‘Exit 8’ traps viewers in a frustrating video game world

“Exit 8” is a movie that goes in circles with little rhyme or reason, and all of that is by design.

The Japanese movie is based on what must be one of the most minimalist video games in recent history as the entire story (I use that term loosely) is set inside a Tokyo subway station passageway. It follows The Lost Man (Kazunari Ninomiya), an asthmatic who is going through a personal crisis with his girlfriend (Nana Komatsu). She is in the hospital and he is trying to make his way to her side but gets lost in the station.

Every time he turns a corner, he’s right back where he started from. Each time he loops back to the same hallway, he sees an expressionless Walking Man (Yamato Kochi) carrying a suitcase. 

The Lost Man, indeed, appears to be lost, but viewers may feel like they’re the ones stuck in an endless loop. (Warning: BART riders who have experienced long delays could be traumatized.)

Along the way, he also meets The Boy (Naru Asanuma), a small child who originally is following The Walking Man, but then attaches himself to The Lost Man.

Like all video games, there are rules. Here they’re posted on the wall of the passageway. Each time The Lost Man finds himself back in the same passageway, he must look for an anomaly — something different from his last time he came through. If he spots one, he turns back to advance to the next level. If there is no anomaly, he can move ahead. The Lost Man must do this eight times successfully to get to Exit 8 and, presumably, out of the station.

One mistake, though, sends him back to the beginning.

Why all this is happening, or even how it could happen, is not clear. 

“Exit 8,” therefore, is a puzzle movie. It operates as a sort of locked room mystery, with director Genki Kawamura gamely trying to keep things visually interesting, imbuing it with a tone of bizarre strangeness while utilizing what is essentially a single set.

It works for a while, but there’s only so much one can do with such a confining, empty storyline. Even at 95 minutes, “Exit 8” seems stretched out. There’s simply not enough there for a feature-length movie.

It would have worked better as an hour-long “Twilight Zone” episode. Or, of course, a video game.