Underrated Sci-Fi Gem With Severance Vibes Leaves Netflix Too Soon
But is that a good thing or a bad thing?
Science fiction has proven to be one of the most popular genres during past decades, and we get why. Most of the time, sci-fi series and movies show the viewers many different realities that could exist in different periods of time and universes.
From terrifying underground facilities to huge dooms, sci-fi worlds are usually offering the alternate lifestyle that, even when shown as a pure heaven, turns out to be something far from the best option.
That was exactly the premise of the 2014 movie The Giver. It is based on the book written by Lois Lowry in 1993. The book was a hit among the audience and immediately drew many fans to the story. So the idea to create a movie adaptation came right in time.
The story in The Giver is about living in a seemingly perfect community where everything is almost sterile: there's no pain, no war, no suffering, but at the same time there's no choice, no difference, no colors even. We don’t know about you, but this gives Severance but without the “life outside of the job” part.
A representative of youth named Jonas, after coming close to a particular age, receives his role in society and it’s of a Receiver. He collects old people's memories, but once he meets an elder Receiver (later called The Giver) they look at memories of the past world and learn about all things that are non-existent in their new world, like joy, pain, and love.
The "real" world leaves him devastated and he decides to break the rule of sharing what he has learned with others, which gets him and some of his friends into real trouble...
Well, while the book was well received by society, the movie left mixed feelings, which is probably why it only received 35% on Rotten Tomatoes.
“A lot of people have a very distinct idea of how the movie should look and feel. The movie has good actors and it follows the book very closely. I think though the movie misses the atmosphere the book had, which is what most people loved about the book in the first place” Redditor BookWormofDune said.
The Giver is leaving Netflix on March 16, but after that you can still manage to check it out on Prime.