Oblivion

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amazon shipped today my steelbook ..... damn things are out of stock already ... and I paying less than the normal bluray version .. go figure
 
Saw this for the first time last night - what a pile of dross!

Completely ripped off Moon's premise, whilst humorlessly plundering just about every classic sci-fi film ever for ideas which were then shoe-horned into a completely nonsensical script acted out by cardboard cutouts. I honestly can't remember the last time I saw a film with so little characterisation.

If you haven't seen this film yet, please don't until you've had a chance to watch Moon, which is utterly superb.
 
There aren't that many original ideas these days, one can argue The Matrix copied Thirteenth Floor and that copied Dark City. It is all about the execution and in that regard I enjoy Oblivion more than I did for Moon.
 
Somnambulist said:
Okay so.

Non-spoiler stuff:

If you were expecting a shooty pew-pew thing because it has Tom Cruise in... no. It reminded me more of a good-looking indie sci fi of years past - not just eye candy for it's own sake, although like with Tron Legacy, the director has an eye for interesting set design and camera angles/shots, which I like. The first twist I thought was utterly predictable and given away by the trailers far too obviously. The next twist wasn't though and around that point I started enjoying the film more. Given Tom Cruise seems to play 'man working for system, system turns on him, fights the system' in most of his work, it didn't feel much like a Tom Cruise film, which I was grateful for.

There are some lol plot holes that bugged me, and some of the themes had potential to be explored more deeply, but were skipped through in almost a single scene of dialogue, although in some respects I felt like it wanted the audience to reflect on it without it necessarily being said by the characters (which is all very Terence Malick but I'm not sure it worked as well here).

I feel like it came really close to being great... but not quite.

Those with a short attention span and a love of fast editing and rushed exposition will probably hate it. But on the flipside, it felt like it wasn't as deep or clever as it wanted to be so the nerdy crowd (hi) might find it falls short it for different reasons.

Still, compared to the usual dreary Hollywood tat it wasn't bad. A single thumb up, or 7/10 or something from me.

Spoiler-filled bit
It was extremely obvious that the Scavs were human and Tom was doing the alie...sorry Glados' dirty work from early on, however the cloning thing got me good, even though it was hinted with the 'radioactive' no-go zones.

From the moment you see the 2nd Jack has escaped when he comes back down the surface, you knew he'd pop up later in the movie, and the moment you know Jack switched the passengers at the end, you saw the happy ending coming, but that was kind of acceptable given the fact the human race nearly got wiped out. The idea of the self thing was given such a brief going over in the house by the lake scene, it felt like it deserved more exploration, especially given said ending and Olga seemed to be pretty cool dealing with a mind-bending scenario.

The biggest thing that bugged me though was the ending - it just seemed like lazy writing after all that- I was hoping for more than a dumb computer with a red eye:

Glados - wait a sec, you're up to something, can't be anything like when those pesky humans stuck a fuel cell in one of my reactors and blew it up, can it?
Jack - no lol
Glados - oh right, come on in... btw I can monitor you physically from a distance but I'm ignorant you're carrying a dude in the pod not a lady... now come stand right in front of me so I can babble
Jack - oh hai, I brought a big bomb!
Glados - oh noes! Send the drones, but don't fire as soon as you have a visual, wait until you're within an arm's length
Jack - kaboom!


Sigh.

Also, and this is a proper nerd criticism. I'm sick of the idea that aliens would need a planet's resources - you have clouds of water in space bigger than gas giants, belts of rocks with all kinda of elements in, why the deuce can you travel the stars yet not use any of that and instead go to extreme lengths to harvest a tiny speck of rock and water? And for what? It seems a bit crap to need all this energy when you're essentially a giant waste of space robot that's mostly empty space, that doesn't do much except float about. Can't we have something more thought-out than 'need energy, kill all humans via energy-inefficient means'?
Click to expand...

And the biggest question IMO... WHy did they need Cruise and his "GF" in the first place to look after the drones? It's a sentient robot with huge resources yet needs a man to repair the drones?

Loved the film though, was a little predictable in some places but generally had a few surprises. I'm glad I didn't do any research on this considering it was based on a graphic novel and as such the plot was known before it was released.
 
IMo the biggest question was:

How on earth someone could become an astronaut when you have that level of motion sickness?



Also a really good 'behind the scenes'

 
Ok so it had a few plot holes, but for me one of the more enjoyable sci-fi of recent. The problem is a perfect script rarely makes a good sci-fi since the premise of most sci-fi is a giant plot hole on real life anyway.
 
Comic was better...

Overall a good film, close to great.
It just felt a bit too sparse in places.
The musical score was very good.
 
I quite enjoyed it. I'd not read any reviews so just watched it and was pleasantly surprised. As an aside watched StarTrek into Darkness and that that was a hoot. Some nice little nods and winks to the original series.
 
DampDog said:
I quite enjoyed it. I'd not read any reviews so just watched it and was pleasantly surprised. As an aside watched StarTrek into Darkness and that that was a hoot. Some nice little nods and winks to the original series.
Click to expand...

I know what talking about

when Spock screams Khan. " kirk did it star trek 2", when kirk died in the reactor room "it was Spock who died in the reactor room in star trek 2"
 
Visually stunning but overall a bit meh. The plot was fine but didn't offer much to keep me interested and it all seemed to go to plan, really. It was like "hey, here's a twist and here's a convenient way to end the film. Boom. Now we can spend most of our time in vfx. Good job everybody"
 
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