Nerds That Geek Movie Review: ‘Mine Games’

Written by Scott Edwards 

Taking trips can be great, but having someone there with you is even better, especially if they are your friends. Needing to get away from your everyday life is something that I will speak to on a daily basis, and if you are able to take this break with your best friends and decompress a bit, it is that much better. As long as you can find what you are looking for, it is easier with your friends around to make sure you are looking in the right direction, as you would be lost without them.

A group of friends are heading up to a rental to get away from their life in college. Although they are in their final semester, they still need to find a way to get their minds right for finals week. When driving up the long winding road to their cabin getaway however, the swerve to miss a guy that seems to be crazy and is walking in the middle of the street. Not being able to regain control of the van, the group finds themselves stranded on the side of the mountain road with no chance of rescue.  

Thinking that their getaway lodge is not too far off, the group decides to start their descent deeper into the woods. Finding what appears to be their cabin, the group heads in and finds it is much nicer than they could have expected but they are missing a couple of other friends that were supposed to be there with them. Not worrying for the night, the group has their opening party, but Michael is not in a party mood and decides to go to bed early. As the group plays their music loud and drinks to their hearts content, Michael battles with dreams of himself killing and hiding bodies around the cabin. Not believing what he is seeing, he is trying to prove to himself that he can remain sane without the help of any drugs, even if they are prescribed for him.

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​When taking a run through the woods, one of the group members finds an abandoned mine that he wants the group to check out. With everyone being adventurous, they all duck into the see what is under the ground, but strange sounds in the mine drive them out and quickly. When another member of the group thinks that he has lost his wallet in the hole, he goes back down into the darkness, but finds something much darker than he expected, his own dead body. Knowing that this is not right, the rest of the group go to investigate what they can only assume being an elaborate joke, but when they find out it is real, they need to find a way to escape the woods with their lives. One by one, the group members have to battle their own fears of death and then have to face it, head on.

Mine Games follows a group of college students getting away from school for a long weekend before finishing up their last semester. With long relationships between them all, they seem to find a common ground to stand on, but they are all keeping an eye on their friend Michael who was diagnosed with schizophrenia and has not been taking his medication. Seeing and hearing things in the woods, but not being able to explain them, the group is feeling safe in their surroundings, but that all changes when they run across an abandoned mine on the property. With everyone eager to take a look, they find more than they bargained for as a couple of the group members bodies are found dead in the depths of the underground cavern. As they are alive and dead at the same time, they have to find a way out of the woods and get back home before something bad happens and locks their future in stone. But with every attempt, they keep coming back to the same place and have no way of escaping their doom, unless they are able to break the cycle as someone prior has warned them.

Being trapped without escape, is not a new idea in the genre, but what the group deals with in regard to that, is pretty original. As each of the group members are able to see the way they die, they try to protect themselves from it, but with all of them being friends, how could they not trust each other. I especially enjoyed Michael’s journey down the rabbit hole as he is dealing with his illness and having grizzly visions of things that he has not done. It played out very well in the end, and I liked how the only person that could help solve what is happening in the wilderness is next to death, while everyone else is waiting for their own to come about. Stay Scared.

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