4 gibbles out of 5

Director: Daniel Minahan

‘Series 7’ has remained surprisingly fresh considering its a reality-TV movie that came out in 2001, right at the beginning of the burst of reality TV.  And interestingly, it’s gotten better.  We’ve seen the “death as entertainment” theme in movies before, and even though ‘Series 7’ – presented as a marathon of the ‘Contenders’ TV show where contestants are given weapons and told that the survivor (i.e. the not dead person) gets to go on the next series (Series 8) – even though the style was unique at the time, it flirted with dark comedy and commentary in pretty obvious and cheesy way, making for an interesting but not too impactful movie.  Years later, we’ve seen all of this on TV now.  Maybe not the death, but that cheesy editing style and over-dramatic presentation is the truth, and my saturation to it allowed me to see this not as commentary, but just a view: if this happens, this is what it would look and sound like.

It’s bereft of the heavy-handed lessons that pop-up in these style films.  I should’ve read director Minahan’s liner notes more carefully: he states that the movie wasn’t meant to be a judgment of reality TV, positive or negative.  He grew up watching COPS, which was considered trash when I was a youth but ended up being a template for what was to come.  And the greatest joy was when ‘Survivor’ premiered when the film was in the last stages of editing – Minahan saw that he had properly emulated where TV was going, stylistically, dramatically, everything.  In that lens, it’s an amazing achievement.

The cast really helps this.  Reality TV has this strange surreality to it, where real people are skewed simply through being viewed by us.  You’ll recognize some faces in the cast, and there are certainly some stereotypes (the religious nurse, the deadbeat unemployed dad) but there’s never a doubt when watching the movie that these people could be – and seem to be – real people.  And there are some winks snuck in there, but its not the obvious layer of morality that you’d expect.  It’s again, just saying – look what happens when you put a camera on someone.  So many films have approached this topic, but ‘Series 7’ is dedicated to it thanks to its format, and never flinches.

There’s an alternate ending to the film on the DVD that, initially, I thought was darker, and more “meaningful.”  But now I feel the opposite.  Minahan remains true to what he was attempting to achieve.  That “meaning” is forced in reality TV thanks to swelling strings and edited conversations.  That’s what we get here.  It’s imperfect because it’s ongoing.  The show ends how a real show would end – leading into the next episode.

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