For a movie about artificial intelligence this film isn’t very smart. The story and the script is a mixed-up mash-up of genres and specific movies with a lack of emotion. One moment you’re watching a Vietnam Nam War story like Apocalypse Now and the next is a sci-fi tale sifting through the desolate neighborhoods of District 9. Through it all Writer/Director Garreth Edwards (Rogue One, Godzilla) keeps blowing up various parts of Southeast Asia just for the sake of the sound and fury a la Michael Bay’s worst impulses.
The premise is that in the not too distant future (2065) artificial intelligence will advance so much that the machines become, in essence, a race of their own, not just robots serving humanity. When a nuclear bomb, with echoes of 9/11, erases Los Angeles, it’s immediately assumed that AI is at fault. The U.S. Military begins a war of genocide to eradicate the machines.
Joshua (John David Washington) is a former special operations soldier tasked with going to war with the machines. He’s part robot himself, needing AI electronic prosthetic limbs after the LA blast. He became sympathetic after falling in love and living among the AI in a hidden village.
Joshua still thinks his wife, Maya (Gemma Chan), a brilliant scientist, went missing in surprise attack and is still alive. He is desperately searching for her while Edwards shows Josh and Maya in flashbacks at the beach expressing their love for each other. But it is played so much throughout the movie that you begin to wonder if they ever had any other happy moments.
Forced back into service by Colonel Howell (Allison Janney), Josh is tasked with finding and destroying what is believed to be the super weapon that could end human kind. What he discovers is that this Creator is an overwhelmingly powerful machine in the form of a small angelic-faced, female child he named Alphie (Madeleine Yuna Voyles). She is an adorable child actor meant to pull at your heart strings.
This is another CG orgy, with over-modulated booming sound design as the Death Star-esque weapon, The Nomad unleashes destruction on whole AI communities. Edwards and his Director of Photography Greig Fraser stage one huge fiery explosion after another while the characters are all are running around Southeast Asia trying to capture The Creator before humanity is to be rendered extinct. Washington, as Joshua, is often seen close up with blank stares and pursed lips without any dialogue. Or he is shown running endlessly to avoid getting blown up. Same for the cartoonishly evil Janney as the Colonel, giving orders and barely escaping getting targeted by bombs herself.
There are plenty of battles and Washington works hard trying to save Alphie in this hodge hodge of a script. Of course there’s an emotional twist to the story but, unfortunately, it’s not enough to make you believe the premise of this film. Edwards has a real talent for creating fiery blasts that fill the screen, but The Creator is a dud.
20th Century Studios. 2 hours 13 minutes PG-13
