Disclaimer: Contains spoilers!
Plot Summary: A man down on his luck is offered a chance to win a fortune as long as he completes thirteen, increasingly dangerous and humiliating challenges.
Review: While the general premise of a death game isn't entirely original, this film takes things up a notch and questions what wouldn't people do for the right price? The thing that works in this story is that the challenges are wholly unique from one another--each testing certain facets where sane people might draw a line from a moral perspective. Or, if you've already committed to a certain number of heinous deeds, would you feel justified in continuing onward? I really love when a movie can get people thinking...unfortunately, the payoff at the end is disappointing with a stupid revelation, unanswered questions, and some shameless sequel-baiting. However, to heavily compensate for this disappointment, we have the appearance of one of this blog's patron saints, Achita Sikamana--otherwise known as Natre herself from "Shutter." She's looking a lot more normal here, but I'll take what I can get since this chickadee doesn't act much. Probably too busy running around Thailand freaking people out.
The story focuses on a guy named Chit just as his life is falling apart financially; his car has been repossessed, his bills are overdue, he's just been fired from his job, etc. Receiving a mysterious call, Chit begins a series of questionable challenges to earn money with each subsequent challenge offering more money than the last to correspond with the difficulty of completion. There are rules though which include Chit not being able to tell anyone about the game which means his friend/semi-love interest, Tong (played by Ms. Sikamana), is left to figure out what's gone wrong on her own. The film hints that many of the challenges are based upon events in Chit's life which begs the question of how anyone could possibly know these aspects. We could easily speculate, but I'm gonna call bullshit on a lot of it unless you want to introduce a supernatural level of omniscience.
With Chit accomplishing more and more deranged and disgusting challenges, he becomes unhinged, so fixated on the prize that he abandons who he truly is. Hell, he's come this far--eating a fly and shit...beating and killing several people--why stop now, right? After wreaking havoc across the city, Chit is lured to a strange building where he must confront his final challenge: murdering his own abusive father. Of course we know Chit will regain his humanity at this point, but that's when the film decides to fall to pieces. We come to learn that Chit's father was also playing his own game whereby killing Chit was his 13th challenge. Likewise, Tong finds the "mastermind" of this shit which is just some fucking stupid little kid. Yeaaah, okaaay. There is a short that connects to this film, called "12 Begin," but, believe me, it doesn't fill in any of these fucking holes; if anything it adds more confusion to the mix. To make matters worse, just when you're hoping for some kind of definitive conclusion, we are shown Tong waking up--god knows where--and this one cop is there, implying he will work with her to uncover the people behind this game. We don't even figure out how many people are watching this show and to what end. With a story like this, and given the longer running time, I think the audience is owed a degree of closure better than that. Who knows, maybe one day we can get a proper sequel with Ms. Sikamana returning.
Overall, this is a fun and engaging film if you aren't too grossed out or unnerved by a few challenges. I know a lot of sites list this as a horror, but, realistically, this is an action-thriller. It is probably longer than it needs to be, however, the pacing is on point with Chit jumping from challenge to challenge in just the amount of time to keep things entertaining. At the same time, Chit is a sympathetic character despite his actions to the contrary. I can certainly imagine the average person eagerly doing what he does if offered the right amount of money; probably would do it for less too. Of course, the main draw for me is Achita Sikamana since I so rarely get to discuss her beyond her role as Natre. Now, there is a remake, which I will cover as well, but I'd still recommend checking this out regardless.
Notable Moment: When all the bikers are decapitated by the wire clothesline. The CG is a bit shoddy on the one guy, but this is probably the most devastating of the challenges.
Final Rating: 6.5/10
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