Rating:
Summary: A solid, but at times clumsy and rushed sci-fi film that has some interesting, subversive ideas.
"The Creator" is very much a Gareth Edwards film, the aesthetics, the pacing, and a focus on human drama - ironic given the film is largely about A.I. robots. But it's this irony that leads to the film's subversive qualities, and without going into spoiler territory, it's suffice to say that humanity, having been at the wrong end of an A.I. caused nuclear strike on L.A., may not be the ones you end up rooting for in the film.
The trailer for the film (see below - 4K download also available here) doesn't really give away too much despite feeling like it gave away the entire plot. Yes, we see John David Washington's character Joshua go on a mission to destroy an A.I. superweapon, only to find that it's a robotic child, which he then decides to protect from the people who sent him on the mission. This much was clear from the trailer, but the context of this, the world in which these events happen, hasn't been revealed in detail and that's a good thing, because the worldbuilding is what makes this movie.
Through Edwards's direction, his technique of combining real locations with seamless CGI elements, makes the world feel very real, very detailed. So detailed in fact, that there's just so much crammed into each shot, that I wanted more exposition, more background on just how this world came to be. The subversive nature of the film (again, don't want to go into spoiler territory, but there is a bit of a twist in the humans vs A.I. fight for survival story), the locations in which the film takes place that brings back memories of America's conflicts of the 20th Century, all means that the film needed a bit more background. In this aspect, the film felt a bit rushed.
In fact, the entire third act was a bit rushed as well. The race to the finish line in order to conclude the film on a satisfying note just happens too fast for me, and the conclusion is portrayed as a bit too black and white when it should have been a very confusing shade of grey, much like the world that Edwards and co-writer Chris Weitz have created. There are also several story threads that felt clumsily written and resolved.
Still, kudos to Edwards for shooting this film on a consumer camera and making it look like a (couple of hundred) million bucks. And Edwards and Weitz did really go there, trying to make us uncomfortable in rooting for the good guys and hoping for death and destruction on the "bad" guys. The Hans Zimmer score is satisfying without being a Zimmer classic.
"The Creator" is a solid entry into the list of humans vs A.I. fight for survival films, with a twist, but it's not perfect.
Watch "The Creator" in cinemas starting 28 September 2023. You can stream "The Creator" starting 20th December 2023 on on on Disney+.
