Immortality review: a peeling apart of stories, power and film that can't quite balance on a knife edge

1 year 8 months ago

Drumroll, please, for the latest interactive, live action, film archival puzzle from Sam Barlow, of Her Story and Telling Lies. This latest rumination on voyeurism also delves into storytelling, sex, death, religion, love, lust, lies, pretence (as distinct from acting), power and self. That's a lot to pack into the partial, out of order clips of three different films, which manage to span both decades and careers. The central figure is Marissa Marcel, an almost-star actor who made three movies before disappearing. So the question you strive to answer, by looking through unedited takes and rehearsal footage, is: what happened to Marissa Marcel?

In typical Barlow fashion, the entirety of the footage isn't easily spooled through. From one starting clip you're able to watch it, flick back and forth through the recording, and pause it to use the in-game search tool to focus on a face or object on screen. Selecting it will then take you to that face or a similar object in a different clip, and eventually you build up a much fuller catalogue of footage.

Now. Immortality also talks quite a bit about sex, in various ways and for various reasons, and there is female nudity. So yes, you can enhance! Zoom! on a tit. And the game will take you to another clip featuring a similar tit. Ba-dum, tsh!

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Author
Alice Bell