After Earth

            Thanks to this song I can no longer say 'Earth.'  It's always 'Erf.'  Well, this part of Independence Day doesn't help either.  Fortunately you get to hear Will Smith say 'Earth' again.  Unfortunately(?) it's fully enunciated.

            On to the review!

            After Earth is, at its heart, a father/son movie.  For that, I cannot give it enough credit.  They could have easily turned this film into some sort of galaxy-spanning epic but to their credit, the filmmakers did not.

            The movie takes place in a future where humanity had to flee Earth after polluting it to the point that it was uninhabitable. A thousand years later, a new threat has arisen: aliens. Not just any aliens, either. Alien warriors that, while blind, are specially bred to smell the pheromones released by mankind when they feel fear.

            Enter the savior of mankind, Cypher Raige (Will Smith), a man who has learned to feel no fear, thus becoming invisible to the alien Ursa.  In order to make things a bit more corny, this ability is called 'Ghosting.'

            Now, General Cypher has a bit of a problem.  You see, his son Kitai (Jaden Smith) is trying very hard to follow in his father's footsteps, but he has a glaring disability in the form of being capable of actual emotion.  Even though he is still a teenager, he expects more from himself and believes his father does as well.  Just think of Cypher as the High Expectations Asian Father meme (with less racism) and you've got the right idea.

            So what is a father to do when his son wants to follow in his footsteps?  That's right!  Field trip!  In this case, Cypher takes Kitai with him on a training mission, where fellow Rangers will receive the benefits of his boundless wisdom.  At least in theory, because something goes wrong and they all crash land on--wait for it--Earth!
            Even worse, the father and son duo are the only survivors, they have limited food and water, Cypher is hurt, and the rescue beacon is 1000 kilometers away.

            That's just the first 30 minutes.  It's a very busy movie.

            The rest of the film is devoted to Kitai's trek across a verdant world that does not want humanity there.  He must fight off all manner of monsters and face dozens of fears in order to get to the beacon and save both his life and his father's.  Also, he falls down a lot.  No, seriously.  There may be close to a half-dozen instances of Jaden Smith laying on his back or side after being hurt/surprised/etc.  That was weird.

            So what about everything else?  Well, the film is gorgeous, there's no getting around that.  For such a CGI-heavy film, I wasn't really bothered by any sense of fakeness.  The futuristic technology is cool for the most part, but I didn't really get the hippie-vibe from all the man-made structures. 

            Jaden Smith continues to surprise me with his acting abilities, while Will seems to be coasting more and more on former fame.  What you have is a mindless summer film that doesn't really impress in any way unless you have zero expectations; then you're marginally impressed.  It is the ultimate inoffensive summer movie that you can probably take kids of any age to see as long as they are not frightened by CGI violence.

            Wait, there is one more thing.  The accents.  They were absolute bullshit.  They sounded like some sort of strange, country-boy-meets-British-nobleman thing.  It's like the director told all of his actors to talk like they moved from Alabama to Ireland, lived there for 10 years and then tried to become nobility.  What kind of idiot would fuck with accents that play no part in a film other than to cause a distraction?

            Directed by M. Night Shyamalan.

            Oh.

Oblivion

            There's a special place in Hell for people who talk loudly throughout a movie.  The man behind me in the theater yesterday will find out firsthand just how hard it is to talk when your mouth is filled with razor blades and Satan's little helpers are stabbing you in the ass with needles.  I even asked him to be quiet, twice, but I think he was partially deaf.

            On to the review!

            This weekend's movie was Oblivion, a new Tom Cruise action vehicle.  Also, it was a hot mess.  It felt like a half dozen of his previous films all rolled into one in an attempt to make a Steven Spielberg-style thinking man's Sci-Fi film.  It made me want to play a bunch of video games like Portal 2, Deus Ex and Fallout.  What it did not do was impress me with its own story.

            The plot is pretty simple, but I can't go into much detail because the entire thing hinges on two twists.  The first one you already know if you've seen a single trailer for the film.  The second one is so terribly masked that my friend and I both figured it out 5 minutes into its 125 minute run time.

            So what I can tell you is this:  Tom Cruise is Jack, a guy who spends all day running maintenance on a bunch of security drones that protect giant machines.  These machines turn seawater into fusion energy.  His partner Victoria (Andrea Riseborough) monitors him from their house in the clouds and stays in contact with their superiors in space.

            The problem is, Jack is a curious sort of guy while Victoria just wants to do the job and take the next train to Titan and be with the rest of humanity.  Of course, curiosity killed the cat, so shit happens.  Also, Morgan Freeman is there.

