TheTruthofItIs Review of The Beta Test

The Beta Test (2021)

The Beta Test, mansplained for those bewildered

[8/10 · 11 November 2021]

"The Beta Test" is an indie film starring Jim Cummings and PJ McCabe who also wrote and directed and let me tell you that this is the FIRST Covid-era indie with writers/actors/directors that has NOT been a waste - this was actually good. There are A, B, and C stories in this film and people are getting confused which is which, even mainstream critics. So without getting too long here, I'll 'splain the A story which is causing the most confusion. The film derives its name from a computer program called the_beta_test.py (written in Python) written by a hacker aliased as Johnny Paypal. He got thousands of names of film industry players via the Sony hack of 2014 and uses them as input to the program which pairs people for "secret admirer" one-time sexual encounters. He makes money, $5000/person, by selling them the name of the other. Sometimes these lead to adulterous encounters which often ends with murder in this film. Johnny's beta test, which is the state of a program before goes into production status, involved about 100 pairings which netted him about $1M but as he was being attacked by Jordan he launched it into "alpha"/production mode which pairs 1000 times more which he expects to net him $1B in the next few days, wow, some business plan. So here's the real spoiler since no one else seems to know or understand. Jordan's fiancee Caroline was the woman he was paired with! That's why she forgave him after his meltdown/implosion in the garage, and she's apparently pregnant (closing scene in the diner) so there's that to keep her with him. And they're on the run since he committed quite a few felonies. All the other story threads are subordinate to this primary one. BTW, some have compared Jim Cummings to Jim Carrey but I think he's more like Ty Burrell playing a psycopathic Phil Dumphy! Also, this has been compared to "Eyes Wide Shut" and there are thematic elements they share including the haunting music, but I'd also point out its similarity to 2008's "Deception" which was really good, too. Now that you know all this, it may warrant a re-watch if you were lost the first time through, enjoy!