Dodging Doldrums

Last night after my beloved college football team lost their game me and the fiancée needed something to pull us out of the doldrums. We surfed the on demand channel and settled upon Joseph Kosinski's latest Science Fiction effort Oblivion (2013).

The year is 2077. Earth has been made uninhabitable after the planet was invaded by an alien race known as the Scavs sixty years previous. The population has been moved off planet to Saturn's moon Titan and giant machines have been tasked with sucking up Earth's ocean waters to transfer to the outer solar system and aid in terra-forming Saturn’s largest moon's atmosphere. Or, so we are made to believe…

Tom Cruise plays drone repairman Jack Harper whose job is to maintain the robotic fleet of protective sentries. He is watched over by his companion and eye in the sky Victoria who keeps Jack level headed and on task. Cruise's character is haunted by the memory of woman who, one day upon a mission in what's left of New York City, literally crash lands back into his life. From there the story plot twists and turns revealing the drone repairman's life is a well manufactured lie.

This is all I will reveal about this story driven movie plot. This film is full of breath taking futuristic technology and stunning scenery from Jack Harpers platform domicile high in Earth’s atmosphere to the ultra modern dragon fly helicopter he zips around the barren apocalyptic landscape within. Breath taking vistas were accompanied by synthesized arrangements that were reminiscent of Moon and Tron: Legacy. Science Fiction fans will love these aspects of the film. But, that being said, that is all the positive comments I can come up.

Strong plot could not make up for boring delivery. Even the insertion of the character Beech played by the indomitable Morgan Freeman could not salvage the effort. The two hour running time desperately needed more action to compel the plot. Instead the director relied on story telling which lent a lethargic grind to the movie’s pace. The bottom line is that the movie was visually stunning and worth watching, but I would not highly recommend this one to be at the top on a watch list. I found it really kind of forgettable.  I give this one Three Stars.