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Friday, April 19, 2013

Oblivion

Oblivion
Rated PG-13 / Runtime 2 hr 6 min / Action, Adventure, Mystery / Sci-Fi

An alien force was detected approaching from space, and they are not friendly.  They destroyed the Moon.  This caused major earthquakes all over the planet.  Giant tsunamis and tidal waves abused the coasts.  Humankind survived underground.  Once the earthquakes and the oceans calmed, the alien Skavs invaded.  We used nukes to win the war.  The fallout from the nukes made many areas uninhabitable.  Humankind has moved to a spaceship called the Tet with the purpose of moving on to Titan, the largest moon of Saturn.

Tom Cruise plays Jack.  Jack is a drone repairman on Earth.  There are resource gathering structures that are sucking up water from the oceans for use in fusion reactors on the Tet spaceship.  Cruise gives a strong and believable performance in spite of his age and size disadvantages.  This is a movie that is dominated by him.  Most of the other characters don't have much of a chance to bloom.  Andrea Riseborough who plays Victoria is the only exception.  She helps coordinate Jack's repair efforts with the people on the Tet.  Andrea does a great job of playing a character that is afraid.  Afraid of breaking the rules and rejection.  Melissa Leo, Olga Kurylenko and Morgan Freeman round out the cast.  They all play characters integral to the story, but they are not given a chance to really shine. Olga Kurylenko looks even more beautiful than in her previous movies if that is even possible.  She also looks much much younger than Cruise which makes their love scenes seem awkward.  

I really wish I had gone into this movie without seeing the previews of it.  The trailers for the movie just give too much away.  Within the movie there is enough foreshadowing to make it predictable.  If it had been done the right way Oblivion could have been a much better movie.  The story is still interesting, but it does tend to drag in parts. The script also has a few holes that are never truly explained, but are necessary for the plot of the movie.  The action scenes and special effects are fantastic as you would expect in a Tom Cruise movie.  Visually the movie hits on all cylinders.

I really enjoyed this movie in spite of the plot holes and predictability.  The back story is interesting enough to get you hooked at the beginning.  Tom Cruise does his best to keep you there.  It doesn't hurt that every scene is a visual feast.  While not a great movie and a bit longer than it should be, it is still worth a watch.

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