Out of all the YouTubers turned filmmakers, Markiplier, aka Mark Fischbach, was one that I least expected. Over the course of his nearly 15-year-long career on YouTube, he has amassed nearly 40 million subscribers as he does play-throughs of independent and AAA video games. One of these games was Iron Lung, created by David Syzmanski. A claustrophobic video game where users play as a submarine captain who searches for life in an ocean filled with blood. It’s an interesting premise that could make a compelling film. However, I did not know what to expect from Mark as a filmmaker. He has a couple of shorts on his YouTube page, but nothing of this scale. However, Mark manages to pull off a miracle with Iron Lung as he delivers one of the most surprising films of the year.
In a post-apocalyptic future, a convict named Simon (Fischbach), is sent on a desperate search for life on a desolate moon where the ocean is made of blood. Confined in a submarine named the “Iron Lung,” a routine mission slowly turns into a bloody nightmare as Simon realizes he may not be the only living organism on the ocean floor.
Like the video game, Iron Lung is a single-location film, set entirely within its namesake submarine. It is claustrophobic, swelteringly hot, and barely functional. The Iron Lung measures no more than fifty square feet, offering no view of the outside world beyond an occasional still image captured by an X-ray camera. The equipment is sparse, the amenities nonexistent as the sub doesn’t even have a toilet. This is a bare-minimum vessel in every sense–it feels less like a submarine and more like a death trap. You’re made to feel every suffocating second inside it.
Despite its claustrophobic scale, Fischbach establishes a distinct visual language. The cinematography by Philip Roy is striking as the film employs an array of lenses and camera angles that make the walls feel like they are closing in on Simon, both figuratively and literally. The editing by Fischbach and Marc Schneider is equally precise as it relies on fragmented transitions that mirror Simon’s deteriorating sense of time and sanity. Furthermore, Iron Lung weaponizes its sound design, ensuring that you hear every drop of blood, every subtle shift in pressure, and every unnerving voice that comes from the deep ocean within the submarine’s suffocating interior. This language creates a deliberate slow-burn that captures cosmic, Lovecraftian horror with unnerving detail. In this case, a record breaking 80,000 gallons or over 300,000 litres of fake blood.
However, despite these praises, Iron Lung is not perfect. The film’s slow-burn pace makes the two-hour runtime feel closer to three. Furthermore, while Fischbach gives a great performance, especially as an actor without professional training, he struggles with the microexpressions and nuances of his character. Simon has a tragic and mysterious backstory that requires a lot of subtle acting. This type of performance is where Fischbach struggles the most, sometimes playing as uneven and clunky. Removing Simon’s backstory or casting a professional lead might have helped even things out.
But with all of that said, Iron Lung marks a promising directorial debut. The film is unnerving, unsettling and downright creepy. The film resists the urge to explain itself, trusting the audience’s intelligence to sit with its mystery and unease of its setting and narrative. Fischbach controls the atmosphere by turning a single location setting into the film’s strength. While the film is not perfect and there is still room for Fischbach to grow, the level of intention and craft on display is impossible to ignore.
