Director: Tino Navarro and David Rebordao
Cast: Rutger Hauer, Cian Barry, Alix Wilton Regan

For quite some time now, I have started my reviews by talking in depth about a certain topic that is related to the movie that I happen to be reviewing. However, in this particular review, I'm going to change things somewhat. This time, I am going to talk about two topics that are related to the movie I am reviewing here, that movie being RPG. Certainly part of the reason is a change of pace, but also because I'm in a lazy mood and I don't feel like right now thinking a lot about how to stretch just one topic into a couple of paragraphs of discussion. Anyway, the first topic I would like to talk about is the idea of living past your expected lifetime. This is a topic I have talked about before, way back when I reviewed The Final Patient. In the many years that have passed since I wrote that review, my feeling about living forever has not changed - that feeling that living forever will suck. Since I'm still in a lazy mood, I will request that you read that review to find out why I feel that eternal life is a bad idea instead of me just writing it out again in this review. But what about other ways of extending your life? As you may have heard, scientists and doctors have gotten close to performing the first human head transplant. How do I feel about that idea being used to extend someone's life? Well, I'm not sure. You'd have to be sure about a lot of things, ranging from genetic compatibility to hoping your donor didn't commit crimes leaving behind fingerprints. I am, however, more sure that the idea of transporting your consciousness into a computer would be a bad idea. That's because computers are much faster than a human brain. If you could think things out much quicker, you would soon run out of new things to think about, and you'd start to get bored very quickly. And trapped in a computer, you couldn't exactly walk outside to play and have fun.

Okay, that's one topic I wanted to talk about a little. What's the second topic? Well, it's about an observation I have had about the film industry for many years - specifically, the film industry all over the world. Observing film industries from many different countries has had me asking a specific question, that being: Why are some countries more successful in getting their films seen outside of their countries than other countries? It's easy to figure out why American films are seen all over the world, but I'm really talking about other countries. Sometimes it's pretty easy to figure out why. For example, Italy for decades did very well getting their movies seen around the world, namely because their movies were more often than not very commercial. (In other words, they made real movies.) But more often that not it doesn't seem to make sense as to why one country does a lot better than another country. For example, why has Portugal had such a tough time getting its movies seen outside of its country? For that matter, can you name any Portuguese movies or Portuguese filmmakers? Some might say the language is a barrier, but the country of Brazil (which has Portuguese as its official language) has managed to make several movies over the decades that have broken through and have been seen around the world. Could it be that the Portuguese government is like the Canadian government and mostly funds dreary arty product that few people in Portugal or anywhere else has a desire to see? I'm not sure if that is the case or not, knowing next to nothing about the Portuguese film industry, though I should point out that even Canada under those dire conditions has managed to make a few movies that have found audiences around the world. (Emphasis on a few.)

Which brings me to the movie I am reviewing here, RPG. As you probably guessed, this is a movie that deals with the topic of getting the chance to live past your expected lifetime. While that premise certainly did give the movie some interest to me when I found it in my neighborhood dollar store, what really interested me was the part of the movie that covered the second topic I discussed in the second paragraph - that the movie was from Portugal. Having previously heard next to nothing about the Portuguese film industry, I was certainly curious to see a movie from a country you don't normally associate with movies. Extra interest came from the fact that this Portuguese movie seemed to have been made with an eye on getting seen outside Portugal. It was filmed in the English language, and had an international star (Rutger Hauer) in the lead role. On the other hand, I remembered Rutger Hauer had around this time done a lot of garbage seemingly just for the money, like Dario Argento's Dracula and the Canadian movie Hobo With A Shotgun. But the curious part of my brain was stronger than the part cautioning me, and I watched the movie. In RPG, Hauer (Flesh + Blood) plays a man named Steve Battier, an elderly multimillionaire who is dying of a terminal disease. Then one day, he is contacted by a company called RPG, which makes him a fantastic and irresistible offer. They tell him that for a large sum of money, they can transfer his mind into a younger body. Battier leaps at the offer, and in short notice he, along with nine other millionaires, have their minds transferred into younger bodies. Battier (now played by Cian Barry) and the other millionaires are of course now very happy, but there is a catch. They were told that they must play a game, where one of them must die one way or another every hour. The last person standing will be able to keep their new and young body. Naturally, soon things become tense between the contestants, especially since they also must assume the identity of the people they kill. Who will win the game?

