After Earth Review

Can M. Night Shyamalan redeem himself with the help of Will and Jaden Smith in After Earth?

It seems well known that Shyamalan has lost some credibility after two major missteps with the widely panned Last Airbender and the unintentionally comedic The Happening. So it seems only the likes of superstar Will Smith (who also supplied the story as well helped produce the film) could guarantee  a safeguard against another major misstep in an already troubled directorial career.

Smith's presence on the project definitely keeps things focused. Indeed, maybe too focused. After setting up the sci-fi universe where humans have abandoned earth for some reason we get pretty brief character set ups before the film thrusts us into a simplistic survival story. The film really wears its sci-fi setting on its sleeve and chooses an almost Cast Away route where the main narrative strings involve survival and survival only.

Which seems fine, many films get caught up in convoluted plots and Shyamalan could have easily let things slip into such non-sense. However, in order to make the survival aspect really engaging we need to become heavily invested in the characters. While the performances serve as effective emotional hooks, the script and dialog feel a little stale and ultimately seem to hold the performances back.

The other thing that the film really needed to nail, the sense of wonder and terror of an alien environment. I think a film like Jurassic Park conveys perfectly the kind of feeling that After Earth needed to emulated and possibly surpass to become a really good film. While it has its moments of terror, it only rarely achieved moments of awe and wonder. Much of the time the film kind of just goes along leaving me feeling passively engaged. Every now asking myself questions like, why wouldn't they have guns or gloves in the future?

 The movie actually does have some almost great set pieces and Shyamalan displays from time to time a Hitchcock like ability to create tension and shock value. Although the more gruesome  make me wonder if the film will prove too intense for younger viewers.

At the end of the day, After Earth has good performances and competent direction as well as a pleasing look combating against a simplistic story and an average script. For my money I'd say skip it unless you really like Will and Jaden Smith and or survival tales.

6/10 - slightly above average.