film criticism by maryann johanson | 25 years: 1997–2022
Knee-jerk clichés abound in a shameless retread of The Matrix in which many levels of storytelling ineptitude are the only depth on offer. Can Hollywood please stop reincarnating the same old movies?
A spectacularly scattershot, pandering mess of pulp junk, cheap-looking animation, and poisonous gender dynamics. A charmless cash-grab that can’t be bothered with the slightest stab at originality.
Welcome to the first action movie of the Trump era, wherein civil liberties are a distant fantasy and “no man left behind” has been forgotten, yet this is all “a higher form of patriotism.”
The most interesting thing about this all-over-the-place drama-thriller is Ridley Scott’s last-minute Hail Mary pass to replace a disgraced cast member. The finale is tense and exciting, but it’s a slog to get there.
Goes well beyond the typical mindless array of slapstick and humiliation to reach disgusting new depths of coarseness. Not just appalling, but actually dangerous.
A triumph of science fiction storytelling: a sweeping tale of mythological scope told with astonishing FX wizardry that brings emotion and intelligence to nonhuman people.
Unfocused like a 1970s cast-of-thousands disaster flick, and with little point beyond engaging in bland and easy propagandistic cheering. Boston deserves better.
“Experience it in IMAX”!
Immensely intense and suspenseful. Disaster filmmaking at its most gripping, yet there is nothing in the least bit exploitive or sensationalized about it.
Clichés about good dads and bad boys go beyond the cheap and obvious and into the insulting. There’s nothing unexpected or even mildly amusing here.
