I recently watched Markiplier's Iron Lung in theaters. I absolutely loved the original game & its concept. It's really cool, and I was extremely excited for this movie to come out. Though this is Markiplier's work, so I came into it expecting something good, but not great.
This movie just about met my expectations. This movie feels exactly like the game does, down to pretty much every detail of the set and its mechanics. I loved the visuals, the sound design, the whole concept. Everything good about the game is here, plus some more. I loved how long and isolated and miserable this movie is, it makes the experience more immersive which is great for an adaptation of this. Mark did a good job of expressing that feeling of desperation as some new horrible bullshit comes up again.
But there's a noticeable amount of things that could've been done better.
For one, I think the original game's exposition text was a perfect and clear introduction to this world. The opening of this movie felt a lot more vague and confusing in comparison. They should've just used the exposition text from the game at the beginning.
Another thing is that about 10% of the time, the acting gets a little flaky, with some awkward deliveries every now and then. I feel like most of the time it wasnt an acting or performance issue, but a writing issue. There's a good handful of lines that could never sound right and should've just been cut.
I will say though, Mark did a much better acting performance than I expected. He filmed himself for 2 hours of runtime mostly by himself in one room, and made it work. If those dozen awkward lines of his were cut from the script, it would've been perfect.
The ghost or whatever was my least favorite aspect of this film. She felt like a video game character more than a real person or whatever she was. Very exposition-ey dialogue there. If any part of this film were to be cut, I think his hallucination conversation with her should've been cut in half. The cheesy pitch voice distortion effect didnt help. (Also I kinda hated the transition into the credits but that's a small thing.)
The ending was much much better than the game's. So much more visceral and miserable, and intriguing. The bandages, his arm getting ripped off, getting knocked and tossed around in waist-high blood, with no hope. You really feel bombarded with misery and violence at the end. I also appreciate how little is shown of the horrors. They left a strong impact on me specifically because of how brief and limited the glimpses you see are. (So much better than the game's frog. The frog sucked, and its jumpscare sucked too.)
I absolutely loved how he kept pushing the camera button so he could see in the dark for a couple seconds when it flashes. A lot of these types of moments feel like what a real person would do in a situation like this. There's an amazing attention to detail, especially with the set. You can tell they really made it fully functional, down to the lights and computer's GUI.
I really wish this film was better, but I'm still satisfied with how it came out, and I'm glad it's good to some degree. I immensely respect the passion and love for the source material poured into this film, it's really amazing how Mark loved this little indie game so much he went and made, filmed and produced an entire film of it.
Experiencing the game first is definitely better, I would've been a lot more confused if I didnt have that background knowledge. Fans of the game will definitely love it, and everyone else will still like it decently. I don't think it was too long overall, but some moments overstayed their welcome individually. I'm glad I saw this in theaters, the sound design was absolutely perfect in a big sound system.
Despite some rough edges, I think Iron Lung was done good justice. The passion and effort really show. It may not be among my favorite movies, but I'll be thinking about this one for the rest of my life.
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