Kim Gentes

A good action flick worthy of TV

I liked the premise of this story and the acting was reasonable enough, but the direction here was dime-store sci-fi with comic book cliche's filling up the scenes and script. The evil menacing and predictable nemisis appears. The standard love interest arises. The heroic effort is brought forth. All reasonable and predictable. The visuals and special effects were mediocre at best and disappointing if one is trying to make a truly top notch sci-fi. But it was clear to me that this movie was meant to live off of the character recognition from comic book and video game, and the possible hype drawn from its star, Charlize Theron.

It would have been nice if they gave her a bit more to do with the role, added some more capable supporting cast and generated some genuinely empathetic scenes and dialog. The director here handed in a poor effort, while everyone else was left in "Flux" as it were. In fact, they were more like left holding the bag, since the director obviously didn't want to take charge or take credit for anything in this film. Because of this, almost every aspect of it flails about looking for purpose. Without a strong hero/anti-hero, dark/evil, genuine plot interpretation by the director, tragic story, etc, the actors and story just meander out there in distance waiting for the end of the film.

Still, the action sequences and Theron's intensity do make it watchable. Plus, my 14 year old son thought the action was pretty cool. But neither of us where blown away by the movie at all. It's worth a trip to the rental shelf, but there was nothing compelling about spending $8.50 per person at the theatre for this half attempt at scifi by director Karyn Kusama.

My solution- bring back Theron for Flux II, hire Bruckheimer for production and get someone great like Spielberg or someone inventive like Danny Boyle to pilot this ship, and throw Kusama overboard.