Directed by: Craig Zobel
Notable cast: Betty Gilpin, Hilary Swank, Ike Barinholtz, Ethan Suplee,
Emma Roberts
The Most Dangerous Game, as a genre archetype has
always been used as a metaphor for class divide as long as the story has
existed. The bored rich hunting a downtrodden, but clever, human being makes
for extremely compelling bones to any story. This has found great success in
films as diverse as Surviving The Game, featuring an unforgettable Ice T
performance and hairdo, to the generic but fun 90s Van Damme actioner Hard
Target, to the insane and cartoonish John Leguizamo vehicle The Pest. There
is something inherently compelling about the idea of hunting a thinking person,
which I believe relates to motivation. Michael Meyers is scary because you
never understand the motivation, the rich hunting the poor out of boredom?
That’s scary because it’s so mundane. We’ve all been bored, and we’ve all
imagined what we’d do with infinite resources, so there is something inherently
dark about coming to the “hunting human beings” conclusion.