IRON LUNG

IRON LUNG is a horror movie about a convict named Simon who stands wrongfully imprisoned for a space station’s destruction and the deaths caused by it. While trying to steal resources from the space station initially, Simon tries to stop his “brothers” from destroying the station. Failing to do so, Simon is now sentenced to pilot Submarine SM-13 in a “Blood Ocean” on a distant moon and do as his captors command in order to be free. The Blood Ocean forms a great sea of actual human blood located on a moon that appeared during what’s known as the “Quiet Rapture.” In the Quiet Rapture, all the stars and habitable planets with people on them suddenly vanished, and left only those who remained on space stations or spaceships alive.

During his first expedition into the Blood Ocean, Simon discovers there are creatures lurking in its depths. However, when he becomes trapped inside the SM-13 submarine beneath the Blood Ocean, he’s forced to put his freedom and possibly his life on the line to save humanity.

Based on a video game, IRON LUNG is an entertaining movie that centers around the stakes of both Simon and humankind’s survival. The entire screentime takes place inside the SM-13 submarine, with the movie’s main character, Simon, rarely interacting with anyone face to face. Simon serves as a great protagonist and is performed well by Mark Edward Fischbach, who’s also the movie’s director. Simon appears not as a man trying to be a hero, but instead as a man forced to be one.

The clever visuals and sound design in IRON LUNG make the viewer feel trapped inside the submarine, yet also scared that the hero will leave the submarine and encounter something even worse. Rarely are there times where ‘monsters’ in horror movies barely have any screen time, but IRON LUNG uses this to its advantage and showcases the creatures in unique ways that still cause terror. Examples include sounds heard outside the submarine, the submarine’s control panel and signals, and X-ray photos that show clear images of the monsters. The filmmakers could have enhanced these elements better, especially in the movie’s second half. Overall, however, the movie is a good adaptation of a video game, though it’s too long and slow in places.

IRON LUNG has a strong Christian worldview promoting sacrifice, where the reluctant hero decides to fight for something greater than himself. As such, the movie highlights the necessity of sacrifice for the greater good, a major point in the Christian faith’s message of Jesus Christ’s atoning sacrifice for the whole world. Sacrifice in the movie is not a choice to be good but an obligation for the greater good. Sadly, however, IRON LONG contains at least 51 mostly strong obscenities, gross images of body horror, copious amounts of blood, and scary creatures. So, the movie has excessive and unacceptable content overall.