After the Dark

It is a shame when such a great idea with so much potential is executed improperly and inevitably fails. That is the case here with 'After the Dark.' The film begins immersing you into the world of Philosophy. The teacher asks his class questions revolving around situations of morality or rationality and how they would go about it. You find yourself answering these hypothetical questions for yourself and then realizing that this is a movie that you can become indulged in without any proper knowledge of philosophy. The one thing that the film did do well was taking an experiment that realistically only took place in one location, and made it interesting by adding other dimensions to it. This was repeated three times with different outcomes and I would find myself correcting their mistakes, thinking that I could figure this puzzle out. What I didn't know was that the movie in itself was a puzzle I would never figure out.

'After the Dark' felt like a 1,000 piece puzzle that you were just about to finish perfectly until you realize that the last piece just doesn't fit right. The movie up until the final 20 minutes or so is really intriguing. It asks all the right questions to get your brain working, however, your brain is working towards an answer that is never given to you. The ending doesn't make sense by any means and it certainly doesn't tie everything up in a nice bow like you so desperately hoped for. Instead, it leaves you questioning the fate of some of the characters and why the last hour of the movie was even relevant.

Aside from some beautiful cinematography, satisfying performances from a young cast and an original take on a film, 'After the Dark' doesn't deliver. It tries to answer questions that no one was searching for a resolution to and denies to answer the questions they were so evidently setting up throughout the entire film.

The concept of this movie seemed promising; a philosophical thought experiment where you must decide who should live and who should die, all presented in a way that was both entertaining and involving for the audience. In the end though, I came away feeling that the script had been written by two people: the first 2 thirds were written by someone who did a crash course in philosophy and had only a vague understanding of the ideas they were trying to explore, and the final third was written by someone who manages to pull off the challenge of being unbelievably self-righteous despite their IQ of 70.

At the start, it (very) quickly glances over some other thought experiments which involve conflicts of rationality and morality (5 people tied to one train track, 1 person tied to parallel track, train coming down track with 5 people, but you have a switch that will change the track the train goes down to the one with only 1 person on, do you flip the switch?). They're well known to anyone who's familiar with utilitarianism, but anyone who's not covered them before will probably be left confused as to how the movie concludes immediately after asking the question that the switch flippers are murderers and offering no explanation as to why. But it's at least getting people warmed up for actively participating in the thought experiment rather than just being passive observers.

The main thought experiment, deciding who should get to live, is pretty interesting at first. Rationality and logic will be most peoples tools for deciding; the people who bring the greatest benefit to humanity should live. The movie then tries to test the boundaries of how far you'll stay rational for the greater good in situations which you may find immoral. Can 'bad' actions be justified if they're for the greater good (e.g. dropping the atom bomb to end WW2)? While this is good in concept, the script and characters fail to pull it off in a convincing way. The characters put up fights on grounds of morality in such petty issues that they come across as just being whiny children throwing a tantrum rather than humans stretched to the limits of what they'll do in pursuit of the greater good and finally drawing a line in what they can bear to justify to themselves as 'the rational thing to do'.

It was the final third that really ruined the film though. Up until then it may not have been great, but it was at least trying to explore philosophical problems. But at this point the self-righteous writer who can barely spell philosophy, let alone comprehend it, takes over. They completely ignore every concept of right and wrong the film has previously been exploring. The writer goes off on their own tangent with their view of what's 'good', which doesn't seem too bad at first, except it appears to be written by someone who has never actually stopped to consider why they judge something as 'good'. There is neither rationality nor logic behind their ideas, no concept of the greater good, in fact, you'd be hard pushed to find any interpretation of morality where the final writers 'good' may fit in to. It's just selfish, unbelievably stupid and defies any kind of logic. The writer isn't trying to write a thought provoking script, he's trying to write a 'feel good' story that ignores reality and is completely unrelated to anything previously discussed in the movie. I believe the writer was trying to convey something along the lines of rationality and logic not being the gold standard when it comes to morality, but he failed in showing anyone why this might be. His attempt to show this may have actually being so poor that, inadvertently, he actually reinforced the importance of rationality.

I think the movie does deserve some credit for presenting a story that will get viewers thinking about some interesting concepts, for that I would still recommend it for people unfamiliar with philosophy, but if you are familiar with the concepts covered then I don't think it's worth watching as it will add nothing new to what you already know and will probably end up just irritating you.

I liked the first half hour a lot actally. I wish it was just a short film becouse it would have been way better that way. That is all I have to say. It should have ended after they played out the first scene. (By the first scene I mean the first time they died in the bunker. Becouse everything after that was just complete BS. It was like they decided that they didn't actually want the story and the plot to make any sense and they flashed it down the toilet. And than there is the actual ending. It wasn't even worth watching becouse it had no relation to the story. It was about as bad as when the author decides they don't know how to finish a story and just says that it was all a dream.

A bunch of kids who all seem to have arrived from the same toothpaste or shampoo commercial turn up for their last day at school ever. The teacher decides to run a philosophy role-play as a kind of review session. What follows are momentous life-and-death decisions with huge consequences for the fate of the human race.

Or not, as it turns out - because it is a classroom exercise. All the exotic settings, CGI explosions, and crisp cinematography cannot distract us from the fact that all that is at stake here is an A, B or C grade. There isn't even a mention that someone might FAIL the class - the stakes are that low! The teacher threatens the lead girl with losing her A+ in a manner that, if taken seriously, would see him fired for power harassment and incompetence. Are we meant to fear for her in this ludicrous moment? Unfortunately, that is as dramatic as this film gets.

The so-called philosophy is preachy and immature. The pupils all kind of blend into each other as characterisation is one-note. And absolutely nothing of value is tested or put at risk here. It's like The Breakfast Club was never made.

How this screenplay made it to the top of anyone's pile is a crime that should be investigated. Two stars - one for the cinematography, the other for the huge drinking game potential.

The idea behind it is great, but I do not think anyone can actually create a film from that idea that an educated audience or anyone who has taken a philosophy class would find acceptable. I will not go into details as there are far too many instances in every scene of the film that make you question the believability that these students have ever taken a single philosophy class.

To enjoy this film I feel you need to ignore the played out apocalyptic scenarios completely and only focus on the two lead characters and the teacher and take it for what it is. If you are expecting to watch a film that is intelligent and driven by strong performances you will be sadly let down. You could seriously watch this film with your television on mute and understand the story just as well.