Oxygen Netflix Movie Review
How calm are you under pressure?
I like to think I am pretty calm under pressure, but I am sure I would not be calm if I was trapped in a box with only 90 minutes or so till my oxygen ran out. While also trying to figure out how to get out and save myself. (The fact I am not good at escape rooms probably says a lot about how my situation would go. Haha!) That is the premise of Netflix’s new French thriller movie, Oxygen, but is the movie any good? Oxygen releases on Netflix on May 12, 2021. Here is my Oxygen Netflix Movie Review. (Spoiler-Free of course.)
Oxygen Netflix Movie Review
The premise behind Oxygen is a good one. A woman wakes up alone in a cryogenic unit and has only a certain amount of time to figure out how to get out before her oxygen runs out. To make it more interesting she has to piece together fractured memories to help her escape. While I really liked the idea and story behind Oxygen I just feel it was not executed as well as it could have been and after watching the movie I felt let down and disappointed. Usually, the idea of a count-down clock to doom makes a movie thrilling and heart-pounding, but that is not how I felt while watching Oxygen. To me, the pacing in the movie seemed off. It was so slow during many points of the movie that when it did hit the exciting parts I just wasn’t as invested as I should have been.
Now, I do give the movie kudos for trying to put some surprise twists in there that no one will see coming. But the surprise twists are so out there that I wasn’t left feeling shocked by them. I actually felt kind of robbed, and that I was in the twilight zone. And I usually love movies with surprise twists! There are some good jump out and scare you parts in the movie, but if you are scared of rats and needles you are not going to like them. Haha!
To top it off…
The voice dubbing was not the best. Also, when I watched the movie the subtitles a lot of times did not match up with the dubbing or the dubbing said one thing while the subtitles said something else. But the movie isn’t all that bad. There is a highlight for the movie and that is Mélanie Laurent’s performance. She plays the main character, Liz, and I think she did an incredible job. She is by far the best thing about the movie. So, what rating would I give Oxygen?
My Oxygen Netflix Movie Rating
Sadly I give Oxygen a C+ rating. While I give Mélanie Laurent high marks for her performance her performance is not enough to elevate the movie past its far out there plot, very slow parts, and dubbing issues. I will also warn you. If you are scared of needles, don’t like rats, or are claustrophobic I do not recommend this film. There is a lot of all three of those in there and even I had to look away at some parts.
Oxygen Parents Guide
I do not recommend Oxygen for kids under 17 years old. While there is no real violence in the movie the movie is still pretty bloody and graphic during some parts and does contain adult language.
Oxygen Synopsis
Oxygen is a French survival thriller directed by Alexandre Aja. The film tells the story of a young woman (Mélanie Laurent, 6 Underground, Inglourious Basterds), who wakes up in a cryogenic pod. She doesn’t remember who she is or how she ended up there. As she’s running out of oxygen, she must rebuild her memory to find a way out of her nightmare.
