The 2019 film “El Hoyo” broke new ground with its unflinching metaphor for inequality. Trapped in a towering prison with cells stacked upon cells, inmates relied on a mysterious platform carrying food to survive each month. But the meager meals dwindled by the time they reached the facility’s lowest depths, leaving those below to unimaginable means to find sustenance. While shocking in premise, it tapped into real social failures that kindled moral outrage.
This setting served as a launchpad for profound questions about humanity. What drives us to turn on one another in dire straits? Can community overcome our base instincts? The film stirred lively debate that a work of fiction rarely achieves. It painted our system’s flaws in stark relief and challenged viewers to envision alternative ways of organizing ourselves.
Naturally, such a thought-provoking premise demanded further exploration. Its director, Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia, recognized potential to broaden the story’s scope while retaining its unsettling resonance. Enter “The Platform 2,” continuing the franchise with new characters struggling within this punitive vertical world. On the surface, it recreates the first film’s distressing conditions. Yet underneath, revolutionary changes have taken place as inmates attempt to transform their circumstances from within.
Now, a shared commitment to equality supposedly governs life in prison. But human nature and societal complexity guarantee turmoil wherever power imbalances persist. As divisions emerge over implementing fair principles, darker forces threaten to overtake progress. Once more, we peer into this metallic abyss to confront society’s bleakest realities reflected there, as well as glimmers of hope that people might chart a kinder path together against all odds. Though unremittingly grim, perhaps these films can stir us to reconsider our own systems and relationships in pursuits of justice for all.
A Divided Prison Society
In “The Platform 2,” we’re introduced to Perempuan, an artist imprisoned within the mysterious facility known simply as “The Pit.” She finds herself paired on the 24th level with Zamiatin, a hulking figure who seems as savage as his appearance. But beneath the surface lies a keen mind, and Perempuan ensures he understands the reformed rules governing their cell.
No longer is it each man for himself. A revolution established equality in sharing the daily provisions lowered through the building’s endless depths. Each inmate now eats only the meal requested upon arrival, preventing starvation through fairness. This new system aims to unlock humanity’s better nature as the detainees display solidarity in enforcing the law.
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For a time, it proves effective. Food scraps even reach the lower depths, offering hope. Bonds form as Perempuan helps Zamiatin acclimate, seeing his intelligence. But power corrupts as much as greed, and a zealous sect emerges bearing a violent vision of justice. They view even slight transgressions as heresy worthy of dire punishment.
As days pass within those claustrophobic walls, Perempuan’s placement changes. She’s stationed on the 180th level with a cynical cellmate seasoned in the order’s cruel methods. Dissent grows over applying ideals amid survival’s harsh demands. Attempts at nonviolence fray as arguments erode, and a spreading conflict emerges that may wash away hard-fought progress.
Questions arise of whether any system withstands humanity’s darker impulses. Can individuals forge purpose from this hell, or will all descend with the building itself? As tensions mount, it seems the only inevitability within “The Pit” is that hope too must succumb to the depths, leaving little but a grim struggle to endure another day’s descent.
Visual Horrors Within the Pit
Gaztelu-Urrutia’s underground prison truly comes alive through exquisite production design. Within the grimy concrete walls dwells an intricate society with rules carved by its denizens. Subtle clues like graffiti and refuse convey the passage of time below. Each newly discovered element deepens our glimpse into this culture of desperation and order taking hold among the forsaken.
Enhancing the gloomy atmosphere, Etxebarria’s score pulsates with foreboding. Its deepest notes rumble like the approaching platform itself, threatening to pull characters into the muck. Elsewhere, ambient textures amplify the constant clamor resonating through rigid levels. Each sound draws us deeper into the Pit’s oppressive sensory experience.
Within this setting, characters emerge with gritty authenticity. Their harrowing plight feels painfully real as skilled performers like Smit and Keuchkerian fully inhabit roles. Raw emotions play out across faces haunted by the stakes. Physicality also transforms, showing the institution’s dehumanizing effects.
Urigoitia’s cinematography immerses us in their reality through cramped quarters. But glances outside punctuate hope with fleeting visions of the outside world’s comforts. When violence erupts, shots emphasize its intimate, visceral brutalities. CGI realistically extends such sequences without disturbing verisimilitude.
Gaztelu-Urrutia’s skilled craft draws us into this nightmarish macrocosm until its terrors feel deeply personal. His deft command of techniques ensures the pit remains as disturbing, thought-provoking, and impactful as intended. For in the end, it’s not just a metaphor but a world whose horrors reflect darker aspects of our own.
Failed Systems and Faltering Dreams
Gaztelu-Urrutia’s saga persists in its critique of imbalance. Within the pit’s suffocating structure exists a microcosm for glaring inequities many face beyond. Those consigned to depths barely subsist on crumbs dribbling down as a privileged cadre feasts above without consequence. Does any system ensure fair distribution when the powerful prioritize retaining excess?
