Pertaining To Exam

Eight candidates. Eighty minutes. One question. The person who gives the right answer will receive a highly sought-after job. The others will go home disappointed. Unfortunately, the candidates are faced with a bit of a quandary from the get-go - they don't know what the question is.

I wasn't sure what to expect from this movie. It's 101 minutes long, and I had heard that very nearly all of it takes place in one room. That didn't sound like a winning formula. But the movie ended up as refreshing just because of its simplicity. Some movies rely on jumping around to different locations in an attempt to create a fast-paced tone. Most movies tend to skip over annoying elements like traveling, time spent eating or sleeping, and other boring, time-consuming things. Exam doesn't skip a minute from the time the candidates enter the room to the time the exam is over.

While going over eighty minutes spent in a single room might seem very boring, suspense and puzzlement grow gradually and then by leaps and bounds as the exam nears its end. Unexpected developments pop up occasionally, and the mystery of where the question is hidden kept me on the edge of my seat.

Another interesting thing is the time and effort the filmmakers obviously put into forming characters. Each of the candidates has his or her own motives and personality, with no real stereotypes. The closest to a stereotypical character is probably the psychologist, who is an exceedingly annoying woman. Surprisingly enough, the devout Christian character nicknamed Black (Chukwudi Iwuji) is pretty realistic. He has flaws, but there are lines that he is simply unwilling to cross. Such a positive portrayal of a Christian in a secular movie is very unusual.

That brings me to the symbolism near the end of the movie. *Spoiler Warning* After Black gets shot, he falls to the floor and remains there. But, contrary to what the final candidate believes, he is not dead. From what I understand, he was shot with a pill that will cure him of the disease that threatens to take his life. Black wakes up and, as he tries to understand what happened, a man speaks very nearly the last line in the movie (if not the last; I don't exactly remember): "He is risen." This is clearly a reference to Christ's resurrection. Interestingly enough, it is the Christian character who, so to speak, rises from the dead. I don't know whether the filmmakers intended viewers to draw the parallel between faithful Christians reaching heaven and Black's healing, but it seems like a logical connection to make.

My Rating: MT (almost constant language, sexual references)