Jupiter Ascended is one of those titles that's hard to put a finger on it. From a cinematography and editing standpoint, it's nearly flawless. Really, it's a technical masterpiece, but that not always equals to a good movie.
This is a Sci-fi Action Romance, and as such the plot is very destabilized. The main problem is the lack of a villain, instead of focusing on that one antagonist that's going to drive the story forward, Jupiter Ascended focuses on a myriad of characters that fail to anchor down the tale due to lack of screen time.
It all revolves around Jupiter and Cain, who are best described as the Beaty and the Beast. Jupiter being the female ready to be swept away by a grizzled warrior with a dark past and an iron will. Extra characters are introduced every 10 minutes, resulting in a mash pit of behaviours and agendas. As such, it's hard to relate to them, as their only background is given via VERY heavy exposition. More often than not you'll be finding yourself torn out of the movie to question their motives.
This "tearing out" occurs regularly due to the many plot holes that are spread around like a minefield. Simple things like "Why is a veteran general who commanded 2 million soldiers ending up as a taxi driver?" or "Why would you do *insert main motive of character* in such a roundabout, stupid manner?", and many other questions that pop in your head while watching, destroy the little suspension of disbelief you have left after the 30 minute mark.
As if to acknowledge this, the plot recycles the same devices not once, but twice, which leads the male lead to perpetually save the female, and to you wondering if are watching the third version of the first act. Speaking of the female lead, Jupiter has almost no defining characteristics, leaving her in the dust in terms of character depth and is mostly used as a model (50% of her screen time is changing clothes). Honestly, the support character has more going on for him.
Finally the casting was a bit off, Mila Kunis is pretty as always and she does well in love stories, unfortunately she also seems very vulnerable in this movie. Even though the character was supposed to grow, her development (the little bit that there was) seemed stale and non-existent. Jupiter was supposed to become more confident by the end of the movie, but I think Mila failed to channel that confidence strongly enough.
And that leads me to the male lead, played by Channing Tatum. This is by far the biggest miscast I've seen in a while. Don't get me wrong, I like his movies and he's a good actor, but he's a baby-face guy, no matter how much make-up you put on him, you won't see the pure ANIMOSITY in his expression that Cain supposedly has. He'd be something like Wolverine, but unlike Hugh Jackman, who has that rugged,grizzled appearance, Tatum just can't have it because of his face structure. I think the only reason he was put in the movie is because he's a popular actor with females, whereas Mila is popular with males. The whole approach was to take a look at the popularity charts and take a pick.
Support actors do a fine job, not much to say about that. Some antagonists lack the viciousness required. Eddie Redmayne almost pulled it off, but his character had a polarity of being calm with random outburst of rage, which Eddie didn't do so well and ended up portraying Balem Abrasax as a neurotic child. During the calm periods you can definitely see the sinister part of the character hidden behind a layer of fake politeness, but when the underlining accent fails, the character fails.
All in all, the antagonists motives were not clear, so if I had to make one up it would be Greed, which is unfortunately the weakest driver when it comes to purpose, unless the villain is really fleshed out (which is not the case).
TLDR: Exceptional cinematography and eye-popping visuals, good action choreography and an original idea. On the other hand we have skeleton characters, poor actor chemistry, looping plot devices and weak story, which is further diluted by the many locations in the movie. A decent watch if you've got the time to spare, could make you think if you dig deep enough into the core of the story and find the idea behind it. Worth a rent if you have nothing to watch, worth a buy if you are fascinated by special effects.
This is a Sci-fi Action Romance, and as such the plot is very destabilized. The main problem is the lack of a villain, instead of focusing on that one antagonist that's going to drive the story forward, Jupiter Ascended focuses on a myriad of characters that fail to anchor down the tale due to lack of screen time.
It all revolves around Jupiter and Cain, who are best described as the Beaty and the Beast. Jupiter being the female ready to be swept away by a grizzled warrior with a dark past and an iron will. Extra characters are introduced every 10 minutes, resulting in a mash pit of behaviours and agendas. As such, it's hard to relate to them, as their only background is given via VERY heavy exposition. More often than not you'll be finding yourself torn out of the movie to question their motives.
This "tearing out" occurs regularly due to the many plot holes that are spread around like a minefield. Simple things like "Why is a veteran general who commanded 2 million soldiers ending up as a taxi driver?" or "Why would you do *insert main motive of character* in such a roundabout, stupid manner?", and many other questions that pop in your head while watching, destroy the little suspension of disbelief you have left after the 30 minute mark.
As if to acknowledge this, the plot recycles the same devices not once, but twice, which leads the male lead to perpetually save the female, and to you wondering if are watching the third version of the first act. Speaking of the female lead, Jupiter has almost no defining characteristics, leaving her in the dust in terms of character depth and is mostly used as a model (50% of her screen time is changing clothes). Honestly, the support character has more going on for him.
Finally the casting was a bit off, Mila Kunis is pretty as always and she does well in love stories, unfortunately she also seems very vulnerable in this movie. Even though the character was supposed to grow, her development (the little bit that there was) seemed stale and non-existent. Jupiter was supposed to become more confident by the end of the movie, but I think Mila failed to channel that confidence strongly enough.
And that leads me to the male lead, played by Channing Tatum. This is by far the biggest miscast I've seen in a while. Don't get me wrong, I like his movies and he's a good actor, but he's a baby-face guy, no matter how much make-up you put on him, you won't see the pure ANIMOSITY in his expression that Cain supposedly has. He'd be something like Wolverine, but unlike Hugh Jackman, who has that rugged,grizzled appearance, Tatum just can't have it because of his face structure. I think the only reason he was put in the movie is because he's a popular actor with females, whereas Mila is popular with males. The whole approach was to take a look at the popularity charts and take a pick.
Support actors do a fine job, not much to say about that. Some antagonists lack the viciousness required. Eddie Redmayne almost pulled it off, but his character had a polarity of being calm with random outburst of rage, which Eddie didn't do so well and ended up portraying Balem Abrasax as a neurotic child. During the calm periods you can definitely see the sinister part of the character hidden behind a layer of fake politeness, but when the underlining accent fails, the character fails.
All in all, the antagonists motives were not clear, so if I had to make one up it would be Greed, which is unfortunately the weakest driver when it comes to purpose, unless the villain is really fleshed out (which is not the case).
TLDR: Exceptional cinematography and eye-popping visuals, good action choreography and an original idea. On the other hand we have skeleton characters, poor actor chemistry, looping plot devices and weak story, which is further diluted by the many locations in the movie. A decent watch if you've got the time to spare, could make you think if you dig deep enough into the core of the story and find the idea behind it. Worth a rent if you have nothing to watch, worth a buy if you are fascinated by special effects.
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