We had such trouble here in the fall. Ambitious creators send serious, carefully “turned” sci-fi to cinemas, showing love for the genre. However, a void remains beneath the surface of the atmospheric images. After the Czech film Bod obnovy now comes the American Creator. The film, which can be seen in cinemas from Thursday, is full of gloomy scenes from the future. But it’s mainly his script that’s sad.
Archival footage recapitulates the history of robotics. From the funny box-like tin creatures of the middle of the 20th century, the development moves far into the present. However, the grainy television patina remains in the visuals, and British director Gareth Edwards holds the audience in a captivating tension right from the start, which – with reference to the famous book by Erich von Däniken – could be called Memories of the Future.
Those “memories” end with an atomic mushroom, allegedly caused by artificial intelligence. Since then, humanity has been trying to eradicate all the androids roaming the earth in this story.
The hero Joshua, played by John David Washington, is somewhere in the gray area. As a former special forces agent, is he on the side of the people, or is he helping the hiding androids? When he loses his wife in the beginning, he accepts the offer to track down the mysterious Creator, that is, the one who developed an advanced artificial intelligence, who supposedly has a weapon capable of destroying humanity. And then the hero’s mission only gets more complicated.
Forty-eight-year-old Gareth Edwards saw Star Wars as a child and wanted to be a director ever since. He succeeded, he doesn’t shoot any genre other than science fiction, he clearly likes it and has an undeniable talent for telling stories through images. He did it, for example, with his second film Godzilla from 2014. Despite the simple script, he materialized impressive monumental scenes from the world of monsters, the dimensions of which far exceed the human scale.
After fulfilling his childhood dream and shooting a picture from his favorite world Rogue One: Star Wars Storynow Edwards has come up with an original sci-fi theme, which was also co-written by Chris Weitz.
Former special forces agent Joshua is played by John David Washington. | Photo: 20th Century Studios
The Creator wants to be serious science fiction asking big questions: about the nature of artificial intelligence, about the boundaries between man and machine, about mortality. Edwards is able to draw the audience into a dark future and at first only reveal details about it slowly. But the more information we have, the less it all makes sense.
It is easy to give in at first. Androids with human faces, emotions and facial expressions flash across the screen, only as soon as they turn their heads, their artificial origin is revealed by a giant hole in the back of the head that you can see through.
Other robots have a humanoid shape, but otherwise their “heads” and other parts of their bodies are completely inhumanly metallic. Some are more like barrel-shaped robots from Star Wars, and their only function is to run to their destination, where they explode.
Edwards has created an imaginative world full of obvious inspirations – himself referencing classics of the genre such as Blade Runner, Japanese cyberpunk sci-fi Akirabut also ET to Alienor even k Apocalypse by Francis Ford Coppola.
Influences can be clearly traced. The Creator takes place in a visually and socially darkened world where conflict rages, but one of the protagonists is an artificial intelligence in the form of a child – and is this cute android a danger to humanity, or a victim? Is it a programmed thing or a being feeling emotions?
Unfortunately, the film varies most of the similar questions, which have been shaken many times in the science fiction genre, in an even remarkably obtuse form.
Cinemas will begin showing the movie The Creator on Thursday. | Video: Falcon
Edwards, like the Czech creators of Point of Restoration, is able to create a captivating world of the second half of the 21st century, where carefully selected locations in Southeast Asia complete the futuristic architecture. However, both films have in common that the more their authors reveal to the audience, the worse it gets.
Edwards works precisely with sound, he can create an atmosphere just by turning it down and letting the things that happen somewhere in the background, in the second plan, stand out on the screen. But even at the moment when the heroes themselves are experiencing strong emotions, the experiences of the audience are supposed to culminate, they tend to shake their heads. For it is often not at all clear what they should sympathize with.
The plot twists feel haphazard, as if the events in this world only happen for the purposes of the plot. Dead characters aren’t dead, they’re just in a coma, and if they die anyway, they come back to life over time. Perhaps there is a technological explanation for this, but why certain things happen at a given moment, rather than long before, remains a mystery.
If it weren’t for the completely serious, mournful tone, certain “big” revelations would have almost Zimmerman parameters.
Unfortunately, a new classic of the genre was not created. And the picture does not even rank alongside works of the type Incoming from director Denis Villeneuve, i.e. modern stylish sci-fi with a few holes in the script, but a strong message at the core.
Directed by Gareth Edwards. It’s just a shame that when watching his film, the title of the famous essay by Philip K. Dick, the author of many classic science fiction novels, from Blade Runner to Total Recall to Minority Report, comes to mind the most. That essay is called How to Create a World That Doesn’t Fall Apart in Two Days. The authors of the Creator can be told only one thing: certainly not like this.
Film
creator
Directed by: Gareth Edwards
Falcon, Czech premiere on September 28.
2023-09-28 08:31:30
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