Score: 1.5 / 5
I'm so glad to say George Clooney is back to acting after four years, but I wish it wasn't in this movie. Playing a post-apocalyptic scientist named -- I can't believe I'm typing this -- Augustine Lofthouse, Clooney has elected to remain on a dying Earth after some unidentified crisis in 2049. Yes, the date is a bit too soon, and yes, it brings to mind Blade Runner 2049 along with scores of other ambitious science fiction movies. He discovers that a space station called Aether is on its way back to Earth from scouting out a new planet for humans to inhabit. Determined to stop them and send them back to the new Earth, Augustine can't get his radio signal to work properly, so he is forced to find a better means of communication. Despite Augustine trekking across the Arctic with only a little girl for company -- little Iris, bless her, is mute and just not the best conversationalist -- the movie never really feels very urgent on this front. Sometimes technically impressive, and with the bones of a decent survival thriller, but bloodless and trite in practice.
Thankfully, there's a parallel story happening on board the Aether. Led by a pregnant Felicity Jones (I think they all had character names, but I didn't catch or retain any) and her partner David Oyelowo, the team including Tiffany Boone, Demian Bichir, and Kyle Chandler have to navigate their way home despite several obstacles that, oddly, mirror the threats faced by Augustine. The hint of horror, though, apart from drifting away into space or getting smashed by asteroids, is that they do not yet know that Earth is now uninhabitable. Oddly enough, the scenes in space held my interest better than Clooney in the snow, mostly due to the camaraderie of the crew and some excellent cinematography by Martin Ruhe (Hulu's Catch-22 and The American).
Realistic complications of both dire situations are almost nonexistent in this movie, and the new threats often feel as irrelevant as the unnecessary exposition, presented to us in unwelcome and sloppily interspersed flashbacks dripping with sickly sentiment. It's not even really character-driven, making these scenes feel spliced in from another movie altogether. At least, that is, until the climax, when a bizarre twist is revealed in soapy, melodramatic fashion that made me feel irredeemably cheated. I don't know how or why Clooney attached himself as director to this project, but he usually works harder to tell worthwhile stories.
Even the scenes that generated in me the most interest and excitement feel copied from other, better science fiction features, especially in a scene when the astronauts are working outside the Aether and run into an asteroid field. It's got Gravity written all over it, even is Alexandre Desplat's uncommonly overwrought score makes it feel a bit different. Ultimately, I can't help but feel that the film was, at best, a couple interesting ideas that the screenwriting committee decided to string together with facile plot threads. Characters are dull, the action isn't novel, and whatever control over narrative Clooney has is wasted across various focal points that can't integrate. If a movie like this makes you want to watch Interstellar or The Martian or even Titan A.E. instead of considering it on its own, it's not worth a watch. No matter how great the cast list may be.
No comments:
Post a Comment