the Backrooms spoilers ahead!!
my friend (@basil-joy) encouraged me to post this.
ok so Backrooms was a decent movie in my opinion, and to quote my other friend (who knows much more about the overall Backrooms lore) i'd give out a 3.5/5. i'm a pussy at horror so i probably missed some portions from covering my eyes out of sheer fear, but to once again quote my friend, the backrooms is concept that is better without focusing on specific characters (as is required of movies), as the focus is the fantastical aspect of the backrooms themselves.
BUTTTT the cinematography, atmosphere, and overall vibes(?) of the movie? immaculate—not to mention the focus of this rant: the themes of stagnation and nostalgia, specifically with Clark in the backrooms.
firstly, the backrooms are all about nostalgia, we've known this, we love this, Clark literally explains how the 'rooms are remembering things wrong, remembering less each time (our memories are only as strong and accurate as our last memory, we're constantly rewriting them via the process of consolidation). secondly, the whole theme of the movie, with Clark and Mary's first conversation, is about stagnation and staying the same, looping in the same patterns, wanting to regress to the same comfortable cycles. the backrooms physically show this, manifesting as almost cubical offices (which are stagnant), with musty yellow wallpaper (almost nostalgic, but definitely dusty and stagnant). the 'rooms themselves are stagnant in nature, as is nostalgia and regressing, and while the things within them change, they change as memories do, minutely, but ultimately static, stifling, giving an air that must be stale. it has good commentary on how we are always nostalgic of a time past, we want to go back to "the good old days". we dream of a past, we dream of time stopping, rewinding, and therefore the backrooms exist in a twisted remembrance of things.
i think Clark survives and is allowed to live and survive in the backrooms after the disaster with Bobby and Cat, because the Backrooms recognizes him as its own, where he deep down doesn't want to change, stays in his happy little routine and his happy hurtful ways. Cat and Bobby are young and ever-changing, and so they get merc'd. but, afterwards, i think the reason why his "alternative" (that i call Captain Clark) kills him after his talk with Mary is because even in accepting himself, allowing himself to not change in his destructive cycle (CLARK: i don't want to change. MARY: then don't.) is in itself too much of a change, the first step TO changing is that acceptance, that acknowledgement, that he is not part of the backrooms anymore, but once again, an ever-changing human, and so he is eliminated. he's not furniture anymore, he's not the same to Captain Clark anymore, predictable in his ways, because he's aware of the patterns, and that in itself fundamentally changes said patterns.
anyways, for any of it's perceived flaws, the Backrooms' brilliance is just part of this big year for indie horror, with Iron Lung and Obsession also being amazing—as well as just a big year for non-franchise movies, with the aforementioned, but also with Project Hail Mary.
andulkaphoto
snowghoul
janainaart
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