The short film, His Body The Battleground premiered in New York City on May 28th this year as part of annual programming by Jacob Ace, a screening called Film X. My interest was piqued by teaser images of the film shared earlier this year, depicting a young man with special effects makeup creating a deep vertical gash across his torso.
With an analog synth score, images of static and bright strobing white lights, His Body The Battleground blurs the line between the digital and physical world. The platonic image of the 'gamer cave' is brought to life in its minimal lighting, the computer screen being a portal into an inescapable world.
The film follows Henry, a young man absorbed in an online video game, complete with original animation. The digital world is dark and bleak, a dark forest where creatures tear our main character's avatar apart. Only when receiving a game over does Henry make the apathetic decision to check his real life surroundings, namely his mother lying on the floor after calling out for help that went ignored. Unmoved, he returns to his game and checks his chat, beckoning to him to prove his strength.
The uneasiness of style, slow lurking camera movements, and obstructed clarity calls to mind the feeling of an endless doomscroll on the most hopeless online forums. Ace's disfigured cult of young boys who followed their own egos and insecure masculinity into a ritual proof of self worth are permanently trapped in their bodies via the digital world.
Ace was inspired by personal observations of online cults, and the "willingness-and complete trust-with which young adults, many of whom appeared to lead comfortable and relatively well-off lives, devoted themselves to these communities." Through the lens of horror filmmaking, Ace brings these observations to life following the tradition of Cronenberg, and even back to the realm of Mary Shelley's gothic horror.
However, Ace is not interested in specific labels, whether that is being inducted into filmmaking canon or the realm of fine art, the work is individual and uncompromised, allowing the audience to draw their own conclusions.
