Customer Reviews

Series 7 : The Contenders

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3 star:		(1)
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SERIES 7 is a prescient film about the absurdly illogical conclusion to "reality" competition shows. What's even more amazing is that this film came out before these shows actually had a stranglehold on American prime-time television.

SERIES 7 takes a look at a fictional reality show (like they aren't already) in which contestants survive by, well, surviving. Last one alive is the winner. When this movie begins, it's obvious that the "show" has been around for several seasons. I don't want to give away anything because this is one of those films in which every line, scene, and plot point is potentially important and entertaining. Suffice it to say, the "show's" producers find ways to spin events as their ratings require (such as the contestant who chooses to stab "himself in the back" as his method of commit suicide).

If you hate SURVIVOR, et al, as much as I do, get this yesterday. - Chris

When it comes to B-rated films, this one tops the list. 'Series 7: The Contenders' is an almost campy parody of reality television, similar to Schwarzenegger's 'Running Man' and Japanese cult classic, 'Battle Royale'

Presented as TV marathon of the 7th season of a reality show, the film takes place in America and the show is called The Contenders. Six people, picked at random from a national lottery, are given guns and forced to hunt and kill each other for the cameras.

It's a dark satire of the reality TV genre. Starring Brooke Smith as Dawn, a pregnant mother and the reigning champion from the fifth and sixth series, 'Series 7: The Contenders' asks the question: 'Is she the monster for killing and doing what it takes to survive, or are we, the viewers, the monsters for entertaining ourselves with tragedy and meaningless death. Humanity's need to watch things die, from a good safe distance, as Maynard James Keenan once put it, is effectively portrayed with all the campy B-rated fun necessary to make a successful cult classic.

The film is littered with interview segments, commercial previews, complications due to technical error, confrontations with the camera-crew, dramatic re-enactments and cliffhanger promos, giving it the authenticity of a reality TV show. The film purposely leaves many key details unexplained, as the viewer is supposed to be watching only what the creators actually aired in the fictional TV show. It is not explained how the TV show got into so powerful a position that it could randomly select people to be killed, but all the Contenders treat it as something they have absolutely no control over, which is possibly a reflection of television's influence over society.

The soundtrack is also noteworthy, but I'll stop here. Just buy the movie, watch something that makes you think for once, and enjoy your purchase.

This was a phenomenal film. Wicked and hateful satire, extremely black comedy, content which seemed at times over the top but retained its credibility all woven together into a nightmarish suburban landscape.

The film's premise is simple: There's a gameshow, called The Contenders. It's currently shooting season 7. You "win" your way onto the gameshow by a national lottery, and you have no recourse but to enter, even if you don't really want to play.

The downside is that the game is Last Man Standing. Each of the seven contenders is given a gun and a cameraman to catch the action, and they have to hunt each other down. The last one standing moves into series 8.

Theoretically, with the dearth of reality shows around, this is an extreme scenario which may need to be employed purely to hook viewers. This is the main theme of the film - violence for spectators. Conceptually, perhaps, not that different to The Running Man - in that film, convicts on Death Row are given an opportunity to play for their lives against futuristic Gladiators who have all the celebrity of today's pro-wrestlers. Series 7, however, has none of that glamour. It's set in the here and now, and all anyone unlucky enough to be in it wants is to get out alive. While some are quietly confident, each character has a sense of dread about the show, and rightfully so.

The filmmakers, though, have gone one step beyond that, and stereotyped the Contenders into recognisable moulds. Dawn is the reigning champion, pregnant and unmarried, with some history of a turbulent childhood. Tony is an angry old man who has no intention of playing the game. Jeff is Dawn's childhood friend, unhappily married now and currently dying of cancer and preparing to commit suicide. Connie is a conniving nurse with delusions of grandeur who seems to have thought more about a gameplan than anyone else. Lindsay is just a teenager, only just old enough to enter, who thinks it's quite cool and whose parents have aspirations of her winning fame and fortune on the show, to the point where they drive her around looking for her victims and get her revved up to kill in the car. They also buy her an extra gun, a big one.

