The Stream: New version of an unexplained Cube with food

The Big Screen: A couple disturbing scenes

The Final Bill: Gross and gory scenes but otherwise still finds a way to make you bored at times

S2S: Movie Review
Director: Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia
Writers: David Desola (screenplay by), David Desola (story by) | 1 more credit »
Stars: Ivan Massagué, Zorion Eguileor, Antonia San Juan | See full cast & crew
Genre: Horror, Sci-Fi, Thriller
Runtime: 1 hour 29 minutes
Venue: Netflix

Welcome back quarantine-mates! I hope you all are staying safe out there and staying home. We’ll continue to review some interesting flicks for you. This weekend we have for you Platform. It’s from 2019, but it is just now hitting the pinnacle of Netflix lore in March of 2020. The idea behind Platform is that we follow Ivan Massague, as Goreng, as he’s stuck in a “vertical prison” with one cell per level, 2 people per cell, and the only food provided to the cells comes down on a platform in the middle of the cell and two minutes per day to feed all of the levels. Let’s see how Goreng’s experience turns out.

First things first, I papa freaks all the hunnies…. bunnies. Wrong first thing. I digress. First, this movie is in Spanish, originally. I chose to watch with the dubbed English. I understand that creates a difficulty for some people. I suggest, if you watch this, put on the dubbed version and keep it pushing. The voices are annoying and the writing is tragic. If I hear the word “obviously” again in the next couple of days, I’m slapping that person on site! Those of you who watched know exactly what I mean.

Second, the idea of the movie is intriguing. For those horror/thriller cinephiles out there, picture a combination of the Cube series mixed with The Belko Experiment and Saw or Escape Room (minus games). Stating that, I’ve said too much but maybe I’ve also peaked your interest. If I take all the great points of those movies, then we’d be on the right track. Platform is not on that track. In the gory and gross categories, Platform can stand a slight chance. Otherwise, this movie lacks depth. Sure, the concept is interesting until you realize you’re just watching a different version of the Cube with food (because how did those people in Cube survive without food?!… neither here nor there). It’s ironic to say the movie lacks depth when the whole movie harps on how deep/far the platform goes down! The writers were on to something, but it feels like they just gave up half-way through and said, “Yeah this is too stupid even for us. Let’s just get Netflix to pay us for content.”

Finally, this movie lacks resolution and any real explanation. Even though my description states that it’s a prison, Platform never explicitly acknowledges whether it really is a prison. Oh, these idiots are locked in alright but what country started this prison system. Shoot! This might be a more effective deterrent to crime than our actual system, but alas we’ll never find out. Social experiment vs. Prison reform? You’ll never find out.

Needless to say, thank God this movie came to streaming only. Forget that the movie has subtitles or poor dubbing, Platform has no direction. That’s difficult to say for a movie that literally just goes up and down for an hour and half. For my horror/thriller fans out there… you’ll get your handful of popcorn out of this but everyone else this is a single popped kernel that if you’re desperate and not squeamish I’d say pop in.