Benito Mussolini built a large underground bunker in a mountain in case of emergencies, and it is a good thing he did, for after the Nazis won the Second World War in 1944, the Americans decided to take drastic action to prevent them taking over the whole planet. This meant a nuclear war that both sides lost, but the Nazis have made good use of Mussolini’s bunker and a group of them are currently holed up there to ensure the continuation of the Master Race through the science of their eugenics programme. But how long can they sustain this cramped existence without going completely insane? Actually, it may be too late for that, but it is a good thing the group are able to get out at the weekend...
That is because this was not an alternative history story, it was a story of LARPers, or Live Action Role Players, those folks who dress up as historical or fantasy fiction characters and act out their own, personal, invented narratives. Sort of a cross between the kind of people who played Dungeons and Dragons but wanted to take it further and battle re-enactment enthusiasts, this was a hobby growing in popularity and in tandem with fandom for various movie and television franchises, and when this little item was released had already featured as a subplot in episodes of Marvel's Hawkeye series a few months before. What had not been examined too much were the ethics of the pastime, and you might ponder that was because it was not an issue.
But dressing up as Nazis to play a war game? Even with a fantastical premise like the one here, you might ponder some of the activities may be ill-advised since who really wants to throw themselves into pretending to be the real-life villains who started the Holocaust? That was the undercurrent of discomfort throughout The Bunker Game, an Italian-French production spoken in English (the LARPers are from various countries, so need to communicate somehow and English is the easiest language to choose). This was a rich seam for a horror to exploit, you would have considered, especially when some shadowy figure begins to exact a vengeance of sorts on select members of the game and it latterly adopted some slasher flick stylings, yet there was something off-kilter about the film that meant it never really settled as it should have done.
What it did have was that bunker, a real place, though we do not see as much of it as we might expect as the action tended to return to the same locations over and over, but director Roberto Zazzaro did have some cash at his disposal to make this look slick, even as his script stuttered. It may be down to the amount of writers credited in a "too many cooks" scenario, or it may be that many of those involved were not using their native tongue, but it did come across as having been poorly translated from a different European language. However, that was not necessarily a massive drawback, since it offered the piece its own atmosphere closer to watching a group of Martians trying to make sense of an atrocity in the world of the 20th Century rather than a bunch of experts who genuinely know what they are referencing and may be working towards an understanding rather than dressing up as Nazis for a lark. Although when it boiled down, that was precisely what they were doing, and as they get their comeuppance, the film resolved itself in a truly strange manner, not making a whole lot of sense but a striking denouement nonetheless. Music by Umberto Smerilli.
[The Bunker Game - A Shudder Exclusive
New Film Premieres 17th March 2022.]
