Meander (2020 film)

Category: Sci-fi psychological action/horror

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Imagine Cube with a lot less blood and gore, set in a series of pipes instead of rotating squares, and horror of all horrors - the people speak French. Welcome to the sci-fi action/horror Meander. 

But yeah, this movie clearly takes a lot of queues from Cube - someone wakes up in a weird place, they're in a uniform and they are forced to pass a series of deadly physical and psychological challenges as they discover more about their new environment. The comparison to Cube shouldn't be seen as a bad thing - there's nothing wrong with paying homage to a classic! It's just that any horror buff will recognise the inspiration almost right away.

Level 16 (2018 movie)

Category: girl-power psychological drama

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Yes, the underlying story of this movie has been done before, and probably better, but there is a certain low-budget charm that Level 16 has that makes it not the worst movie around.

The basic premise of Level 16 is that orphaned teenage girls are kept in an isolated environment without fresh air or sunshine and taught through fear and submission to be obedient and feminine - but surprise of surprises, it turns out that the couple at the head of the operation are harvesting the girls for their pure skin. A piece of information shatters the belief in the environment the girls are in and eventually, the lead girl faces the courage to go against everything years of indoctrination instilled in her in order to break out and bring an end to the nefarious deeds taking place…inside a Russian prison, of all places.

As I said, nothing that hasn't been done before.