Tomorrowland

Tomorrowland may be one of the biggest disappointments of Summer 2015. A visually stunning movie by Brad Bird who clearly had big visions for the story that he wants to tell, but unfortunately, Damon Lindelof (and Jeff Jansen) came along and Prometheus-ed it to where Lost now lays and wither.

The good thing about this movie is the potential that it had from the moment it starts. A great opener and a brilliant choice by Bird to start the movie with a double prologue. The black box mystery was established early - the concept itself interesting though not highly original - and the audience’s imagination was tickled.  

Bird’s directing, Michael Giachhino’s score and Claudio Miranda’s cinematography really brought Tomorrowland to life, and there were a few set pieces that were truly impressive. Britt Robertson is the modern Disney heroine – more in the vein of Katniss Everdeen – and an excellent protagonist for us to root for. It was established early that she was special and we were aching to know why as we follow her on this journey.

But as the movie progressed, the laziness of the storytelling pervaded into everything and the movie looked lethargic. It all went downhill when George Clooney was formally introduced. 

Okie, maybe about 10 minutes after he was formally introduced.

From then onwards, the narrative became a mess. Nothing gets explained. 

It was as if the First Act was a completely different movie from the Second and Third. Think of it as World War Z in reverse, except that there is no Drew Goddard here to save the plot.

It did not help that when the action slowed down, the dialogue was clunky and expository-heavy with Lindelof and Bird trying to be quippy, but they are not Joss Whedon.

Clooney has always been a one-dimensional actor and cannot really act beyond roles that are not quintessentially him. All he did here was to shout his line, and perhaps if he shouted them loud enough we may be convinced of the feasibility of Lindelof’s house of cards.

We should have had a buddy sci-fi movie with more Raffey Cassidy’s Athena and Robertson’s
Casey solving the mystery.

Like Prometheus this was a stylish movie with a director that clearly had a vision and the chops but betrayed by a bad script (just so happened that it is again by Lindelof).