content that entertains his audience and produce other people’s stories for this audience. Maybe I should send him my “screen play” for the “The Sniper.”