| 06 July 2010
Released earlier this year, British psychological thriller Exam chronicles the fate of eight candidates as they enter into the final stage of recruitment for a mysterious Fortune 500 company. However, being one of the most influential, and secretive, companies in the world, it soon becomes apparent that the candidates are faced with no ordinary selection process, and the movies 100 minute run time serves as an insight into what people will, and won't do for the sake of money, prestige and power.
With regard to the films premise, it's a remarkably simple set up; after making it to the final round of selection, the candidates are placed in an exam room together, and are given eighty minutes to complete a test. In order to do so, they need only answer one question. The caveat to this, is that the candidates must first figure out what the question is, all the while following a strict set of rules – deviation from the rules in any way results in failure of the test, and immediate expulsion from the selection process.
As it winds toward its climax, the movie takes some bizarre twists and turns as the candidates try to figure out the question, with each idea becoming more and more outlandish as they get closer to the eighty minute deadline, and before long, the candidates begin to turn on one another as desperation and suspicion take hold.
Despite a chaotic, and somewhat predictable ending, the movie starts out well, and does a good job of drawing the viewer in by creating a palpable sense of intrigue, and before long you'll find yourself joining in with the guessing games and semantic evaluations. Most of the logic the movie employs in dealing with its central mysteries is easy enough for the viewer to follow along with, and in some cases the movie even does a good job of subtly leading the viewer to a certain conclusion, only to later show it to be nothing more than a dead end.
The movie also does a good job of showing how easily people can get swept up by the tide of unfolding events, especially when part of a group of like-minded individuals; during the course of the movie, the candidates ideas dovetail from rational and well thought out, to tenuous and frantic all too easily as time continues to slip away from them.
However, the film is let down somewhat by the ending, both in terms of the deterioration of the volatile group dynamic, which seems a bit silly, and by the ending itself – parts of which seem largely telegraphed.
Despite this though, Exam's premise is still an interesting idea for a movie, and is, for the most part at least, quite entertaining, as well as being something of a pastiche of (and perhaps a cautionary tale for) reality TV shows.
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