Late-stage capitalism is killing us. Look at the world, especially in the United States, where billionaires get richer and the poor get poorer. Out of FrightFest, co-directors Ed Dougherty and Brea Grant’s anthology film, Grind, takes gasoline and a lighted match to hustle culture. Greedy companies such as Amazon, DoorDash, and Facebook propel humanity hurtling toward our inevitable extinction. As they say, there’s no ethical consumption under capitalism. We’re all trapped in buying from corporations and using social media platforms that are literally contaminating the air we breathe and the water we drink. Grind makes damn sure the audience gets a spoonful of reality (it tastes a lot like Rubitussin). The jokes are equally brilliant, funny, and depressing.
The opening segment “Warehouse Wonders/The Black Box” (directed by Chelsea Stardust) begins the interconnected film with a warehouse worker scouring shelves for a ring light in the influencer section. But she doesn’t find it in time before the DRGN Corporation timer goes off, signaling that she has failed after three strikeouts. When you displease DRGN, they send you a giant mystery box—its contents hidden until the company sends one to a branded coffee shop in the final segment. The introductory story frames the film as an incisive indictment of the deterioration of the workforce and how we are nothing more than rats chasing the cheese and getting nowhere. Thanks, Boomers!
“MLM” tells the story of Sarah (Jessika Van) and her journey as a rep for Lala Leggings, established by The Founder (Barbara Cramption). She’s an up and coming influencer, and her onscreen skills leave much to be desired. But it’s that awkwardness that is actually quite charming. The pressure to meet her quotas leads to her superior to collaborate on a live-stream, breaking the rules and summoning the Ax Man to teach them a harrowing lesson. “MLM” bleeds into “Delivery” about a DRGNDash driver named Benny (Vinny Thomas), who also struggles to find orders worth his time. When a customer known only as Simon S. places an order, Benny goes on a wild journey into the belly of compliance and consequence.
The third segment, “Content Moderation,” embraces mindless office tasks and the reality that you can never escape it. Former teacher Joel (Christopher Marquette) takes a job at the DRGN Corp., where he’s promised a hefty salary—but there’s a catch. Joel must descend into The Pit, housing an office space where he will moderate over six million video submissions. Once that’s completed, he will then join his office mates upstairs and receive a massive paycheck. It’s as grim as they come, especially in a post-COVID world.
“Content Moderation” gives way to “Union Meeting,” centered in a DRGN-owned coffee shop where its employees have formed a union to combat corporation ethics. Dead Meat host James Janisee stars as a naive barista and joins his coworkers in forging a way forward through deadly capitalism. But as their plan unravels, they eventually receive one of those mysterious boxes, which contains a wicked surprise. The film then comes crashing into the coda, featuring The Founder and her husband, and showcases the unavoidable, toxic cycles of abuse.
Grind works on every conceivable level. It hilariously blasts hustle culture, capitalism, and the sad reality that the grind will likely never end (sorry, Millennials, Gen Z, and Gen Alpha, you won’t get to retire). Money makes the world go ’round, and billionaries have hoarded an insane amount of wealth that could literally solve world hunger. Bezos, Zuckerberg, and Musk could feed every impoverished country, make sure every person has clean drinking water, and that every homeless person no longer had to die on the streets. But why would they?
Leave a Reply