Portal: No Escape
Portal: No escape is a short film set in the world of Valve Software’s exciting Portal game that took the gaming world by storm a few years ago and revisited in Portal 2 this year. The film was recently released and is already building quite a following, being compared to Escape from City 17 1&2, short films set in another Valve games universe.
No Escape centers on a woman who wakes in a mysterious cell with no recollection of how she came to be there. Eventually she manages to find the portal gun and make her daring escape.
Despite the fact that this film is based in the portal universe, a world with a lot of die hard fans, the creators have not felt it necessary to stick to rigidly to the source material. They have clearly done their best to keep things accurate and throw in plenty of game references, however where this was not possible in a real world situation they have done the best they could and created something that works better for the medium. The opposite of this can be seen in the Escape from City 17 films.
Made by the Purchase brothers these films try and stick to the games canon as rigidly as possible introducing many creatures and characters from the games. While this would be a welcome turn of events to many fans I feel it has not done the movie justice. There are many CG elements within the movie which considering the amateur status of the film makers is done exceptionally well. However it is not quite well enough to escape from the uncanny valley, the term used when something is nearly life like but just enough is wrong with it that our brains don’t like the look of it and reject the image. So much of the City 17 films is CG from the police forces helmets to the alien and zombie menace, even all of the sky and cityscapes have been artificially created. Unfortunately this jogged me so far out of the immersion of the film I was less able to concentrate on what was actually happening in the film.
No escape on the other hand has decide that with its lack of true to game portal gun and security helmets that they would just have to make do with what they can. Sure this means the guards are running around in paintball masks but it allows the viewer to quickly accept this and then focus on the action again. The film is not without it CG elements but the director Dan Trachtenberg and his team have tried to keep them to a minimum or at least of a variety that they could efficiently handle, so that it blends seamlessly with the live action.
The movie has a great pace keeping us questioning what is happening to begin with and then tense and on our toes during the escape. I especially like that the story telling has been completed almost without any dialogue what so ever, instead using on screen action and subtle music to build mood.
The Purchase brothers movies can be found on YouTube, as can a making of feature for No Escape.
Enjoy.
Opening it up made it much more accessible to non-gamers, it stands very well by itself, though the portal gag is not immediately apparent till she puts he hand through it.
ReplyDeleteA film like this works because a minds crave meaning, when we find it, it is literally pleasurable, evolutionary psychologist argue it that this is adaptive. That is those ancient human that were able to solve puzzles, (where did that giant pussy cat go?), fared better.
One strategy in film is to always have a mystery, the audience finds an answer to it but in the process uncovers another mystery. Each time the audience solves a problem, they get a squirt of endorphins, (pleasurable), every time they get another mystery they become engaged.