Last week, I had the privilege of attending a screening of the 2025 horror film Exit 8 followed by a Q&A with its director, Genki Kawamura, as a part of Melbourne Writer’s Festival. After releasing the film last year, Kawamura also penned a novelisation of the same name, both of which were adapted from 2023’s original video game.

For the film version of Exit 8, I have one word—claustrophobic. I swear I could feel my chest tighten and ribs almost explode with frustration seeing the corridors looping and looping. Many points throughout the first act got me thinking, when is this nightmare going to end?

One thing Kawamura said in particular really struck me—“We may not be murderers, but we are constantly ignoring humanity around us.” This is in reference to the opening scene and premise of the whole film at large, where the main character ignores another passenger scolding a mother and her crying baby for being too loud on a packed train. He continues with, “What if these things started popping up as anomalies and we start to notice and take action?” These small actions manifest themselves into the Exit 8 loophole, replaying as anomalies over and over again, much like how we replay small regrets in our heads. The Exit 8 loophole is a parallel of one’s mind, showing how it preys on its own vulnerability. This overthinking allows for clarity but also deters one from making an actual decision or taking action at all. I enjoyed the Q&A much more than I did the film, as the context provided by Kawamura provided each choice in Exit 8more depth.

Exit 8 is a meditation on humanity and our anxieties in this endless rat race society we live in. The film’s Tokyo setting makes so much sense, a society where we constantly see the working class become drained by demanding corporate culture, always exhausted on the commute home. This cycle just repeats again and again. Exit 8 seeks to flesh out the story of its main character—“The Lost Man”—and his dilemma of wanting to keep his unborn child, because he does not know if he would be able to take care of it, and he feels undeserving, seeing as how he did not stand up for the crying baby and its mother. 

I enjoyed the symbolism of the anomalies that manifested in the loop, like the vision of his significant other saying “Which is it?” (regarding his choice to raise his unborn baby) and how it all ties in with the main character’s dilemma. Kawamura spoke on how, especially in Tokyo, people are so focused on their own lives, confronting parenthood becomes a complex decision. “It is a common trope now, should we still have kids? Are we bringing them into a world worth living in?” 

I found Kawamura’s filmmaking techniques very clever, as the film is practically only set in two corridors, forcing the camera to maneuver in a confined and rigid space. Kawamura mentioned that his team named the two corridors Hitchcock and Kubrick—is an ode to two of the most influential horror film directors of all time. Having seen so many one-take shots, it’s evident how clearly inspired Exit 8 is by Psycho and The Shining. 

Because Exit 8 is adapted from the game, the very beginning of the film harkens back to its source material and is shot entirely in first-person point of view (POV). Kawamura wanted to showcase the POV of a player, then subsequently switched to the POV of watching the game take place. There was a very immersive experience in both variations. 

A final quote from Kawamura: “Humans don’t appreciate what they’ve got until it's gone.”