In attempting reform, the prisoners emulate real societies struggling to lift the marginalized. New rules write equality into law, and solidarity expresses the shared dream all may thrive. Yet control naturally consolidates upward over time. As basic needs go unmet, fanatics exploit unrest by offering simple answers—and more sinister roles to displaced anguish.
None escape reflecting society’s flaws. Self-interest reemerges despite best efforts, complicating cohesion. Leadership meant to course-correct risks fueling the very abuses Progress sought to remedy. Watching hopes fracture lays bare vulnerabilities in any reform, no matter intent. When crisis strikes, true colors surface. Principles succumb to baser urges for control and survival.
Through this microcosm, a sobering message emerges about human nature. However nobly we conceive systems, base impulses endure. Balances perpetually teeter no matter the scale. Perhaps the only inevitability lies not in any political direction but in our shared struggle—and the solace found through solidarity against the dark before we rise again. If cycles repeat without end, all that remains is focusing the light we have left.
Development in the Depths
Perempuan emerges as the steadying force amongst turmoil. As an artist bearing past mistakes, she grasps humanity’s capacity for progression through unity. Her resilience enduring each relocation renews hope that life within the Pit need not mean relinquishing one’s spirit.
Yet perseverance has limits now tested. Zamiatin, too, transforms from a savage to someone receptive to Perempuan’s guidance. Though quick to anger, his intellect awakens to solidarity’s power. But fracturing order breeds radical ways of thinking. When survival is not guaranteed, extremism spreads rapidly.
Dagin Babi embodies this rising fundamentalism with an unsettling conviction. Professing to uphold law and an eyeless face shrouding true designs, his followers carry out acts more barbaric than the old “every man for himself” ways. As unrest swells, preserving the foundations of change requires growing risks few seem willing to take.
Meanwhile, administrative figures act in self-interest at others’ cost, disregarding the impact on lower levels. Fractures emerge between high and low that destabilizing elements exploit to assert dominance. Yet for all their posturing, these voices stay peripheral—not the story’s nucleus like those simply trying to endure another miserable rotation with dignity intact.
If systems remain vulnerable and humanity imperfectable, perhaps the only victory lies in sustaining hope and compassion cycle after cycle, lifetime after lifetime, as the platform continues its ceaseless descent into the abyss.
Lost in Abstraction
Gaztelu-Urrutia’s allegory shines in premise, drawing thoughtful parallels between society’s structures and those mirrored within the Pit. But fleshing out ideas into a story proves trickier.
The film starts compellingly, revolving around Perempuan and Zamiatin’s bond opposing radicalization. Their dynamic hooks one into this brutal world. Yet as unrest rises, particulars fade. Personal arcs lack depth, reducing characters to types driving conflict abstractly.
Finely is this balance tested? Maintaining focus on implications amid literal violence tests any film. But gradually, metaphor overwhelms humanity here. Issues simmering beneath emerge only half-formed amid gore and religious mystery.
Potential for poignant social analysis feels wasted as clarity sinks. Allegory risks preaching what drama could show more powerfully. While expanding this dystopia’s scope, this installment spreads its thematic muscle too thin, crossing that line.
Ending on an intrigue note, its successor may do well returning focus inward. Further exploring what makes this microcosm tick at a human scale could resonate more profoundly. For its concepts to translate fully, flesh and blood must lead over abstraction in the depths.
Questions Remain in the Depths
Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia’s sequel effectively expands “The Platform’s” compelling frontier. Within the pit’s suffocating walls emerges a reformed society, shining light on oppressive systems’ fragilities. Perempuan and Zamiatin anchor this reality through earnest struggles mirroring our own.
Yet as in the original, ambition outpaces execution. Personal arcs lack depth against allegory’s scope. Conflict fluctuates between visceral metaphor and perplexing mysticism, sacrificing coherence. While expanding, extraneous flourishes dilute potent substances.
Despite lapses, the film retains thought-provoking thematic meat for analytically-minded viewers. Beneath a shroud of nightmares exists societal mirrors rarely so unsettling. If future installments refocus on intimate struggles amid reform, nuanced portraits may emerge to haunt like the prison itself.
For now, questions linger as the platform descends. Can a reformed Pit survive humanity indefinitely? Or will those confined eventually escape such a metaphor—whether through revolutionary bonds proving stronger than self-interest or destruction guaranteeing none forget the inequalities underscoring this macabre nightmare? Either future promises further descent into the abyss.
The Review
The Platform 2
Platform 2 takes compelling steps in expanding its allegorical prison universe, though its unstable balance of plot and themes undermines the profound discussions it aims to spark. While retaining thought-provoking substance, lapses in coherence dilute potentially haunting portrayals of humanity's frailties. Overall, the film elicits mixed feelings, effectively building on its predecessor's foundation but falling shy of the original's unshakeable impact.
PROS
- Thought-provoking examination of social reform and its challenges
- Expanded world-building and lore of the dystopian prison setting
- Strong performances anchoring the visceral human drama
CONS
- Thin character arcs that lack depth
- Unstable balance between literal plot and philosophical themes
- Overdone mystical and religious elements that muddy the allegory
