The defence The Arthouse Gremlin
“Its refusal to behave is the point.”
The strange choices create the kind of friction that follows you out of the theatre and into the argument.
Back to trending 
Stay Alive
Horror · 2006
After the brutal death of a friend, a group of friends play an underground video game based on a 17th-century noblewoman, only to discover that dying in the game results in their real-life death.
Movie details
Stay Alive
“Play It To Death.”
2006 Horror 1h 40m
Critical arithmetic
One number, for now.
Scores change. Arguments endure.
TMDB
5.8 / 10
Community rating
After the brutal death of a friend, a group of friends play an underground video game based on a 17th-century noblewoman, only to discover that dying in the game results in their real-life death.
CriticWise case file
What this film says about your taste.
Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.
The archetype split
Who fights over Stay Alive?
For the defence
The Arthouse Gremlin
“The stranger, the better.”
Read their case For the prosecution
The Prestige Tourist
“You like your greatness pre-approved.”
Read their objectionThe split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.
Taste neighbourhood
Nearby on the taste map.
TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.
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Play Dead
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A woman wakes up injured in a basement surrounded by corpses. To survive, she pretends to be dead while a grotesque ritual unfolds in the house above.
Unfriended: Dark Web
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When a 20-something finds a cache of hidden files on his new laptop, he and his friends are unwittingly thrust into the depths of the dark web. They soon discover someone has been watching their every move and will go to unimaginable lengths to protect the dark web.
Brainscan
Horror · 1994
A lonely teenage horror fan and video gamer plays a new immersive and hypnotic computer game where he becomes a psychopathic killer, but when he emerges, he finds that the murder has actually happened.
Until Dawn
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One year after her sister Melanie mysteriously disappeared, Clover and her friends head into the remote valley where she vanished in search of answers. Exploring an abandoned visitor center, they find themselves stalked by a masked killer and horrifically murdered one by one...only to wake up and find themselves back at the beginning of the same evening.
Would You Rather
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Desperate to help her ailing brother, a young woman agrees to compete in a deadly game of "Would You Rather" hosted by a sadistic aristocrat.
Play Dead
Horror · 2022
Criminology student Chloe fakes her own death to break into a morgue, in order to retrieve a piece of evidence that ties her younger brother to a crime gone wrong. Once inside, she discovers that a sadistic coroner is using the corpses for his sick and twisted business, and when he realises that Chloe still has a pulse, a terrifying game of cat and mouse ensues.
The Possessed
Horror · 2021
A man with the ability to exorcise demons fights to protect his loved ones after a sudden surge in demonic possessions. After discovering his nephew's girlfriend has the same supernatural gift, they join forces for the ultimate confrontation. Inspired by actual events.
Home Sweet Home: Rebirth
Horror · 2025
When a city is overrun with a demonically-possessed crowd, a cop must find the source of evil to save his family.
Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City
Action · 2021
Once the booming home of pharmaceutical giant Umbrella Corporation, Raccoon City is now a dying Midwestern town. The company’s exodus left the city a wasteland…with great evil brewing below the surface. When that evil is unleashed, the townspeople are forever…changed…and a small group of survivors must work together to uncover the truth behind Umbrella and make it through the night.
Where it lives
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Names above the title
The people responsible.
Cast & crew
Directed by
William Brent Bell
Written by
William Brent Bell · Matthew Peterman
Jon Foster
Hutch
Samaire Armstrong
Abigail
Frankie Muniz
Swink
Sophia Bush
October
Jimmi Simpson
Phineus
Adam Goldberg
Miller Banks
Wendell Pierce
Detective Thibodeaux
Court is in session
Put Stay Alive on trial.
Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.
The prosecution The Prestige Tourist
“Oddness is not depth.”
A film can break every rule and still leave nothing behind but the memory of how hard it tried to be singular.