I've got a pretty good feeling that you have never seen a Portuguese movie before, and from that I have a feeling that you are especially interested in knowing how this particular example of Portuguese cinema stands up not only to Hollywood movies, but films from other countries as well. So it makes sense for me to start my analysis of RPG by looking at the movie from a technical viewpoint. The movie gets off to a good start, showcasing when the character of Battier lands at an airport a night and is transported to the RPG headquarters shortly afterwards. While obviously made up of special effects, the look of this sequence is all the same sleek and eye-catching. Subsequently, the exterior and interiors of the RPG headquarters also is slickly made, even though a real careful look will spot some cost-cutting measures such as limited views of a room. (On the other hand, there are some good touches such as some effective use of CGI.) However, the respectable production values come almost to a screeching halt not long afterwards. The RPG staff decides to send their ten clients to.... a Portuguese ruined building circa 2013! Yes, you guessed it - almost what's entirely to follow stays in this run-down graffiti-scrawled wreck and its surrounding countryside! Oh, I suppose the filmmakers do occasionally throw in some outside touches such as holograms and a tall wall that surrounds the property and prevents the participants from escaping. But such touches only add up to a couple of minutes of the running time in this part of the movie; the bulk of RPG simply looks like the filmmakers just showed up to this abandoned property and added nothing except the actors to this location.

I supposed if pressed I could come up with a few additional notes of praise for the movie's direction - the cinematography and the lighting is professional enough, for example. But it wouldn't take too much pressing for me to come up with a longer list of shortcomings with the direction. There is the tone of the movie, for example. The first ten minutes that set up the movie do have a little intrigue and mystery that makes you curious as to what will soon follow. But once the millionaires are given their new bodies, things quickly fall apart. There is simply no edge to the movie from this point on. A large part of this is due to the script (which I will get to shortly), but the direction has just as much to blame. This movie fees extremely slow and pointless. There is no feeling of struggle or mystery, and the characters for the most part just casually hang around with no plan in mind except to occasionally get into sexual situations. And when violence does rear its ugly head, the deaths have no impact, whether its because the deaths happen offscreen, or unfold in a few seconds in front of our eyes. That's certainly bad, but what makes it even worse is that the characters are a pretty insufferable bunch. For a long time, we don't even know their names except for Battier, and they also all have amnesia that robs them of having any unique personalities that would separate themselves from each other. When they speak, they often give their English dialogue such thick accents that not only is it sometimes hard to understand them, but they forget to put proper sounding emotion in their voices so that we can believe what they are expressing. In case you are wondering about actor Rutger Hauer, I feel I should reveal that he only has about ten to twelve minutes of screen time in the entire movie. Not only that, Hauer in his few scenes seems mechanical, tired, and uninterested in his surroundings. Clearly this movie project was a simple cash grab for him, since he's given so very little to do.

The only cast member that gets to show a little life is Chris Tashima, playing the mysterious "Mr. Chan" that runs the RPG company. He shows some spark despite getting even less screen time than Hauer. But even his role has some of those severe script weaknesses I alluded to earlier. At the end of the movie, it's kind of hard to determine just how he intends to keep going, or how to get away with what he's doing. For that matter, it's never made clear why the ten participants who sign up for the RPG treatment all seem very willing before signing on to agree to start killing each other once they are given their new bodies. In fairness, I admit that the movie does otherwise set up the premise fairly well, in the first few minutes explaining what is going on without seemingly rushed or forced in any way. And subsequently in the movie, there are a few interesting ideas brought up, such as when it's revealed that the setup is akin to a video game, complete with "bonus" boxes with handy items for the participants to use. But the execution of these ideas is pretty badly done for the most part. For example, the "bonus" box that is found in the movie comes very late in the running time, and is quickly dealt with and forgotten, never to be brought up again. But the biggest problem with the script is that it doesn't seem to know what to do with its premise for the most part. I mentioned before that the direction is slow and pointless, and that's mainly because the characters just talk amongst themselves for most of the running time without seemingly having much desire to reach a goal. Maybe had there been a true and central (and active) villain in the movie, the writers would have been pushed to make more active characters and storytelling. But as it is, RPG is a tedious and pretty dull exercise. I will give it this, however: it's the best Portuguese movie I have ever seen.

(Posted August 27, 2023)