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PROS:
-Uh, Tom Cruise. Duh. No, really. Seriously: has there ever been a more likable actor in the history of the business? Yes, he’s in that “he’s basically the same guy in every movie” class, but to *me*, those are the best actors for movies like this. That’s what character actors are for. The only guys I can think of on this level are Denzel and Will Smith, though Jason Bou- uh, I mean, Matt Damon, isn’t far behind. Crooze seems to be the only genuine Movie Star who never really lost his shine, and that fact is evident here.
It’s no great revelation that he hits all of his usual notes here: he’s charming, funny, earnest, etc, at all the appropriate times, as always. None of this is done in a way that truly stands out, but who cares? Cruise is Cruise and we all know what that entails, and frankly, that’s the appeal. I will say he absolutely pulls off one element to his character that we’re simply not used to seeing. If you saw Knight and Day, just imagine that guy has a twin who got screwed out of all the machismo genes, and you have the guy in this movie. It’s kind of refreshing to see the Crooze charm juxtaposed with what we get here. It’s refreshing.
-Blunt. She’s the glue that holds it all together, both in terms of her character and performance. I cringe when thinking of other actresses who could have been tapped for this movie were it helmed by other directors. Let’s just say, thank god/science/Buddha/Vishnu/whomever that, say Michael Bay didn’t get his grubby ass mitts on this, because her character would have been the first and biggest element to get screwed up here. An actress such as, say, Michelle Rodriguez would have ruined this role by beating us over the head with her usual “I’m a super tough chick who can hang with the boys” schtick. Blunt finesses her way through with a vulnerable stoicism that nicely offsets Crooze.
-The supporting cast. It seems the writers had a lot of fun casting a motley crew for J unit. I had a blast with every single one of them.
CON: (SPOILERISH)
-I’m sorry, I genuinely loved this movie overall, but PLEASE, oh PLEASE, can we get some alien/machine oppressors who AREN’T little more than a hive-minded group of, giant, spindly, robot squids? Can we get some fucking sentience, some smarts, some character, with a decent motive for once?
It can be argued that the best villains in superhero movies often outshine their more noble counterparts (Spider Man 2, The Dark Knight, Thor, etc). The ‘Alien/Machine Oppressor/etc” genre is the exact opposite. By and large, the aliens/machines are nothing more than a mindless or hive-minded force with little character or interesting motive. Skynet made for an awful villain if we’re being honest.
The Matrix had the good fortune of Agent Smith, but the Sentinels were awful. The Avengers had Loki, but the Chitari offered nothing but fodder for our heroes to beat up.
Sometimes, the story doesn’t really necessitate that we get some meat on the invader/oppressor side. Shit, I felt that the way Battle: LA was told, it was wholly unnecessary. The entire movie amounted to found footage of an invasion and the military response. The motive (our water) wasn’t great, though not the absurd notion people thought it was IMO. ID4 was similar. The Avengers didn’t really ‘need’ the Chitari to be anything more than mindless, generic video game henchmen.
Still, I find myself growing bored and annoyed with the completely uninspired offering of alien and machine overlords. It’s high time we got an interesting invader.
That said, I’m intrigued by a few things: SPOILERS.
-I wonder if the “reset” days spawned off alternate timelines of their own.
-I wonder if, at the end, Cruise getting the Omega’s power meant he’s stuck living out the same day forever, or does he now have control?
Both of those elements scream tentpole fodder if you ask me.
IMO it stands up well with CA:TWS as the best blockbuster of the year thus far. It doesn’t have the dead weight of Godzilla (here’s looking at you, Kick-Ass, and your worthless storyline in that movie) nor the overly convoluted waste of X-Men (So much to love about it, yet still so much to dislike). My gripe about the aliens aside, they do a great job of pacing the movie and moving pieces from point A to point B without getting mired in dense extrapolation. Given the subject matter, that’s a real feat if you ask me. -Sig-
“Why didn’t you do this in your own god damn country?"
-All Stah's view on undocumented immigrants wanting to be treated like human beings.
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