I suppose it is evolution, but science fiction films have
only two ways to go; rehash old plots and premises, or develop new, even more
implausible plots. The Tom Cruise movie
Edge of Tomorrow, redubbed Live Die Repeat, has it both ways; it creates an
implausible plot that feels oddly familiar.
This is yet another film, following The Last Samurai and Steven
Spielberg’s War of the Worlds, where the film makers seem to be saying that it
doesn’t matters if every other character in the film dies, as long as Tom
Cruise is alive at the end then the film has a happy ending. How much this can be attributed to the ego of
the actor and how much is happy coincidence I do not know.
The film (I am unsure by what name to call it) begins five
years after aliens called “mimics” (the name is never explained; they don’t
really mimic anything) have landed and basically conquered Europe. The humans are preparing for an all-out
assault because they think they have developed a weapon that can defeat the
mimics, a full-body armor suit with built in weaponry. For reasons that are not adequately
explained, the general in charge of the assault decides to take the opportunity
to pull a prank on an American captain in the PR department (Cruise) and put
him in the front lines, where he is certain to be killed. To be fair, Cruise plays his character as
such a self-centered jerk that it seems plausible that he ticked off a high
ranking officer and deserves the prank, although killing someone for being a
jerk seems a bit harsh.
Anyway, during the assault, Cruise manages to do something
that causes him to die and then wake up the previous morning. The film then becomes a cross between
Groundhog Day and the opening scenes of Saving Private Ryan, with Cruise
bumbling around the battlefield until he is inevitably killed, restarting the
sequence again. Fortunately for the
audience, he eventually finds someone who knows what is happening (Emily Blunt)
and she neatly exposits the plot. The
only hope for the human race is if during one of his rebirths Cruise can get to
the Head Alien (called Omega) and kill it before he dies and goes back to the equivalent
of Go.
The scenes where Cruise wakes up over and over are handled
well, although one is reminded of the genius of Groundhog Day where it never
felt repetitive. The constant restarts
do begin to drag a bit, although seeing Emily Blunt shoot Tom Cruise in the
head over and over and over does have a certain cathartic capacity. How much you buy into the plot is entirely
based on your level of credulity; I found it slightly more implausible than the
average Doctor Who plot.
I am loathe to give career advice to Tom Cruise, who has had
one of the most storied, long-lasting careers in Hollywood, but Tom, you have
to accept that it is 2014. You are in
great shape, but you are also old enough to be Emily Blunt’s father’s older
brother and at some point that fact is going to bubble up in the audience’s
subconscious. After a string of hit
after hit (despite the occasional Far and Away or Days of Thunder) he has hit a
dry patch. Oblivion failed to reach
audiences, and Jack Reacher was a major flop.
Now Edge of Tomorrow performed so poorly in theaters despite a notable
supporting cast and A-list writers and a director, it had to be re-named for
DVD release. Tom Cruise needs to look
for more age-appropriate material; start playing fathers, scientists, that sort
of thing.
I can’t recommend Edge of Tomorrow, or whatever it is
called, unless you are one of those science fiction fans with limited
discretion. It isn't nearly as bad as
its reputation has become, but it also isn't nearly as good as some of those
year-end top ten or twenty lists that include it say it is. It’s worth watching on DVD; heck the scene of
Emily Blunt doing push-ups is worth the DVD rental.
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