White: Luke Mably
Dark: Adar Beck
Chinese: Gemma Chan
Blonde: Nathalie Cox
Deaf: John Lloyd Fillingham
Black: Chuk Iwuji
Brunette: Pollyanna McIntosh
Brown: Jimi Mistry
Invigilator: Colin Salmon
Guard: Chris Carey
Exam: 8 candidates, 80 minutes and one question. Who wins? You dec... oh, no, you don't, actually.
They enter a windowless concrete bunker and take their desks, while an armed security guard takes position and in walks
the invigilator (Colin Salmon, sounding very much like Jean-Luc Picard). What is the job they're going for? Will
we even find that out? As he continues, he tells us that, in terms of who goes away from this with a contract of
employment, the next 80 minutes will determine the next 80 years of their lives... 80 YEARS?! You don't even get to
retire?
Exam is a dialogue-heavy piece and would work brilliantly as a play. It's very intriguing but I can't go into
more detail about the film because it would give it all away and the whole point of watching is see how the candidates
deal with their situation. And how! Most of the cast get a fair crack of the whip in the script and there are dark times ahead as the work
through every possible permutation to get to the answer.
It's difficult to single out one cast member from the rest of the mostly unknowns but you get to learn just enough about
them all to justify their presence in a script, a script that names the characters just by basic descriptors, so one's
blonde, one's brunette, one's white, one's black, one's brown, one's Chinese, one's dark(-skinned) and one's deaf...
well, not deaf as such, just doesn't say a lot. And top marks goes to writer/director Stuart Hazeldine for his
directorial debut, since this is the type of film where anyone could easily paint themselves into a corner and not know
how to get out of it, but not only does he manaage that, he also comes up with, what I can only describe as, the perfect
ending.
"'Bastard' doesn't do you justice." was my favourite line in the whole movie as the tensions rise, but who said
it to whom, and why? You can only find out by watching Exam.
The Apprentice this is not. The Apprentice is reality TV shit hosted by Fozzie Bear. Exam passes with
flying colours.
Oh, and Pollyanna McIntosh, as Brunette, is hotter than the sun. Let's hope we see a lot more of her soon.
The film is presented in its original 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen ratio and is highly-detailed with no problems.
The tense atmosphere is brought to the viewer with carefully-chosen tight camera positions and to watch this movie in
any other format just couldn't begin to do it justice. When it appears on TV it deserves to be seen without advert
breaks but then the BBC are so hit and miss with such a wide image, at the time of writing this review, so I don't know
if they could be trusted.
For the record, I'm watching on a Panasonic 37" Plasma screen via a Samsung BD-P1500 Blu-ray player.
The sound is in Dolby Digital 5.1, and is mainly used for dialogue and ambience given the style of the piece. It performs
that task admirably but it won't be used as a demo disc.
The extras are as follows:
Interviews (23:54):
Short but sweet Q&A pieces with the director (6:15), producer Gareth Unwin (1:19), director of photography
Tim Wooster (1:12), and various cast members talking about their characters (13:48). However, sometimes these are
a bit too short to prove any real worth.
Behind The Scenes footage (5:53):
On-set footage during the filming.
Photo Gallery (2:43):
A selection of shots to the atmospheric theme.
Trailer (2:07):
Presented in the original 2.35:1 ratio, this trailer is the ultimate in ridiculousness since it gives FAR too much
away about the film. It's best to know almost nothing at all before seeing it and let word of mouth do the rest.
Audio commentary:
From director Stuart Hazeldine and editor Mark Talbot-Butler.
The menu features scenes from the film mixed together its incidental music.
There are English subtitles only and the chaptering from Sony is worse than usual, breaking from its disappointingly
strict 16-only-however-long-the-film-runs policy and reducing it to a mere 12. There really is no justification for this.
I would implement one for every five minutes, plus opening and closing credits.
As of April 2009, Blu-rays and DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TH-37PX80B
37" Plasma TV with a Sony BDP-1500 Blu-ray player and played through a Yamaha DSP-AX820 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Jan 2011: Intel Quad Core Dell XPS 8100, i7 CPU 860 @ 2.80Ghz, 8Gb RAM, nVidia GeForce GTS 240, Windows 7
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
Blu-ray: 
Exam: 8 candidates, 80 minutes and one question. Who wins? You dec... oh, no, you don't, actually.
The film is presented in its original 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen ratio and is highly-detailed with no problems.
The tense atmosphere is brought to the viewer with carefully-chosen tight camera positions and to watch this movie in
any other format just couldn't begin to do it justice. When it appears on TV it deserves to be seen without advert
breaks but then the BBC are so hit and miss with such a wide image, at the time of writing this review, so I don't know
if they could be trusted.
For the record, I'm watching on a Panasonic 37" Plasma screen via a Samsung BD-P1500 Blu-ray player.
