The philosophy teacher Mr. Zimit (James D’Arcy) of a high school senior class at an international school in Jakarta presents an extremely challenging role play on their last day of school:
It’s pretty much the atomic apocalypse, and they have the change to get to a nearby bunker. The bunker will protect them, and can keep them alive and healthy for a year. The problem is the bunker can only have 10 people, and there are 21 of them, including Zimit.
Choosing will have to based on practicality as the teacher has them randomly choose an occupation. So obviously the organic farmer (James, played by Rhys Wakefield) is exponentially luckier than the poet.
As they get more into the game, they get more freaked out by how ready and willing Zimit is to eliminate the “useless” ones. He also says he is the wild card, so they might or might not be missing something essential if they don’t let him.
But based on his erratic behavior, they don’t pick Zimit, and it turns out he is the one with the exit code to the bunker: they have one year to see if they’ll be able to leave, or die there after their resources run out.
And this is only the first iteration. There will be two more – with two more very interesting situations, occupations and the desirability of the candidates changing.
So everyone gets to see what the other is made of, and we end up with a very interesting story about how even the most supposedly rational people give in to their urges.
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After the Dark (originally called The Philosophers) is an intriguing film with potentially a disappointing ending. I say potentially, because I initially hated it. But after thinking about the whole story, from the beginning, it made a lot of sense. It also explained the irrationality of their teacher in all of the situations, and his hostility toward James.
Now, you will probably hate a few characters, the teacher being one of them. The female protagonist, Petra (Sophie Lowe, Once Upon a Time in Wonderland) might also get on your nerves after you see the whole picture. You will probably also think the students didn’t think things through in certain situations and could have been more rational and smarter, ending their iterations with much better results.
But after you think about how normally rational people tend to act irrationally in so many situations, it will make sense. It might not be the ending I’d have gone with if I were the writer; but with these characters, I’m fine with the ending, and I like the movie as a whole (though I find the first half a bit more exciting.)
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This is an interesting, post-apocalyptic movie about rationality and human nature in general. Recommended.
Written and directed by John Huddles.
PS Is it just me or does James D’Arcy remind you of Jack Davenport (Steve of Coupling)?
