Share?

Share? Surprised me. I almost turned it off several times due to its inane stupidity. I would call it satire more than a thriller. There isn't all that much thrill to it, but it takes very clear jabs at social media, social media addiction, and caricatures. The visual effects were laughable, the characters were stereotypical, and I didn't find any of it particularly funny or even really sci-fi related apart from the use of computers that were big in the 1980's.

I have seen far worse movies, though. This indie film was simply shot; the camera never moves. There are no shaky-cam shots, jump scares, explosions, or lens flares.

I'm actually glad for that, because they have enough trouble managing actual fire.

A lot is left unexplained but as this film seems message-focused, most people will just glaze over the lack of clarity.

Sadly, in my opinion, the film also blew its landing. People gained power and promptly abused it, as everyone knows they would. I won't spoil it for those who choose to watch it. I'll just say that it ultimately disappointed me.

This is just cube redone as a bunch of people in separate rooms. The only difference is most of the people are supposedly happy being prisoners. I guess that makes it original... The main character is ok but boring. No way people are paying to watch him fart.

It was hard to stay immersed in the movie, your mind wanders as it drags on and on. It should have been a short on Black Mirror. The yoga chick is the only one worth watching.

This was a tight budget, 1 camera same rooms over and over, Crappy TV monitors. Whole thing reeks of cheap.

I would not recommend but it isn't awful, just boring.

I was doing my daily ritual: taking 10-20 minutes scrolling through movie channels, adding things to watch later (and usually spending more time doing that than actually watching movies; I'll never, ever catch up to my list), and "Share?" popped up again. Today was finally the day I would give it a chance, and I was most pleased that I did. Thought-provoking, but not heavy handed, short, but not slight, and something I'll recommend to a wide swath of people. Might have to watch it again, and maybe very soon. (The last movie I wanted to see again almost immediately was "Beyond The Infinite Two Minutes".)

...might have been a better title. I appreciated this familiar thriller set in the near future, or now? It's easy to imagine or as the filmmaker not so subtly points out IS happening to us now. I could personally relate to the thrill of getting clicks and putting off more important things in my life but for what? Are we really living when we operate in this kind of void?

I also appreciated the simplicity of the setting and system by which the filmmaker brings us into this bleak and sterile world fulled by external forces, a faceless and relentless pressure to produce more and more and more - but for what? I'm looking forward to more films by this up and coming director writer.

Did you know that social media fosters toxic relationships among its users, who only gain clout and/or material gains by performing inanely for each other? In this fundamentally unbalanced type of community network, individuals are complicit for as long as they allow themselves to be seduced by the illusion of power-wow! That's the sort of asked and answered wisdom at the heart of "Share?," an ungenerous techno-satire about an unnamed man who wakes up in an unfurnished cell with only a computer monitor for company.

There's a little more to this sketchy sci-fi parable, all about a wary cipher, #000000014 (Melvin Gregg), who learns how to not only survive, but maybe even game his prison's live-streaming camera network, which connects imprisoned users through their respective computer monitors. But only a little. "Share?" ostensibly has a dark sense of humor, too, yet even its jokes point a lazy finger at viewers.

"Share?" is only 70+ minutes long, and it shows. We see the movie's world through the unblinking eye of #000000014's computer monitor, the one he also uses to broadcast a live video stream from inside his grey brutalist cell. Why is he there, and who's keeping him? That's an irrelevant mystery, according to co-writer/director Ira Rosensweig and co-writer Benjamin Sutor. Rather, we're supposed to focus on the patternmaking logic that leads #000000014 to figure out how to get attention from unseen viewers and earn points that he can convert into amenities, like food, clothes, or an inflatable mattress. #000000014 spends a lot of time peering into and through the camera frame since it's presented as a monitor. His computer seems pretty basic, given frequent prompts like "Share?" and "Good food?" It's almost as if social media and technology only grant its users' limited agency, maaan.