- Directed by: Justin Tipping
- Written by: Skip Bronkie, Zack Akers, Justin Tipping
- Stars: Marlon Wayns, Trip Withers, Julia Fox
- Run Time: 1 Hour, 36 Minutes
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpEy0iOixb4
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
Set in an alternate reality where the NFL is the USFF, we start out with little Cam who has the perfect combination of football obsession at a young age combined with an athletic physique capable of being a world class athlete. As he is groomed to possibly replace a retiring megastar, things get strange and ominous – or maybe he’s just seeing things from stress and head injuries. We both struggled with this because we give no weight or value to football. They take the obsession, the extremes required to stay at the top, idolatry, and cult level fandom to the extreme. Neither of us fault the acting or production values, but we didn’t enjoy it that much.
Spoilery Synopsis
We open on Cam, a little boy, watching football on TV. The whole family gets very excited when their team wins. His hero, Isaiah White, gets injured badly. Credits roll.
Fourteen years later, Isaiah is still playing, better than ever, but everyone is talking about when he’ll finally retire – maybe another year at best. Now-adult Cameron Cade is said to be the next star of the game. During an interview with Cam, he says he wants to be the GOAT. One night while practicing, something very strange happens to Cam.
We cut to Cam’s brain scans, and something’s not right. He’s had a traumatic brain injury and a stapled wound on his head. On his return to the game, everyone talks about him surviving the attack. Half the family thinks he isn’t ready, and the other half insists there’s nothing wrong with him. He’s not fine.
Cam wants to be alone and sullen, so he goes to a big party and ignores everyone. Tom, Cam’s manager, calls and says that Isaiah White himself wants to train Cam for a week. On the way there, we see how cult-like some sports fans are.
Cam goes to see Isaiah, who lives in a really cool place. He’s going to put Cam through a special “Boot camp” for football. We then get a training montage. Cam gets a physical exam, and someone steals his underwear. Cam then meets Elise, Isaiah’s wife, who is a power blonde influencer selling jade vaginal eggs and offers Cam one of their anal jades for men before she heads off for travel. Cam talks to Marco, the doctor, about blood transfusions and injections.
On the second day, Isaiah and Cam go for a run in the desert, Cam passes out, and he sees something else that’s weird. Now it’s clear that he’s been hallucinating some of the weirdness we’ve seen. Marco gives him another special shot, and he’s suddenly feeling much better. Then things get weird and they torture a man to motivate Cam to play harder. Afterward, he sits in a hyperbaric chamber for several hours, where he hallucinates some more.
On the third day, they actually play some football, and one of the players gets hurt pretty badly, which seems to be what Isaiah had in mind. More hallucinations ensue– maybe? Did Isaiah really just kill an overzealous fan? That one seemed more real, as well as the aftermath.
The next day, Isaiah and Cam go out to the desert to shoot guns. Cam talks about his father and why he plays the game.
Elsie takes Cam to a party in the city. Marco is there, and he says, “Run!” He meets the owners of the team, and they like him. Meanwhile, Isaiah stays home and works out. There’s more hallucinations, and maybe a ritual of some sort. Maybe Marco loses his head. Stuff happens, and maybe some of it’s real.
On the next day, Cam starts injecting himself. He confronts Isaiah, who talks about generations of blood, a gift from the gods. The blood of their mentors give them the powers of the chosen one. The trick is, there can be only one, and Isaiah’s contract is nearly up. “You’re gonna have to take it from me.” The two men fight to see who really has the killer spirit. Cam has it and uses it.
In a surreal, impossible ceremony, where all the characters gang up on Cam and explain how he’s been groomed all his life for this. Cam instead beats the mascot to death with an ax before killing everyone else with a sword.
And then what?
Brian’s Commentary
What in the hell was that climax???
This is one of those is-it-real-or-a-hallucination stories that we’re so sick of. Cam had a head injury, so all the crazy stuff he sees later on is suspect.
I suspect the filmmaker is trying to show us everything that’s wrong with the mindset around sports obsession, but maybe I’m being charitable with that.
I suppose my problem here is that I have no understanding at all of the screaming, raw, passion and obsession with what is ultimately a pointless game.
The ending was cool and over the top, but it made no real sense at all.
It’s well made, looks great, and the acting is fine. On the other hand, I couldn’t wait until it was over and was bored half to death with it.
Kevin’s Commentary
Well into the movie, I thought there was too much of wondering if things happening are really that strange or if Cam is hallucinating from some combination of stress, obsession, and head injury. Though the effects and visuals are very cool.
As a not-at-all football fan who enjoys watching the spectacle of the Superbowl and really nothing else about the sport, it was hard relating to the passion for the game that so much of the movie revolves around.
Past the halfway point, I started to suspect that the whole thing, or most of it, was real, staged and arranged by Isaiah who is crazy with a God complex. Right from the beginning with the clonk on the head that Cam got. Isaiah thinks he can do or get away with anything, so he does. And with all the “supplements” and substances being administered to Cam, there could easily be hallucinogens in the mix – augmented by a head injury.
I guess in the end, it’s up to the viewer to decide how much of it was real and how much was not. I wouldn’t say I hated the film, but I’d only give it a five or six overall.
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