Jupiter Ascending is lame.
It’s another entry into a long string of Sci-fi/fantasy flicks that
totally misunderstand why people love Sci-fi/fantasy in the first place.
When you’re telling a story, simplicity is often your most
viable weapon. Star Wars, which is what
I think Jupiter Ascending is trying to be, had many of the same quirky world
building elements that Jupiter Ascending has. But Star Wars was built upon a
very simple plot. Jupiter Ascending does
not have that kind of simplicity to add clarity to its bizarre world; creating
something of an indeterminable cinematic mist for its audience to parse
through.
The movie is all over the place. Plot elements jiggle around this bureaucratic
universe, and simply refuse to come together into a singular vision. It becomes difficult to figure out what the
movies point is. Is it a hero’s journey
like Star Wars or The Matrix? Maybe. Is it a morality tale about the preciousness
of human life? Sort of. Is it an intergalactic Game of Thrones
between three villainous siblings? I
guess. Yet if the movie was truly about
any of those things there would be a stranglehold on it, yet the themes can’t
seem to connect to the plot or each other in any real way.
What’s worse is that the movies central conflict, which is a
romantic one, falls totally flat. The
two central characters, played by the equally beautiful Mila Kunis and Channing
Tatum, have absolutely no chemistry on camera.
Their relationship feels forced and unnerving, not natural.
Many, if not all, of the movies issues could have been fixed
with a less bloated script; or possibly a shorter running time. The result of the filmmakers compromise of
breadth and length is that the movie feels over-long and nonsensical at the
same time. They could have easily made a
trilogy of much better movies out of the plot of Jupiter Ascending, and we all
would have been much happier because of it.
Alas this is not the case.
The movie is semi-watch able just because of the beautiful
sci-fi visuals and a few wonderful casting decisions. Eddie Redmayne, who plays one of the films
villains, is particularly entertaining to watch; as is Sean Bean, who is almost
always proficient at playing cool auxiliary characters. The movie looks and feels great; complete
with some fantastically original science fiction images, but that’s really the
movie only plus.
I’d have trouble recommending Jupiter Ascending to
anyone. It’s loud, confusing, pompous,
and watching it is much like having a stoned cultist explain to you his
religious beliefs. The movie is pretty
look at, but that will only get you so far; you have to get the script and
storyboarding right too. Unfortunately
Jupiter Ascending fails, more then anything, to tell its story correctly.
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