It's not a happy scenario. However, with a hugely upbeat power-punk soundtrack and omnipresent gallows humour, complete with a Rescue 911-type narrator/voice over in the background, the film comes across as gleeful; just good old-fashioned family fun for everyone to enjoy round the TV at night. The fact that it is all so tragic seems not to occur to anyone bar one or two of the contestants.

The characters are richly textured, the plot fast-paced and unpredictable. At times your stomach will turn, at others you will burst out laughing. As the story winds up, and people's attitudes change, the climax comes completely out of left-field to blindside you.

The film is cutting-edge stuff with razor-wire social commentary. The humour, when there, never seems set-up, and there are no "punchlines" so you know when to laugh. It all just happens. I found it to be hugely enjoyable indeed; and I think the film tells us a lot about ourselves as a species.

The soundtrack by Girls against Boys is also excellent.

Having seen "Series 7" during it's theatrical run in 2000, I considered it one of the funniest films of the year. A stinging satire on the reality TV genre, "Series 7" is set in the near future where anybody, as decided by random lottery, can be called to be a contestant on "The Contenders." Every week, the six chosen contestants must kill or be killed all for the pleasure of the viewing audience. The program, as you might expect, is the highest rated show on American TV. There can be only one winner--and the prize is to live to compete on next week's show.

"Series 7," in spite of clearly being an entertaining spoof, is also relevant to the state of TV today. As we have proven time and again, the barriers of acceptable TV have been breaking down and anyone will do anything for a moment of possible fame. Despite the science fiction plotting, it's really not such a leap of faith--not quite as unthinkable or far-fetched as I would like.

As the reigning champion, Dawn Logarto (played convincingly by Brooke Smith) is very pregnant and one week away from being released from the competition undefeated. She gives a great performance--desperate, bitter, sarcastic, protective and surprisingly real. Everyone in the cast is solid, if relatively unknown--but that lends the piece a certain credibility. It is as if we are watching real people.

The violence and danger are real. The "kills" are real--sometimes brutal and ruthless. But it is always fascinating, creative and hilarious. Shot in mockumentary style, and played as a TV broadcast, this is a bold and original work. The writing and direction is brisk, funny and true to the genre it mocks.

I absolutely recommend this film for those who enjoy more cutting edge entertainment. And if you love or hate reality TV, there's enough here to entertain either side. There's only one problem. You can't buy it anymore. It plays on some of the movie stations occasionally, so please seek it out. It's well worth it. I'm glad I have the DVD, for it's a movie I reference and share often. I'll leave with a descriptive quote of the film from Rolling Stone--"Think 'Dr. Strangelove' meets 'Network'". If that, alone, doesn't intrigue you--maybe this movie isn't for you. KGHarris, 11/06.

Employing an accomplished television parlance, Daniel Minahan's SERIES 7: THE CONTENDERS mixes the gritty vérité of "COPS" with a hyperbolized competition that dwarfs the contests of television shows like "Survivor," "The Mole," or "The Runner" (the latter ultimately deemed "too sensitive" for production). Shot on digital video, SERIES 7 stars Brooke Smith as Dawn Logarto, an expectant mother and reigning champion of this horrific competition wherein six randomly chosen civilians struggle to kill off their opponents. Their prize? Nothing more than staying alive and fighting in SERIES 8. Keeping the details of the contest sketchy keeps SERIES 7 from becoming a science fiction story and, in turn, gives it more punch.

Director Minahan presents SERIES 7 as a full season of a program boiled down to a tight 87-minute running time. As with actual television programs of its ilk, SERIES 7 creates drama in its presentation. The contestants come from vastly different backgrounds--from the "Angel of Death" nurse, Connie (Marylouise Burke), to the blowhard loser, Tony (Michael Kaycheck). Minahan drives further into television faux-reality by placing SERIES 7 in Dawn's home town and making one of the contestants an old high school flame--Jeffrey Norman (Glenn Fitzgerald), a terminally ill artist with a long-suffering, manipulative wife (Angelina Phillips).

