[critical] THE ROVER

Uonce more, I see the interactions between Cinema and Video Game.

Two media already in and of itself, exciting to watch : a young, but evolving at a good pace, the other technologically in the (r)evolution, but stagnant side proposals.

The video game manages to compete with Cinema in terms of staging, art direction or narrative. It also competes, the tv series now, when it comes to narrative spread out over the length, character development.

This fact has of course been spotted by the film industry, which now begins to be interested in the production of adaptations of the games (SILENT HILL, etc), integrate well-known actors (Kevin Spacey – Call of Duty, Ellen Page – Beyond 2 Souls) in the world of the video game. The Cinema has shaped the video game, which, once matured, is now starting to inspire the film. The loop is closed.

Of course, this opinion is quite personal.

A few examples :

– A game such as Bioshock relies both on an artistic direction incredibly worked (the game takes place in a city underwater abandoned and anchored in the 50s (!!!) former flagship of a kind of utopia half communist half capitalist) and a scenario that searched full of revelations and twists. A masterpiece.

– The series Uncharted, it was a tribute to the entire cinema of Spielberg’s particular INDIANA JONES.

A series that took the maturity of up to transcend the tribute in engineering to provide the a adventures video-fun the most impressive ever, with Uncharted 2, as the absolute role model of rhythm, immersion and staged one of the scenes put us in a building of nepal attacked by a helicopter overarmed ; the building will eventually collapse, with us inside (!!! bis).

I turn slightly this theme because for me,

one of the inspirations direct THE ROVER does not come from the cinema, but precisely in the video game.

Specifically, the Last of Us from the same studio that Uncharted (Naughty Dog).

The game featured Joel and Ellie, among the survivors of a post-apocalyptic world (a disease turns humans into pseudo-zombies), a cruel world, or the threat, the stronger is generally not zombiesque, but human.

The game, by its staging is more restrained than flashy, with a sensitivity range on the emotion slow, an artistic direction of incredible precision, able to immerse ourselves in his universe, yet not so original, and in the end, we knock out in a final absolutely insane, and yet without any spectacular.

The relationship between the characters and the consistency of this universe post apo were much more than the mechanics of the video game – albeit a very successful

THE ROVER shares many points with The Last Of Us.

Eric (Guy Pearce, perfect) and Joel share the same look. 40 years old, beard yucky recalling loneliness and lack of landmarks, family violence, instinctive and in-hesitantly, information on its past given drop, misanthropy inexplicable.

For Joel and Eric, every human being is a given. More or less useful, more or less problematic. A vision awful of what remains of the human species, which makes mandatory the character unsympathetic, but intriguing.

This character, therefore, seems to find in his partner – Ellie in the game, Rey (Robert Pattinson very well too) in the film, a reason for (over -) live, because the protection of the other, induces a form of fastener, revives a feeling that seemed gone forever.

For all that, even if the film and the game doesn’t offer any form of hope, they do it in a very different way.

By its very nature as a video game, Last Of Us, we forced them to integrate the feelings of the characters, since we had lived in an active manner multiple traumatic events, which reinforced the ultimate decisions of the characters, making a total darkness.

THE ROVER, of course, can’t suggest something as strong with this as a base. David Michôd pushes all the same talent with his vision misanthrope to the end and offers absolutely no way out of it, moral or physical, to its characters.

His talent is to induce a form of logical reasoning nihilistic.

“A film of a drought terrible, misanthrope, unsympathetic. But also a second revelation of the talent of David Michôd to give fullness to a material difficult to access. A film that shares much with the video game “The Last of Us””

The artistic direction of the film also borrows some elements to the video game. In particular, this atmosphere is dry and desert-like, but mostly thanks to the narrative through the environments. Person never explains what it is the famous “collapse” indicated in the credits, yet, some of the details very subtle revealing a universe much more detailed than it seems.

However, Last of Us allowed to have a more holistic view of the disaster, by the variety of environments offered. Urban or bucolic, living or abandoned.

THE ROVER is happening, to him, entirely in a desert landscape huge but paradoxically, anxiety-provoking.

Finally, the dynamic of the film, a road movie interspersed with meetings routinely very violent, layer the pace of the video game, big moment of contemplation interspersed with gunfights.

The violence, in both cases, is explicit, graphic, frontal, and concise.

David Michôd already director of the very good ANIMAL KINGDOM adds its personality to the whole.

A real talent for setting a scene in space and the narration of place each character on a path of great sense ; Who have totally assimilated to the base material, the survival post-apocalyptic, he observes the characters with nothing to lose otherwise the life. Like animals, all act on instinct. When emotions come into account, it usually means death. Cruel, but without a doubt realistic and even more disturbing.

This dry atmosphere, cruel, unhealthy is accompanied by music that lasts, the picture of the saxophone in rough of Colin Stetson. How to recall him to the spectator to keep as much on the lookout that the protagonists of the film.

To develop this reasoning, inter-media, I would say that

the culture of the video game begins to integrate our collective unconscious,

and that we begin to clearly see its effects in the media Cinema. Some films take over the mechanical (EDGE OF TOMORROW die & retry, SNOWPIERCER, structure worlds…) other the visual codes. (Speed racer) With THE ROVER, in addition to technical aspects, it comes to sensitivities like ;

in all cases, when we are presented the characters and universe, if a link unspeakable is created because you get the identify to something known, This allows it to help a producer, until the end of his approach, in the case of THE ROVER, a nihilistic, dehumanised and desperate.

We can even go so far as to imagine artists of all media interact between them. This promises a future trans-media turned to the proposal rather than the operating license or the repetition of forms is exhausted.

A rumor spoke of Paul Thomas Anderson who would Metal Gear Solid.

Imagine James Ellroy rewrite L. A. Noire, Viktor Antonov (art director for Half-Life2 and Dishonored), working with Steven Spielberg, Daft Punk composing the B. O. of a Ground!

In short, THE ROVER is a film of a drought terrible, misanthropic, uncompromising. But also a second revelation of the talent of David Michôd to give fullness to a material difficult to access.

A film which by its artistic direction, its subject is very close to one of the best video games of our generation : The Last of Us.

It is also the promise of an exciting future trans media, if the culture of the video game continues to integrate the collective unconscious.

• Original title : The Rover

• Production : David Michôd

• Screenplay : Joel Edgerton, David Michôd

• Main actors : Guy Pearce, Robert Pattinson, Scott Mc Nairy, David Field, Anthony Hayes

• Country of origin : Australia, U. S. A.

• Output : 04 June 2014

• Duration : 1h42mn

• Distributor : Metropolitan Film Export

• Synopsis : In a post-apocalyptic world, Eric continued with hard work the thieves of his car, a Rover. He will meet with Rey on his way…