291. Spree; movie review

 

SPREE

Cert 15

92 mins

BBFC advice: Contains strong violence, sex references, discrimination, very strong language

Ok, we live in a society where the need for validation by social media has spiralled out of control but do we need a rash of movies to amplify the point?

This trend appears to have replaced the found-footage genre which was so popular a decade ago.

Now we have films such as Spree which purports to show live streaming from those who will do absolutely anything for social media fame.

Its central character is Kurt Kunkle (Joe Keery) whose channel, Kurts World, is failing to entice an audience so he decides to up the ante.

He becomes a driver for a taxi service called Spree and in his car, he sets up cameras and lights so he can present the elaborate death of his customers.

Yep, he kills people for likes.

However, the harder he tries to create 'unique content', the more frustrated he becomes at being ignored.

I accept that it is not aimed at me but I found Eugene Kotlyarenko's film reprehensible.

Ironically, it ends up trying to elicit an audience by becoming wilder and wilder - in other words doing exactly what Kurt Kunkle does.

Spree reflects a world in which fame is more important than soul and easy money is revered more than working hard for it.

Thus, even the characters who are deemed to be well-adjusted, are famous for being famous. These include a comedienne (Sasheer Zamata) who isn't funny a flamboyant YouTuber (Joshua Ovalle) and an angry DJ (Sunny Kim)

Meanwhile, Kurt perceives himself to be 'working his ass' off to try to garner followers.

The problem is that Spree doesn't really explain why Kurt or indeed society have arrived at where we are.

Its characters are one-dimensional so it shouldn't be too much of a surprise that its acting is stilted.

Overall, I am afraid I just found it crass.

Reasons to watch: Social media phenomenon taken to its limit

Reasons to avoid: Pretty damned crass

Laughs: None

Jumps: None

Vomit: None

Nudity: None

Overall rating: 3/10

Did you know? In April 2017, Steve Stephens in Cleveland uploaded a video of himself shooting and killing a 74-year-old grandfather. After he was done, the killer logged on to the social network to talk about his actions. Facebook claimed it took a long time for the video to be removed because users didn’t flag it as offensive for over an hour.

The final word. Eugene Kotlyarenko: "When we got into building the "Kurt Kunkle" character we looked at a bunch of videos from the most popular well-known influencers, to people who only had single-digit views to try to figure out which scripts they were emulating and how exactly they communicated to the camera, and their imagined audience." Borrowing Tape

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