JONESING FOR FILMS

A man gets off the subway while getting upsetting news from his ex-girlfriend. Amidst the hustle and bustle of the subterranean aisles and stairway connecting to various terminals, he goes down a corridor. Another man walks down the corridor in the opposite direction. He keeps walking down the winding corridor, turns, the corner, and encounters the same man as before, walking in the opposite direction. He continues and again encounters the same man walking in the opposite direction.

This is the simple premise of Exit 8, a Japanese psychological horror movie. It is an adaptation of a 2023 indie video game. The man, named simply The Lost Man (Kazunari Ninomiya), eventually sees a sign with instructions. The corridor is a time loop of sorts, with instructions to look for any “anomalies” in the hallway; if there are no anomalies, he is to go forward to the next exit. If there is an anomaly, he is to turn around and go back. If he misses an anomaly, he starts back at Exit 0.

Categorizing this film as a psychological horror may be a stretch for some, but there are some scares and plenty of psychological torment for the limited characters involved in the story. It is similar to the puzzles where you try to spot the differences between two similar-looking pictures, only, in this instance, The Lost Man has only his memory to go by as there is no side-by-side comparison.

The anomalies themselves vary wildly; they may be something small and barely noticeable or something bigger and frightening. There may be something different with the advertisements that hang on the wall, a door handle on a door on the other side of the corridor may have the door handle in the middle of the door, or there may be something more unnerving awaiting in the corridor. Or there may be nothing at all. Doubt and anxiety about whether The Lost Man can ultimately escape is palpable at times.

The use of liminal space is key to the effectiveness of the movie. Liminal space as a disturbing aesthetic gained popularity within the last decade. Liminal spaces are the “in-between” spaces or areas of transition, and their emptiness or the absence of people or abandonment make them feel eerie, disorienting, and surreal. Maybe not coincidentally, another horror movie about liminal spaces is coming out later this year, Backrooms. The movie industry has a long history of similarly themed movies coming out in close proximity of one another (Deep Impact and Armageddon, for example). 2026 may be the year of the liminal horror.

I’ve seen quite a few video game adaptations, and this might be the most unique and unlikely adaptation into a feature length film. As an indie game, it is short and cheap; I played it the evening after seeing the movie and paid less than $5 for it. Given the unique nature of the source material and the stripped down nature of the game, it is surprisingly one of the best video game adaptations you are likely to find. It makes it easy for the director, Genki Kawamura, to graft onto it a few elements to build out the story.

A brief backstory is given to The Walking Man (Yamato Kochi) and a Boy (Naru Asanuma) appears in the corridor as well. The Lost Man’s ex-girlfriend reveals that she is pregnant while he is on the train at the beginning of the film, and they are both unsure about what they want to do about it. This makes the decision-making of whether to go forward or turn around symbolic of his indecision over the news he has received rather than just being a straightforward adaptation of a “walking simulator.” One of the posters adorning the left side of the corridor is an M.C. Escher drawing involving ants on a mobius strip, shaped like an 8, another symbol of an endless loop.

While it is highly effective in creating a surreal atmosphere, there were some elements that I could have done without. They made the decision for The Lost Man to be asthmatic, so he is consistently having coughing fits as he navigates the corridor loop, and the coughing gets old very fast. There are one or two other little quibbles with this film, but they are all minor.

Knowing very little about the film other than the time loop concept and being a video game adaptation, I was pleasantly surprised by the experience of watching Exit 8. It has some unsettling imagery and uses its psychological horror as a symbolism for fork in the road moments of decision that all people experience on some level. It also effectively conveys the anxiety of making the decision in playing the game about turning that corner to see if you chose poorly and are back at Exit 0. And it may send some people down an internet rabbit hole about liminal space.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars