Invaders
2018 · 15m · España
Tones: tense, theatrical, whimsical
Olivia, an idealistic primary-school teacher, secretly leads a regional league of Invaders, a clandestine street game played with QR codes and martial-arts combat. Ambushed by two rivals who recognize her real identity, she must fight to complete her mission.
Picked by Felix
The scouts
A primary-school teacher moonlighting as a street-combat QR-code warrior is exactly the kind of absurd, high-concept premise that makes you question whether you're watching satire or sincere action cinema—and the film earns that confusion by committing fully to both. This is what happens when someone actually asks 'what if we combined indie game culture with martial arts' and doesn't blink.
The theatrical tonal register—whimsy layered over genuine stakes—recalls a particular lineage of British genre-play (think Edgar Wright's formal playfulness), and the editing discipline required to balance a QR-code MacGuffin with hand-to-hand combat sequences demonstrates real control over mixed-register storytelling.
The decision to make the protagonist's 'real identity' her mundane teaching life rather than her fighter persona inverts the typical superhero reveal, and that single tonal flip—treating the secret combat league as the authentic self—is what makes this premise sing rather than merely gimmick.