There have been more than a few low budget horror movies that were masterpieces. Indeed, I’ve reviewed a few them here–Carnival of Souls, Night of the Living Dead, The Blair Witch Project. Even Halloween, which I didn’t rate that highly, at least came across as a watchable evening diversion. Unfortunately, though Iron Lung is certainly low budget, it is neither a classic nor at all fun to watch. My son, with whom I saw the movie and a fan of the game on which it’s based, assures me it was made for only $3 million and is a technical feat. I don’t deny that if that was indeed its budget, that this movie even exists is something of an accomplishment. And it wasn’t absolutely terrible. I’ve certainly seen worse. It had a few good points. But it was very far from a good movie.
In my writers’ group, we talk about the As You Know Bob syndrome, an affliction that sometimes occurs at the beginning of science fiction novels by amateur writers where the author feels the need to immediately info dump all pertinent background information in a highly unnatural conversation between two characters. Stereotypically, such a conversation might start off, “As you know, Bob, the alien invasion of the ship is underway and the crew must defeat them in the next six hours or risk our star drive being destroyed,” hence the name of the syndrome. Well, this movie starts off with one of the worst examples of As You Know Bob syndrome I’ve ever seen. We open watching a single man in a small submarine whose mission is being explained to him over a loudspeaker in tedious detail that he must already know. The man is referred to by the speaker only as “convict,” although we later learn his name is Simon.
It seems all the stars in the universe have gone out, and humanity is reduced to a small rump population, exploring planets for any useable resources and gradually forgetting its science and technology. Whatever unnamed authority is governing this rump has located a distant planet that they believe has an unspecified something they need. The planet is covered with an ocean of blood, for no apparent reason other than “wouldn’t it be cool if a submarine on an alien planet had to steer through an ocean of blood? So metal!” And that does sound pretty cool, except that the movie doesn’t even take advantage of this premise.
By not taking advantage of it, I mean the submarine Simon is located in is almost completely closed off from its surroundings, including visually. It has some rudimentary dials and gauges for navigating, a work light that keeps flickering out, and a big screen that shows a photographic image of what’s outside the submarine which Simon can update every minute or so to see what’s outside. This setup does allow the movie a certain amount of tension–what will appear on the screen next? A cave? A skeleton of a giant underwater alien? Oh no, a minute has passed and the skeleton’s gone, it was actually a living creature!–but still, it means we don’t get awesome visuals of a submarine flying through blood, which would have been far cooler than most of what we actually get.
Besides his limited input about the environment around the submarine, Simon has also not been given any information about what he’s supposed to be researching. With his few tools, he gradually figures out a little about the planet’s surface and what the authority must be after, and also, when he discovers a hidden notebook in a panel of the submarine, he learns that he’s not the first convict to be on the vessel, and that the authority has no intention of releasing him from his prison sentence when his mission is over, as promised. It seems he’s stuck in this cramped tin can until he dies…unless he can figure out the secret of what the authority is searching for, and keep it from them until they agree to let him go. Or maybe the secret has such power that he can learn to wield it himself, if it doesn’t drive him insane first.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s just say until the climax, we’re treated to plenty of claustrophobic scenes of Simon creeping around in tight crawlspaces and niches on a tiny little submarine as blood drips from the failing seals and welds. In fact, I would say that’s pretty much the movie, so if that doesn’t sound appealing to you, feel free to skip this one.
I think the main problem here is that what’s fun to play in a video game is not necessarily what’s fun to watch in a movie. As my son explained to me, this movie is very faithful to the video game it’s based on. Indeed, it feels very “video-gamey” to me. For instance, I never got any sense whatsoever that this submarine was actually moving through an ocean, blood or otherwise. Rather, it felt much more like the submarine was simply jumping from one sector of a map to the next as demanded by the advancing plot points.
That’s maybe a minor quibble. A much more serious “video-gamism” is Simon himself, who dominates the movie’s screen time but is only a cipher. He’s given no personality, no goals beyond survival, and we learn next to nothing about his background. This may be fine in a video game, where the player provides the personality, and the character he’s playing is only a shell or avatar. In that case, adding personality to the character may only make it more difficult for the player to imagine himself in the driver’s seat. But in a movie, giving us a main character (nearly the only character) with no personality gives us no reason to identify with him, cheer for him, or really care what happens to him one way or another. Maybe if this movie had a really dynamic plot with spectacular settings, it would have made up for the lack of personality in its main character. But it’s entirely set on a small submarine and is rather stingy with the action. Simon is all we’ve got, and he doesn’t give us any reason to be interested.
Iron Lung (2026)
Story/Plot/Characters— The dialogue in this movie is atrocious, there’s only one character to speak of and he’s a complete cipher, and the pacing is plodding. While I do like the Lovecraftian themes and it’s kind of cool to see Simon figuring out his situation, it just doesn’t add up to anything. (.5 points)
Special Effects— The special effects aren’t bad for what they are, there’s just not a lot of them, and it really relies on a couple repeated tricks. I mean, it’s admirable what the producers did on a very limited budget. And if the movie had really made use of the special effects it used, my assessment would be different. (For instance, see my review of special effects in The Haunting, which was little more than some screams and rattling chains but was truly scary in how it used in them.) In the end, it’s just some dripping blood, creaking submarine hulls, and fake skulls seen through a viewfinder. (.5 points)
Scariness— Claustrophobia is a form of fear, so I’ll give it a point here. (1 point)
Atmosphere/Freakiness— There are definitely things I like about the aesthetics of this movie. I like the analogue steam-punk of the dials, gauges, and welded iron of the submarine. I like the dripping blood as the water pressure of the ocean outside stresses the submarine’s weak points. Insofar as it’s worth watching at all, it’s thanks to the grungy claustrophic freakiness. But none of the freaky elements feel like they’re in the service of anything. (1 point)
Total=3.0 points (Avoid)
A video game movie that does too little to transition its concept from video game to movie. Not terrible, with a few interesting details here and there, mostly in its steam-punk aesthetics, but overall Iron Lung has little to offer anyone who’s not already a fan of the game franchise. Most horror fans who aren’t will want to avoid this one.