Directed by Ian Hunt-Duffy, Double Blind tells the story of a pharmaceutical giant that wants to conduct a drug test, and they are ready to put the lives of the subjects in jeopardy if it comes to that. The people who took part in the human trials were offered a huge sum of money, and they had no clue what they had signed up for. So, let’s find out what happened during the test and if the subjects were able to come out of the lab alive.
Spoiler Alert
What did Blackwood Pharma want to do?
Blackwood Pharma had very carefully selected a bunch of people to conduct clinical trials on them for a drug that they wanted to market. Dr. Burke, who was heading the experiment, had her doubts about the drug, but she wanted to see first what effect it had on people. Now, everybody who was present there was going through some kind of crisis in their lives, and they had no family, an aspect of their lives that played a key role in their selection. Everybody was happy to be at the facility because they were being paid a huge amount of money in return. Claire was a part of such a trial for the very first time, and that was why she was a bit unsure and anxious about the entire thing. There were people like Amir, who was in the medical profession, and because he had not gotten an internship at Blackwood Pharma, he decided to take part in the trial, hoping that in the future, he could work for the company. Vanessa had a hard life; she didn’t socialize with anyone and stayed by herself. Dr. Burke gave 25 mg of dosage at first, and then, on the orders of her superiors, she kept on increasing it. At first, all of them were fine, but slowly, they realized that they were not able to sleep.
At that juncture in Double Blind, Dr. Burke informed her superiors that there were certain negative impacts that the drug was having and that they should stop the trial immediately. The drug was directly affecting the central nervous system and causing brain inflammation. But Dr. Burke was told to carry on with the trials, and so she came and told the subjects that they would get a bonus of $30,000 if they kept taking the drug. The people were too naive to understand what was happening there, and the moment they got to know that they would get extra money, they forgot that they were risking their lives. But the subjects got to know what they had signed up for when Alison died in front of their eyes. Claire was really mean to Alison, after which she went away and fell asleep. When Alison fell asleep; her eyes and nose started bleeding, and finally, she had a seizure and died on the spot. All of them realized that staying awake was the key to survival, and they could meet a similar fate the moment they fell asleep.
How did Dr. Burke die?
Amir was skeptical from the very beginning of Double Blind, and he decided to take matters into his own hands. He went to Dr. Burke’s office when she was not there and checked the system for any details he could find about the test. He saw the MRI scans and all the other reports, which made him realize that the pharma company knew what they were doing but still wanted to go ahead with the trials. Amir knew that his only chance of exposing the perpetrators was if he had some evidence to prove his claims. And so, he decided to make a copy of the MRI scans, but as soon as he did that, the emergency shutdown system was activated. The bunker where the tests were being conducted was made to withstand any tragedy, and that is why, in case of a lockdown, the doors didn’t open for the next 24 hours, and even the owner of the company couldn’t do anything in such a scenario. Dr. Burke tried going out of the door, but she got stuck in between, and before anybody could pull her back, she got gravely injured and then met her fateful end. With Dr. Burke gone, the subjects knew that they would have to somehow manage to stay awake for the next 24 hours and hoped that help would arrive as soon as the doors opened. But it was easier said than done because they had already been awake for several hours, and now their body and mind were getting affected due to sleep deprivation.
Was Claire able to get out alive?
Amir told all the inmates to just hang in there for the next 24 hours, but Ray and others started questioning his credibility. Obviously, they were not thinking with a straight mind because of the lack of sleep, and they were making all sorts of conspiracy theories in their head. Ray conveyed to everybody that Amir was working for the pharmaceutical company, though in reality, that was not the case. Ray and Vanessa wanted to inject a sedative in Amir so that they could find out if he was speaking the truth or not, but before Vanessa could do that, she fell on the floor and bled to death.
During Double Blind‘s ending, even Amir lost his mind, and he stabbed Ray multiple times in rage and anger. He then went after Claire, but she somehow managed to save herself. The 24-hour time period lapsed, and the guards of the pharmaceutical company entered the facility with the intention of killing whoever had survived. Claire put blood on her face, and she pretended to be dead. Together with all the other dead bodies, she was also thrown inside the van and taken to the burial site. Claire woke up in the middle of the journey, and the driver lost control of the vehicle, and before he knew it the vehicle got disbalanced and turned upside down. The driver did not survive the crash, but Claire came out of the vehicle alive.
Will Claire take revenge on Blackwood Pharma?
Claire was in a state of coma, and probably the pharma company believed that she wouldn’t come back to her senses. They had created a fake narrative and put all the blame on Dr. Burke. The spokesperson of the pharma giant said in the press conference that they had no clue what Dr. Burke was up to, and under the pretext of conducting tests that she was authorized to, she was doing some sinister things inside the laboratory. The board members of the company denied any vicarious liability, taking ignorance as the defense. But there was a twist at the end of Double Blind, as Claire opened her eyes and probably came to her senses. The film left us on this cliffhanger, and I am very sure that if there is a sequel, we would see Claire going after the pharmaceutical company and trying to bring the truth to light. Claire didn’t have anything to lose, and she knew that nobody deserved to die in such circumstances. They were treated like lab rats, and I believe Claire would like somebody to take the onus and accept their faults.