            My problem with Oblivion isn't that it's a bad movie.  It is actually an entertaining movie.  My problem is that it's so damn lazy.  Every single plot point is predictable, and just in case you're a blithering idiot, someone on screen will quite literally lay it out for you verbally.  There is a ton of pointless dialog, and the movie is about 45 minutes longer than it has any right to be.

            However it is a freaking gorgeous waste of time.  The special effects are fantastic and all the shiny toys and gadgets are fantastically rendered.  I especially liked how awesome the security drones looked, even if they did seem to be a minor Portal rip-off.

            The long and short of it is, if Tom Cruise thought he was kicking off the summer Blockbuster season this weekend, he was wrong.  What he did do was prove to you that he can totally act, he just doesn't give a shit.

Looper

            Despite taking a month off to recharge my batteries and prepare for the fall movie season, I'm still not actually ready for it.  Not only do I not have a backlog of Wednesday reviews, I managed to take on more writing challenges.

            But I'm glad to be back!

            On to the review!

            Back in little ol' 2005, the most impressive film of the year was a little nowhere film from a nobody guy.  It was called Brick, and it was written and directed by Rian Johnson, a relative unknown who, at the time, only had 2 short films under his belt.  Starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, it completely reworked the old noir detective story for modern audiences.  Also, it was freaking amazing.

            Now it's 2012, and not only is Mr. Johnson back, but he's also brought Gordon-Levitt with him.  Hopefully this will be a long and beautiful friendship.  In fact, I'll even go so far as to hope that Rian Johnson becomes the next Christopher Nolan.

            His new film is Looper, and it's one of the most well-written, fun, interesting, and surprising sci-fi action movies I have ever had the pleasure of seeing.  Not as confusing as Primer, and not as crazy as Twelve Monkeys, it nonetheless manages to entertain you even as it unspools its plot until the very end of the film.

            Gordon-Levitt stars as Joe, an assassin in the year 2044 who volunteers to shoot people sent to him from the future.  In return, he's well-paid enough to have all the fun and drugs he wants.  However, there is one tiny downside.  The contract he signed promises that someday he'll be forced to 'close the loop.'  That is, he'll have to assassinate his future self.

            This being a movie, things go horribly wrong.  When he finally faces Old Joe in the guise of the well-aged Bruce Willis, he is unable to close the loop, no matter how much he would like to.

            "But I saw all that in the trailers!" you moan, thinking I'm just going to rehash what you already obviously know about the movie.  So here's something for you to consider:  Everything after that is batshit insane in a good way. 

            The trailer would have you believe it's a simple chase film.  The trailer tried to make you look like a dumbass. 

            Joe is perfectly willing to take out Old Joe.  Old Joe has better things to do than get shot dead.  The syndicate Joe works for isn't interested in giving him another chance.  Old Joe has a plan to fix things.  Joe doesn't want to hear it.

            This is where things start to go absolutely, fantastically off the rails.  The movie is well-written, and you can stay one step ahead of the characters only if you're seriously paying attention.  References become plot points, and things that seem important can become irrelevant.  It's that kind of movie.

            The acting is phenomenal.  Gordon-Levitt continues his streak of impressing the shit out of me, and I think I'm developing a man-crush.  Bruce Willis delivers his finest performance in a very long time, and even the secondary characters are convincingly real.  Emily Blunt, Paul Dano, Noah Segan and Jeff 'Fuck Yeah' Daniels all deliver their roles perfectly, helping to flesh out the world that Looper wants so hard to convince you could be a very real future.

            The movie does a great job in the makeup and wardrobe department as well, making Gordon-Levitt actually look like a young Bruce Willis (because come on, nobody is going to put makeup on Bruce Willis).  The clothing and styles are all pretty cool, as are the little hints that this really is a dystopian future. 

            Many of the vehicles have either solar panels or what look like some sort of fuel recycler hooked up to them.  The buildings and streets have a strange, futuristic run-down look going on; Think Back to the Future Part II only with a bigger budget.

            The only downside is the special effects.  Wisely, Looper keeps them few and far between, but when they occur, they tend to be cheesy.  The one scene that really looks out of place involves a jet bike and a cornfield.  Trust me, if you don't notice it, you're not paying attention.

            However, a crappy greenscreen effect is absolutely no reason to avoid seeing Looper.  After leaving the theater, I decided then and there to buy it when it comes out on Blu-Ray.  While that may not mean much to you, keep in mind that I purchased a total of one movie released in 2011 and am the proud owner of not a single damn film from 2012 so far.

            Go do yourself a favor and watch Looper.  If you end up liking the action but find that you wanted a little more realism in your time travel, go home and blow what's left of your mind with Primer.