Rent 8 Days (2019)

A selection of unpleasant people do just about anything to make sure it isn't them that die - 8 Days review by DW

The entirety of continental Europe is about to be wiped out by a giant asteroid, and we are presented with a depressing array of characters (all of whom seem to suffer from some variant of narcissistic sociopathy) who will do just about anything (up to acts of downright evil and depravity) to make sure that they, either survive the impact, or perish in an alcohol-induced coma. This means making sure someone else dies (lots of other people, in fact), or they have plenty of booze. Thus, they all embark on a variety of half-baked schemes to get train rides or air flights out of the blast zone, or just get really hammered with old flames who abandoned their hollowed-out souls long ago, for a better life as far away from them as possible.

Like all real sociopaths, however, they're not actually all the bright. Their various plans backfire, leading to compromises and disappointment. This is a set-piece in making sure the hand basket makes it all the way to Hell.

The problem is, it's very hard to give much of a damn about them. They're just a bunch of sad, heartless bastards, who's only tragedy is their inability to mask their personality disorders under a period of intense stress. You feel that all the nice people are probably somewhere off camera, and we're left watching the flailing of these incompetent and unlikeable people.

When it finally turns out Europe isn't going to get it so bad, there is virtually no thought or time given to the place that's going to get it full-on-bad, instead, and we are left watching the continued machination of these sad, wretched, soulless Germans, as they continue making life worse for each other.

You really do have to wonder about the emotional intelligence of the scriptwriters, that they could produce such an impressive array of miserable, semi-functional characters.

A Wild Ride of Character Strands & Back Stories as a Meteor Approaches Earth - 8 Days review by PV

I REALLY liked this. A wild ride, with a large cast of characters - each with a different director (watch the MAKING OF extra) woven together as a tapestry in the edit suite after shooting. I liked some more than others, loved the backstory of the 2 former East German (GDP) soldiers from 58 years before. Others worked less well.

For those expecting a huge CGI-fest of end-of-days burning hell, this will be a disappointment. It's character-based, all about these people's lives in the days before the meteor hits and their backstories.

The 1979 film METEOR comes to mind, of course, but also all end-of-days movies from 28 DAYS LATER (and the less good 28 YEARS LATER and the truly awful BONE TEMPLE) though that has zombies, as does the wonderful GIRL WITH ALL THE GIFTS. The 1970s BBC TV plague drama SURVIVORS was terrifying at the time; the pc tickbox 2008 remake not so much. Thankfully this German TV drama is not woke, as a UK version would be. A Turkish cop backstory works. Nothing is grafted on to tick boxes though, as UK TV does as standard.

This is basically a disaster movie, so such 1970s classics as THE TOWERING INFERNO or THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE come to mind - a group of characters who have to make moral decisions, to stay or leave, to be selfish or not. The theme of the selfish gene v altruism is what it is all about.

What I did not like about this: 1) the agenda that it's Europeans seeking to leave Europe as refugees rather than people trying to come to Europe from the rest of the world. It's eyerollingly obvious BUT not hammered home - this is no preachy woke lecture sermonising at us like some finger-wagging nanny as so much UK TV drama is.

2) the nudity and sex scenes. Now, I am no prude - when nudity/sex is necessary then fine. However, here it was gratuitous at times - would the drama suffer if some party scenes were cut out. No. So why include them? To shock? The EXTRAS filmlet has the showrunner admitting as much. Also, I have no problem with full frontal male nudity, but why was it not balanced with full frontal female nudity? Gender equality, purlease!

So, one star taken off for the abuse. Otherwise, I seriously enjoyed this wile ride, and the deep digs into character the plot allows, however unlikely and conveniently neat some bits are. And it helped me improve my German!

The music of the opening credits is superb, original score BUT clearly based on Handel and maybe Purcell, very English then, possibly Bach. The graphics also fit so well. I usually fastforward through credits. I watched this every time, for 8 episodes. It is truly beautiful. One of the best since TV drama VIKINGS.

So 4 stars. 4.5 almost.

There COULD be a sequel, the aftermath....