Stuart Hazeldine’s “Exam” and Seven Notes on Existence

EXCEPT FOR ITS detail shots in its OBB, Stuart Hazeldine’s Exam happens in a single room from beginning to end. Because you can always read its plot here, I’m just listing down seven random thoughts while watching the film:

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The first to be disqualified was an Asian woman, and we were left with White, Black, Brown, Blonde, Brunette, Dark and Deaf. The naming, however, came from White, who “killed” Black in the end. Blonde was eventually hired. In a film about identity and anonymity, it questions our notions of representation and strangeness, and how a British film ultimately betrays its biases on qualifications, intelligence and survival.

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Not what is the question, but are there any questions?

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In the film’s alternate history, we continue to fight for a job. The world remains pragmatic, material, economic. “There is one position, and the rest is fantasy,” says White, about the work they’re all trying to get.

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Matters of interpretation: not what was said by the Invigilator, but what was not said. The rhetoric of absence. The assumption of secrets. And yet/so: dialogue, confrontation, interrogation.

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The prospective job is involved with the health industry. The challenges on man: sickness, death. With continued epidemic, infection, virus, the body remains most vulnerable. When the new discovery was revealed to facilitate rapid cell regeneration, the metaphysical reclaims its foundations to the physical. The problem is our own humanity.

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To see clearly is all. The power to turn the lights on and off inside the room, however, rests on their capacity to speak and give command.

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There’s a guard. There’s a camera. And there are rules. There is one question before you, and one answer is required. The singular, the exactitude of one, the exam.