Ok...ok...another Purge movie. They are 1-for-3 with this franchise and I was dreading of seeing another movie of this franchise. You know what, I'm going to skip the build-up. They are now 2-for-4 for me now with this movie because even though I am not recommending you to go see it in the theaters, I think this is a movie you can watch and stream along with the best one of the franchise: The Purge: Anarchy.
The United States is in economic and social turmoil. The New Founding Fathers of America have replaced both republican and democratic parties. Chief of Staff Arlo Sabian (Patch Darragh) and Dr. May Updale (Marisa Tomei) have planned to initiate an experiment on Staten Island within two days to allow the citizens to unleash their anger within a 12-hour period. Those conducting and monitoring the experiment offer the citizens $5000 to stay home during the experiment, and an additional compensation for those who participate.
Drug lord Dmitri (Y'lan Noel) tells his dealers they will be out of Staten Island during the Purge Night while one person, Capital A (Christian Robinson), wants to stay and purge. Elsewhere, a young dealer named Isaiah (Joviah Wade) has a run-in with Skeleton (Rotimi Paul), who harasses him and says she is going after his sister during Purge Night. Isaiah gets a bad cut on his neck, courtesy of Skeletor and his razor, and Nya (Lex Scott Davis), tends to his wounds at home and is an advocate against the Purge
On the evening of the experiment, many people make their way off the ferries onto the Island. Isaiah participates in the Purge to go after Skeleton, which Nya thinks he has stayed. Meanwhile, Dmitri has stayed. Skeletor kills someone and the recorded footage goes viral after the NFFA gets their hands on the video and the people think that they are multiple parties going around. And, the limited chaos becomes national chaos.
This is nightmarish to think that this movie could potentially be relevant to today's society, meaning that the worst is yet to come. However, even though the movie is powerful in delivering the haunting images of ultra violence and social commentary, it is repetitive in its nature amidst a storyline that is executed well but is sort of routine. It is almost a tete-a-tete match that is not quite interesting as its political and social undertones of the movie. But, even though it lacks in scares in the first two-thirds, it combats back in that element but it gets heavy-handed in that aspect that it pounds you a little bit with the message even though I got it throughout the movie. It is like a professor is showing me the carnage of the war and the person is narrating it and then after the documentary, the teacher tells me what the narrator told me.
Director Gerard McMurray and writer James DeMonaco have made a richer political movie than the third movie and a better personal story than the first movie even though it does not quite balance it out in the end. There is a lot to like in the movie, amidst the treachery and the first two-thirds of the personal story, but it feels like a product of never-ending violence that shows us the point even though you get the point. So, I could view this as a guilty pleasure per se maybe over time but I cannot recommend it. I would say rent it for streaming or wait until it comes out on cable.
**1/2
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