SERIES 7 presents characters in rapid-fire shorthand but, remarkably, none of them come off as stereotypes. Rather, they're infectiously enjoyable and become so familiar so fast that the audience can invest in them (save for the underplayed Frank (Richard Venture), a conspiracy theorist).

By consciously employing the clichés of "reality shows," Minahan brings to fore commentary about the desires of today's audiences while not overpowering the film's narrative. Indeed, audiences have found SERIES 7 disturbing in the film's ability to minister to and underscore the undeniable bloodlust that prevails in today's "enlightened" society.

SERIES 7: THE CONTENDERS succeeds in every milieu it invades. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said about its distributor, USA Films. Except for "key markets," SERIES 7 played in few U.S. venues. It seems that USA hoped to shirk any potential controversy that this insightfully violent film could incur. After avoiding several major film festivals, USA dumped the film onto video and DVD in late 2001--not bothering to make the film available to several major retailers or to update the film's well-crafted website with this information.

I find all "reality" shows to be exceptionally tedious, and movies about "reality" shows even more so (Mary-Kate & Ashley Olsen in "The Challenge"? Bor-ring!). This movie, however, was pretty good. Basically, it's 5 people set loose on the streets of Danbury, CT (so close to home!), armed and dangerous (they're issued a 9mm semi-automatic pistol at the start of the show, but it's no-holds-barred from there), and licenced to kill...each other.

One of my favorite scenes was at the mall, where the contestants were all drawn by a phony note. The young girl "Lindsay Berns" (Merritt Wever) not only had her pistol, but an M-16 (semi-auto only), a 12-gauge pump-action shotgun *and* a bulletproof vest (a gift from her boyfriend). She winds up being beaten to death with a metal cane (*severe* head trauma), by the older guy, Franklin James (Richard Venture). He is then shot by Connie Trabucco (Marylouise Burke), who is wielding a sniper's rifle. You won't see *that* on "Big Brother" or "Survivor"!

Overall, very solid entertainment, even though it loses points by being a fake "reality" show (SEE: "Joe Schmoe", "Scare Tactics", etc.). My rating: 7/10.

So hard to find this cult classic movie that should have made it much higher in the box office that it did. I'd recommend this to anyone with a good sense of humor and who is into thriller or action/drama movies. Great buy if you can find a copy!

Wow! This movie blew me away. One of the best mock-umentories EVER!! (Trailer Park Boys is great too) If you've ever wondered what it would be like to be in a position where you have to kill or be killed, you must see Series 7: The Contenders! Welcome to the future of entertaintment!

The Bottom Line:

Series 7: The Contenders is a razor-sharp satire of reality television that uses all the trappings of the metier it is skewering to make the film actually seem like a "marathon" edition of "Series 7," the hot new show in which middle Americans hunt each other down on camera; the film is often more interesting in conception than in execution but it's still worth a look.

3/4

This is "Truman Show" had it been directed by a dog-off-his-leash Charlton Heston foaming at the bit and handing out ammo like caramel chews from a firetruck at a parade. Basically the same idea as "Battle Royale" with a healthy two scoops of the reality TV heart-to-heart confessional booth slop: Five residents of a town and the previous week's winner of The Contender, the top-rated show in the nation, are given guns and told to kill the other players. The prize? Face off next week against five more contestants. The parting gift? Death. A complete fantasy world in which America has embraced its perverse thrill for violence by the scruff of its neck, winners of The Contender are referred to as "heroes." Anyone not thoroughly revolted (yet also mesmerized the way eyes are drawn to flashing lights and warm blood racing away from a car crash) by the extreme disregard for life in this world will likely cringe when a love triangle unfolds between the previous week's "hero" -- who also happens to be an expecting mother -- a suicidal artist/testicular cancer sufferer (a nod to "Fight Club?") who used to be her goth lover/partner in crime in high school, and the artist's wife. "Series 7" is a thorough commentary on our cripled society and perhaps its ultimate conclusion: Consumer = disposable product = ultimate entertainment. Too bad it's out of print. I found a used copy for about $18 from Amoeba in SF.