If you thought America has the market on dystopic futures mostly cornered, here’s White Chamber, a surprisingly non-YA tale of Great Britain under civil war (I think mostly because of Nigel Farage).
Waking up inside a white room (with, sadly, no black curtains), Dr. Elle Chrystler (Shauna Macdonald, The Descent) is slowly tortured by the mysterious room, which generously has the ability to heat up, freeze down and, gunkiest of all, drop acid for a sprinkler system. The man holding her hostage is apparently rebel leader Zakarian (Oded Fehr, 1999’s The Mummy), who we thought in the first few minutes of the film was a reputable leader of the people.
Then, surprise, the film backtracks five days and we learn that, originally, it was Zakarian who was the prisoner, with a whole team of scientists controlling the white chamber. They aren’t torturing him for fun and games — instead, they’re testing a wide variety of drugs to see what works and what doesn’t in order to create the latest and greatest of super-soldiers to make Britain safe for those who supported Brexit. Science!
As much as I like the idea of White Chamber, for the most part, it’s a little too repetitive given its two-room budget. We’re either in the chamber or the lab, making the film very rinse, torture and repeat for its own good. Additionally, it has a believability-pushing ending that almost made me feel like this might turn into a notorious comedy of manners, right down to the mistaken identities. Gorblimey, luv! —Louis Fowler