The Creator, a sci-fi adventure from Rogue One and Godzilla director Gareth Edwards, is a thinking man's action movie, exploring big ideas about our technological future against a gritty dystopian backdrop.
In 2070, after a nuclear bomb has been detonated in Los Angeles, a war between mankind and artificial intelligence ensues. Ex-special agent Joshua Taylor is recruited to find The Creator, an AI architect who has created a mysterious superweapon that can end the war.
The film is superbly cast with an unique ensemble of character actors that never would have worked together otherwise.
John David Washington continually solidifies his place as a leading action star post-Tenet, with both the physicality for the action and vulnerability for drama. Allison Janney's robot-hating villain steals all her scenes, notably one particularly chilling interrogation
The world building and production design are meticulously detailed and gorgeous. The CGI buildings mesh seamlessly with the natural landscapes, standing convincingly with solid weight.
However, the film falters in its narrative details and ends up creating a fascinating world that it doesn't do enough with, resulting in an entertaining but flawed movie that's shy of being great.
For every artistic detail that would bring me into the world of The Creator, there'd be other ones that would frustratingly take me out of it.
As much as I admire Gareth Edwards' eye for detail, his influences would stick out and take me out of the narrative. For example, the AI robots have Japanese written across them. Why would a sentient robot race label themselves at all? We assume they can read all human languages. The only explanation: Gareth Edwards loves Japanese animation.
Ken Watanabe's role was occasionally distracting. Why is there a Japanese robot who only speaks Japanese leading a group of Vietnamese robots? It's not like there can't be a Japanese-speaking robot living in Vietnam. I try to rationalize it, but it still begs for more explanation. Wouldn't it have been easier to set the story in Japan instead?
The script leaves a crucial gap in the AI backstory that would definitely clear up whether they are friendly or hostile, which the story merely hints at and leaves it open for interpretation. This was dissatisfying to be ambiguous with such a crucial plot point and leave it unanswered and unexplored.
All that said, I still enjoyed The Creator very much. It was refreshing to watch an original big-budget sci-fi film that's not an established intellectual property that had no corporate reason preventing any characters from dying nor an end credits scene teasing a sequel. Anything could have happened throughout the movie. That brought me back to a time when all movies used to be that way.
As a fan of Gareth Edwards' work, The Creator left more to be desired. Since so much of the film was well done in such good taste, I can't help but hold it to a higher standard, wishing it hit harder and ended stronger.
In 2070, after a nuclear bomb has been detonated in Los Angeles, a war between mankind and artificial intelligence ensues. Ex-special agent Joshua Taylor is recruited to find The Creator, an AI architect who has created a mysterious superweapon that can end the war.
The film is superbly cast with an unique ensemble of character actors that never would have worked together otherwise.
John David Washington continually solidifies his place as a leading action star post-Tenet, with both the physicality for the action and vulnerability for drama. Allison Janney's robot-hating villain steals all her scenes, notably one particularly chilling interrogation
The world building and production design are meticulously detailed and gorgeous. The CGI buildings mesh seamlessly with the natural landscapes, standing convincingly with solid weight.
However, the film falters in its narrative details and ends up creating a fascinating world that it doesn't do enough with, resulting in an entertaining but flawed movie that's shy of being great.
For every artistic detail that would bring me into the world of The Creator, there'd be other ones that would frustratingly take me out of it.
As much as I admire Gareth Edwards' eye for detail, his influences would stick out and take me out of the narrative. For example, the AI robots have Japanese written across them. Why would a sentient robot race label themselves at all? We assume they can read all human languages. The only explanation: Gareth Edwards loves Japanese animation.
Ken Watanabe's role was occasionally distracting. Why is there a Japanese robot who only speaks Japanese leading a group of Vietnamese robots? It's not like there can't be a Japanese-speaking robot living in Vietnam. I try to rationalize it, but it still begs for more explanation. Wouldn't it have been easier to set the story in Japan instead?
The script leaves a crucial gap in the AI backstory that would definitely clear up whether they are friendly or hostile, which the story merely hints at and leaves it open for interpretation. This was dissatisfying to be ambiguous with such a crucial plot point and leave it unanswered and unexplored.
All that said, I still enjoyed The Creator very much. It was refreshing to watch an original big-budget sci-fi film that's not an established intellectual property that had no corporate reason preventing any characters from dying nor an end credits scene teasing a sequel. Anything could have happened throughout the movie. That brought me back to a time when all movies used to be that way.
As a fan of Gareth Edwards' work, The Creator left more to be desired. Since so much of the film was well done in such good taste, I can't help but hold it to a higher standard, wishing it hit harder and ended stronger.