Jupiter Ascending stars Channing Tatum, Mila Kunis, Sean Bean and Edddie Redmayne and is directed by the Wachowski brothers. It was released in Australia on the 19th of Feburary, 2015.
Jupiter Ascending is about a young woman called Jupiter (played by Mila Kunis) who, after being saved by a Splicer called Caine (Channing Tatnum) must confront her destiny as leader of the Earth and stop Balem Abrasax (Eddie Redmayne) from controlling the planet for his own pleasures.
Now this was one of my most anticipated movies of the year, being directed by the Wachowski brothers, who did 'The Matrix' and it's sequels (I still like the sequels a bit, even though some of the stuff is a bit ridiculous) and Cloud Atlas, a film I still don't know if I like or not. After viewing it, like Cloud Atlas, it took me a while to understand if I liked the next film from these brothers who are slowly degrading into terrible movies. The action scenes were fun to watch, and the ideas that they had created in this space opera, such as the tax file numbers, and the political government of the universe, was quite interesting to watch. Also, the idea about where humans come from was a wonderful idea, and made me hugely invested in the film. The main problem with the film is actually the story. The background and ideas associated with it are worthy of a great space opera like Star Wars, but are beat down by the characters and the story, which are the front lines that should draw the audience in.
To start off with, the story was incredibly predictable, with not much new offering. If you have seen the trailer, you have seen the better part of the movie, and the character development that takes place. I felt like Jupiter, while defending for herself a couple of times, was very much a damsel in distress, having Caine, the Splicer, rescue her numerous times, after she herself got into the situations. I wish Jupiter had more of a big epic fight in the ending then what she got, which was more of a cat fight with a villain I swear is secretly gay.
Which leads me to the villain, played by Eddie Redmayne. I didn't understand his idea as a villain at all. What he wanted, why he wanted it, what his purpose was. He was just a guy who wanted the planet Earth for something it was created for, and is now being attacked for it. I won't go too much into detail about it, but I felt like it should have been explored a bit more with more of a debate. Also, his acting was not the greatest. I'm not sure if this was due to the director or Eddie himself, but the villain just seemed so lame and unimportant to the whole idea. The voice that he put on as well seemed stupid, but I feel like he was doing that because he's meant to be thousands of years old and had to have this old man voice.
The splicer's were very interesting, being humans mixed with a DNA to give them powers, such as Caine, who is mixed with a Lycan, which gives him awesome smelling abilities (it sounds better in the movie).One of the best scenes in the movie was near the start, where Caine rescues Jupiter (of course) and there is an epic chase with jet boots. The jet boots was AMAZING in this movie and put to very good use. It is good to see the Wachowski brothers still have brilliant ideas, even if their characters sometimes lack depth.
Another problem with the film, was how much green screen was used. It started to become very obvious and annoying at times, definitely in scenes where it was just two characters talking, and they were standing in front of a green screen that stood out more then the actors. I actually swear the house they were in at the end was green screened as well, and it seems that the film makers spent soooo much money on cgi and action, that they forgot to set up some actual stages to record on.
The action scenes were also very few and far between, with maybe too much political issues, even though I didn't mind that. And even then, some of the political stuff went over my head, such as people betraying others and suddenly forgetting about said betrayal moments after. I'm not sure if it's just me missing something, but I did feel like I was falling behind, and nothing was mentioned about it when I looked up the plot.
All in all, Jupiter Ascending is a fun film to look at, and has marvelous ideas with the splicers and the ideas about humans, but lacks in characters and the actual story. The acting was alright, but nothing stood out as amazing.
I would give this a 2.5 out of 5 stars, and would recommend waiting for the blu-ray/ DVD release, or if you wish to see the action scenes on the IMAX screen (which aren't that impressive to be honest) watch it in cinemas.
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