Bingo Hell (2021)
October 4, 2021 11:01 PM - Subscribe
Oak Springs is in the throes of gentrification. The locals and local businesses who thrived there for decades are now being pushed out in favor of microbreweries and cold press coffee. Amidst all this Mr Big's Bingo arrives announcing that everyone deserves to be a winner.
Mr Big makes good on his promise of large prizes offering one of the early winners 10,000 dollars and tells the rest that the prizes will only get bigger. But the prizes come at a very high price for the winner. Lupita, a life long resident of Oak Springs, is convinced there is something very wrong with the bingo game and aims to stop it.
Mr Big makes good on his promise of large prizes offering one of the early winners 10,000 dollars and tells the rest that the prizes will only get bigger. But the prizes come at a very high price for the winner. Lupita, a life long resident of Oak Springs, is convinced there is something very wrong with the bingo game and aims to stop it.
Currently streaming on Prime.
posted by miss-lapin at 9:54 PM on October 5, 2021
posted by miss-lapin at 9:54 PM on October 5, 2021
I like the cast and the (fantastical) premise. If you enjoyed this, 'Bubba Ho-Tep' should be worthwhile to check out. (I'm a bit surprised there isn't a FanFare entry for that.)
Place ~ Community - reminds me of Spider Robinson in his 'Callahan's' series. A longstanding community gets run out of their physical community in Long Island, in the late 90s (the story started in '77 - so has an increasingly mature cast), for reasons outside of their control" and mostly relocates to Key West.
Metafilter was founded in 1999. I joined in 2004 (under a different handle) after lurking for a while.
This is definitely a lower budget indy but the acting is passable (the villain is pretty good) and there are a lot of neat details (the $ handstamp). A little heavy handed commentary-wise.
Pacing issues. Would have benefited from an independent editor. The colour palette and contrast is way too much and looks bad, worse than any Canadian sc-fi that makes it onto SyFy.
Let mature people look like mature people instead of trying to hide it, when the character isn't meaning to hide it through makeup/ lighting. The super neon/ saturated lighting is a Massive Fail.
Fun enough, the ending felt a little like unfinished homework.
posted by porpoise at 7:03 PM on October 24, 2021
Place ~ Community - reminds me of Spider Robinson in his 'Callahan's' series. A longstanding community gets run out of their physical community in Long Island, in the late 90s (the story started in '77 - so has an increasingly mature cast), for reasons outside of their control" and mostly relocates to Key West.
Metafilter was founded in 1999. I joined in 2004 (under a different handle) after lurking for a while.
This is definitely a lower budget indy but the acting is passable (the villain is pretty good) and there are a lot of neat details (the $ handstamp). A little heavy handed commentary-wise.
Pacing issues. Would have benefited from an independent editor. The colour palette and contrast is way too much and looks bad, worse than any Canadian sc-fi that makes it onto SyFy.
Let mature people look like mature people instead of trying to hide it, when the character isn't meaning to hide it through makeup/ lighting. The super neon/ saturated lighting is a Massive Fail.
Fun enough, the ending felt a little like unfinished homework.
posted by porpoise at 7:03 PM on October 24, 2021
You are not logged in, either login or create an account to post comments
Spoiler warning:
After going through everything to defeat Mr Big, Lupita realizes that her community isn't about the physical place of Oak Springs but the people. This makes the evil of gentrification just about being too attached to a place and not that people and businesses who have thrived for decades suddenly find themselves with no place to go and deprived of the community they have relied on.
But the ending is "Hey let's go to the beach" like moving away is that easy. It felt victim blamey (the real problem is the attachment to the place and not outside groups coming in to exploit the area with no appreciation of the locals whose home this is).
posted by miss-lapin at 10:16 AM on October 5, 2021 [2 favorites]