Jupiter Disappointing
I'm back! I took a long hiatus over Christmas and the beginning of the year while I worked hard on the fifth book in the Eno the Thracian series. I should have the new cover up shortly!
It was a pretty dull season for my kind of movies. Nothing that I saw really moved me to the computer. Fortunately, it looks as if that dry spell is over. And no, I''m not talking about Fifty Shades of Grey. Maybe if it starred Lara Croft and Cthulhu�
Jupiter Ascending is, as everyone knows, the latest offering from the Wachowski Siblings. It was supposed to be released back in Summer of 2014 but was pushed back to February, allegedly for CGI work. We saw it in 3-D and the artwork is very good, clear and crisp. Which is a good thing because this movie is all about visuals. Planets, including this one, sweeping vistas of space, and the beautiful costumes all appear with memorable fidelity and grace. However, all this technological beauty supports a story as old hat at the Perils of Pauline.
I literally lost track of how many times our heroine, Jupiter Jones, is kidnapped by nefarious forces. Her hero is less Caine Wise, the genetically-engineered warrior, than his amazing hover-board which is right out of Back to the Future. I found myself wishing it would break down just so that we could have a little suspense about whether he was going to rescue her again or not. It was as much a 'deus ex machina' as the sonic screwdriver in Doctor Who.
Speaking of the classics, the Wachowskis obviously enjoyed throwing in endless visual and story references to the Greek/Roman myths, including having a space yacht decorated with golden statues of gods and heroes. The story has overtones of both the Oedipus and Electra stories, full of family conflict, death and rebirth.
Jupiter's genetic code is a precise, if accidental, replica of an off-world's queen�or something like that. The explanations for why Jupiter is so special are brief and confusing. We're obviously expected to take it on faith that somehow this miracle has occurred and everyone wants control of her because her previous incarnation left her all her money. So all this beauty and interstellar intrigue is, at heart, about big business. With explosions.
The main trouble I had with the film was that the Wachowskis emptied their file cabinet on this one. The story could have lost a subplot or two without suffering. There was so much story to cram into the running time that the characters were never fully developed into people worth caring about, but neither were the people in the myths. Jupiter is an archtype, 'the girl in danger'. Caine is 'the hero'. Balem Abrasax is 'the villain'�wasting Eddie Redmayne. They are not complex enough to be interesting over a long film, no matter how beautiful.
It was a pretty dull season for my kind of movies. Nothing that I saw really moved me to the computer. Fortunately, it looks as if that dry spell is over. And no, I''m not talking about Fifty Shades of Grey. Maybe if it starred Lara Croft and Cthulhu�
Jupiter Ascending is, as everyone knows, the latest offering from the Wachowski Siblings. It was supposed to be released back in Summer of 2014 but was pushed back to February, allegedly for CGI work. We saw it in 3-D and the artwork is very good, clear and crisp. Which is a good thing because this movie is all about visuals. Planets, including this one, sweeping vistas of space, and the beautiful costumes all appear with memorable fidelity and grace. However, all this technological beauty supports a story as old hat at the Perils of Pauline.
I literally lost track of how many times our heroine, Jupiter Jones, is kidnapped by nefarious forces. Her hero is less Caine Wise, the genetically-engineered warrior, than his amazing hover-board which is right out of Back to the Future. I found myself wishing it would break down just so that we could have a little suspense about whether he was going to rescue her again or not. It was as much a 'deus ex machina' as the sonic screwdriver in Doctor Who.
Speaking of the classics, the Wachowskis obviously enjoyed throwing in endless visual and story references to the Greek/Roman myths, including having a space yacht decorated with golden statues of gods and heroes. The story has overtones of both the Oedipus and Electra stories, full of family conflict, death and rebirth.
Jupiter's genetic code is a precise, if accidental, replica of an off-world's queen�or something like that. The explanations for why Jupiter is so special are brief and confusing. We're obviously expected to take it on faith that somehow this miracle has occurred and everyone wants control of her because her previous incarnation left her all her money. So all this beauty and interstellar intrigue is, at heart, about big business. With explosions.
The main trouble I had with the film was that the Wachowskis emptied their file cabinet on this one. The story could have lost a subplot or two without suffering. There was so much story to cram into the running time that the characters were never fully developed into people worth caring about, but neither were the people in the myths. Jupiter is an archtype, 'the girl in danger'. Caine is 'the hero'. Balem Abrasax is 'the villain'�wasting Eddie Redmayne. They are not complex enough to be interesting over a long film, no matter how beautiful.
No comments have been added yet.
