Rebirth

Hey, you still have the Manifesto? The what? The Manifesto, man. Don't tell me you threw it away.

"Rebirth" is a psychological thriller of the Netflix collection. I certainly won't deny that I have become a fervent supporter of the Netflix Originals series. I've seen already some great movies ("Spectral", "iBoy", "Before I Wake" and "Message from the king"). And also some less successful experiments ("Mute" and "Death note" eg). "Rebirth" is a special case and ends somewhere in the middle. In essence, it's not such a bad movie, but there were certain aspects that made me really hate it. Some will even find it an annoying film. I still don't know whether I should take this film seriously or not. If it was meant to be serious and tried to create an image of how similar organizations function, then it was rather frightening. If, however, it was meant to be satirical, I guess I haven't noticed it then. For me it wasn't really funny.

For Kyle (Fran "The Living" Kranz) every day is a duplicate of the previous day. He can be seen as a settled and satisfied model citizen who carries out his day-to-day job. This seemingly carefree existence is thoroughly shaken up the day his crazy, hyper-kinetic ex-school friend Zack (Adam "Once upon a time in Venice" Goldberg) turns up in Kyle's office and reminds him that they once wrote down a promise. A "Manifesto" with one important slogan : "Don't be boring". And that's something Kyle, after agreeing to go to some bizarre reorientation weekend, is told several times. Unfortunately, "Rebirth" turned out to be somewhat boring with a disappointing final piece.

Fran Kranz convincingly plays the confused and panicky Kyle, who sees his smooth going civilian life reduced to a chaotic, uncontrollable nightmare. It's obvious the propagated message of the "Rebirth" program is all about self-control. "Rebirth" is about getting a grip on yourself and not apathetically following the course of the system (as zombies). According to Zack, it's all about rediscovering yourself and start loving life back again. The only thing Kyle seems to experience is that it's an insane and degrading program. The fact that Zack looks as if he has eaten too many psychedelic mushrooms, doesn't seem to help him either.

To be honest, the film really got on my nerves at certain moments. For example, there is the dazzlingly handsome Naomi (Nicky Whelan) who has the annoying habit of answering every question with a question. It was driving me crazy. The exaggerated group events also felt like a sort of mass hysteria. And it became a bit too predictable when Kyle ended up in a pillow-filled room with a couple lovely, very tasty looking women whose sex lives are clearly as exhilarating as watching a chess game. It looked like a hippie commune. It also felt rather surreal and unearthly.

As I said before, specially the end is disappointing. Initially, you see an organization trying to recruit members by means of brainwashing and psychological pressure. I admit it was intriguing. But in the end it felt incomplete. Perhaps also due to the lack of any explanation. Initially, "Rebirth" looked like a sort of sect, full of esoteric ideas and dogmas, with the aim of allowing the participants to experience a rebirth in which all connections with their inculcating, self-centered living environment are cut. It wants to hold an imaginary mirror up to them and show that the participants are living in an artificial world controlled by others. That they are puppets in a social puppet theater where others pull the strings. Or also, an artificial bubble that you don't want to pierce because of the comfort, their acquired status and financial security. Afterwards, it seems to be nothing else than a cheap sales organization of food products, which they try to sell through networking at well-organized home parties. In the end it felt like I had just attended a Tupperware demonstration.

This has got to be the strangest film, I've ever seen. However, in this particular case I am not sure that's a good thing. Throughout the movie, you don't really know what's happening which is usually a good aspect. At first, it seemed promising but it ends in an unexpected way. I would say the plot was decent, creative in a way, but the execution was mediocre. I was expecting something entirely different. The ending sucked A LOT, it was unpredictable in a bad way. The downside for me was the way the film ended. You could connect with the movie at some points. The start is pretty good, it shows a promising film. It was such a weird movie that it made me write a review, something that I never do.

How many movies do we need, with the 'only in a movie' plot of some poor dumb schmuck ALLOWING himself to be subjected to endless UNCONVINCING mind games throughout? The viewer is set up with the idea that the schmuck is going to learn some valuable lesson by the time it's through. But he's a non-existent movie stock character: anyone in real life would catch on that they're being gulled and would yell "you can all go f____ yourselves" and storm out, but this is the character who never does. I did, about 45 minutes in. Anyone want to post a spoiler and tell me if the lesson he learns is how to do that?

Rebirth is one of those movies I confess to enjoying, but I genuinely didn't have a clue what was going on. It was trippy, gripping, and just plain bonkers. It was disturbing, but did tell a good story, how we're incredibly materialistic as a society, and how we're all totally reliant on our phones. The film had a slightly odd homo erotic feel about it I thought. Very well acted, Fran Kranz and Adam Goldberg were excellent.

It's a film you could easily dismiss, saying it makes no sense, but it's actually well written, and neatly crafted. I loved the 'not a cult' theme that ran through it.

Marketing will be the death of us all!

Enjoyed it, 7/10

This gets an average rating. The plot was extremely good, great acting and there was a wonderful claustrophobic feel to it. Unfortunately, as compelling as it was, the pacing was all off, and I found myself getting bored about three-quarters of the way through. It almost felt as if it could have been an hour long and much more satisfying.

As mentioned though, the acting was really good, and there was some real talent on show; I would hope that some of the names in the film go on to bigger things as the characterisations were fantastic.

It's definitely worth your while to watch it if you've already got Netflix, but beyond that I'm not really sure of its place in cinematic history.