Despite primarily covering a small part of the lives of two characters, wonderfully played by Ciara Bravo and Tom Holland, the movie has an epic feel to it. That is helped by the movie having no lulls; scenes are only as long as they need to be before advancing to the next event. We're given the story of an unnamed character coming of age through love, war, drugs, and crime. Throughout, the one constant in his life is his love for Emily even when the relationship is perhaps the worst thing for either of them. The acting, narration, and cinematography is outstanding and this movie is worth the watch.
This movie is supposed to be set in the year 2190, but every single part of the technology suggests it was set in 2005. I like when Sci-Fi leans away from making everything bright and full of beeps, but this runs in the opposite direction full tilt. That means the show, with a small cast set in a small space station, needs to carry the movie. And it simply did not do that. It feels like each person was filmed giving their lines without any co-stars around for tense scenes. Very little sense of chemistry and a lot of dialogue seemed unnatural. Avoid this trash.
I appreciate a good western, and I know a good one may be a little slow compared to other genres. This definitely fits the bill and revolves around a simple plot at first; Lefty vows to find the killer of his best friend. The cast is stellar, full of big names, yet none of the performances really stand out. Pullman plays Lefty well but the character just wasn't compelling to me. Flanagan's acting is over-the-top and he plays a boring stereotype. Caviezel's stoic tough guy is boring and seemingly his normal go-to role. After the simple plot aspect concludes, the movie falls short on the rest of it giving the impression the writers felt they needed filler to round it out.
This is a tough movie to review without spoilers, so maybe an anti-spoiler? You know something is coming at the end, to resolve the entire premise and plot of the movie. It does a poor job giving hints to let you guess which direction it will go, so you are on a scenic ride with no ability to look out the side windows. The one time they do give you a hint, you only realize it in hindsight because they don't actually give you a hint. It comes across as "wait... that is poor writing" when there is a reason for it. Liam Neeson is very Liam in this movie where he plays Liam who gets a bump on the head and wakes up with some memory loss, only to find someone pretending to be him, and he has to figure it out.
