The world of incomprehensible horror just got a little bigger, but I’m not complaining. I’m not sure I understood a lick of Backrooms, the film I’m about to describe, but on some level it doesn’t matter. I love when movies tell me something new, and I had to admit, this was most certainly a new experience, albeit a weird and tragic one.
Off the 680 in a Santa Clara strip mall, there’s a poorly frequented business entitled Cap’n Clark’s Ottoman Empire. Clark (Chiwetel Ejiofor) owns the failing enterprise and has taken to living in the store. He has his own set of issues including alcohol and insomnia. It’s not just that nobody ever comes into the store; the store itself feels a tad haunted, like it was intended to be a cemetery but instead became a crappy furniture store. *Shrug* What’s the difference, anyway?
Struggling with power problems one evening, Clark goes down to the basement and discovers a portal, a false wall to an entirely different world of Backrooms. Going through the wall, Clark discovers an office space void except for a bunch of random furniture stacked in the middle. Beyond the room is an entire labyrinth of empty rooms with dull yellow walls. The whole set-up is unnerving. It’s like being transported into a Narnia where the forest and Mr. Tumnus have been replaced by an endless office space abandoned in the 1970s.
Good luck getting wi-fi down here.
This is certainly a case of “curiosity killed the cat,” right? I mean, we can all see that this scene is a very stale evil, like the remnants of a forgotten trap. Is it a labyrinth? Should we expect to find a minotaur in the center? Exactly what is going on here?
This is one of those films where I don’t want to give away anything more, and yet I’m not sure I could for I’m
not quite sure what I saw. Suffice to say, there will be encounters in the Backrooms, and some of them will happily describe the R rating. I think what confused me most of all about the set-up was that the Backrooms themselves felt like a living, breathing, evolving entity. How is that possible? I have no idea, but I’m certainly intrigued.
I kind of felt like this film was making it up as it went along, not unlike the Backrooms themselves. Give Backrooms another ten years, and it will evolve into something completely different; maybe a film in which a bizarro world creature finds its way to Cap’n Clark’s Ottoman Empire and has its own Frontrooms adventure before escaping into Santa Clara. To date I’ve seen two incomprehensible horror film with great trailers this year. I like Exit 8 a little more than this one, but the whole Backrooms world got to me. I hear this is based on a web series designed by the 20 (!) year old writer/director Kane Parsons. Holy crap! Good for you, buddy. I digress. I am going to look up that web series right now.
There once was a store owner named Clark
Found a portal, and entered on a lark
Behind a false wall
Was a world great and small
Where danger had no need of the dark
Rated R, 110 Minutes
Director: Kane Parsons
Writer: Will Soodik, Kane Parsons
Genre: WTF?!
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: People who enjoy a puzzle
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: People who do not
