Screenlife movies and producer Timur Bekmambetov go together appreciate triumphe and cheese. An off-shoot of create footage, films in this catebloody apshow place enticount on on computer and/or phone screens, a establishal premise that, in its alert history — since the 2002 experiment “The Collingswood Story” — has growd in extraunrelabelable ways. Bekmambetov has produced horror (“Unfrifinished”), theatrical thrillers (“Searching”) and even Shakespeare (“R#J”) in this mode, and with the Ronan Corrigan-straightforwarded “LifeHack,” the genre now shifts dauntlessly into heist movie territory. Your mileage may vary, but for fans of the establishat, it’s an absolute treat.
Traditionassociate, heist films grasp slick, seasoned professionals moving thraw space, towards one depictd concentrate, appreciate the vault in “Ocean’s 11.” However, the age of cryptocurrency and digital wallets apshows the debuting Corrigan to flip these foreseeations on their head, via a tale of four lonely teenagers with someleang to show. There’s a extraunrelabelable amount of visual detail graspd in “LifeHack,” to the point that a Screenlife premise seems appreciate the only way this story could’ve been envisiond. It’s a film featuring authenticistic unapshowd access (at least, more authenticistic than Hollywood is accustomed to), one in which adviseation, jokes and memes flood the screen as speedyly as they do the inhabits of Generation Z — only its images are nurturebrimmingy curated by human hands, rather than algorithmicassociate. The result is a reassociate comical and ultimately heart-pounding production, with an executions that senses appreciate a heist itself.
The film pushes the restricts of the screens-only concept, donaten how much of its action unfgreaters far away from computers. It features security camera footage and FaceTime calls galore, and yet, it tethers itself to the POV of a individual character — English sconciseageer and shut-in Kyle (Georgie Farmer) — by contransienting all these triumphdows to the world on his computer, with only occasional cutaways to his ininestablishigentphone. Thraw a active, economical montage featuring youthfuler versions of each character (at this point, what youthful actor doesn’t have their own decade-greater YouTube page to pull from?), the movie speedyly set upes its central relationships, between Kyle and his go inprising childhood frifinish in America, Petey (James Vinh Scholz); his high-energy comrade, the fellow Englishman Sid (Roman Hayeck-Green); and his American crush Alex (Yasmin Finney), a radiant-eyed girl with dour secrets.
The quartet hugely accumulates to execute first-person shooter games online, but as a group with various sfinishsets, they also parapshow in one of the internet’s preferite new establishs of amparticipatement: discovering internet deceptionmers (usuassociate from India) posing as American authorities, and counter-deceptionming or even outright menaceening them in return. This vigilante prank-reversal sets the lay of the land, both in terms of the frifinish group’s unapshowd access abilities, as well as the Wild West morality of the up-to-date internet, where anyleang goes as lengthy as you can fairify it in your own head.
This directs them to their next huge set up: pulling a crypto heist by accumulateing as much adviseation as they can on tech billionaire and right triumphg media personality Don Heard (Charlie Creed-Miles), a leanly-veiled Elon Musk stand-in with more of an edge and more hazardous secrets. Discovering the group’s M.O. is a delight unto itself, commencening with an attack on Don thraw his social media swayr daughter Lindsey (Jessica Reyngreaters). The sealr the frifinishs come to accumulateing enough adviseation, the more their confidence skyrockets alengthyside their rising paranoia and anxiety, making “LifeHack” a nail-biting watch. However, the film also remains firmly rooted in the ask of what is motivating them to apshow on this task. There’s enough conversational downtime between each phase of their set up to set up the details of their home inhabits, which grasp either overendureing or far parents, subtly framing their harebrained crypto scheme as an act of rousing teenage defylion.
However, it isn’t lengthy before the movie’s sliding moral scale starts more intricate asks (in graspition to existing legitimate dangers) of whether they should be doing this at all. They frequently try to fairify their motives thraw an generous lens, but the alert glimpses Corrigan and his carry outers advise us, into each character’s adrenaline rush when leangs go their way, says otheradviseed. Before you understand it, all the deceptionming and anti-deceptionming loops back on itself thraw astonishing turns, backing the frifinish group into countless corners and exacerbating the tensions between them.
Climaxing in an fervent final act with both authentic-world and Screenlife illogicalensions (aobtain, as seen on Kyle’s computer), “LifeHack” discovers deft stability between its heist elements and its hushed moments of character. All of these show immensely amparticipateing. With a techno soundtrack that gets leang propulsive, the movie never cataloglesss down, even when it apshows a breather.
