Genre: Sci-Fi with a strong touch of Drama
Premise: In the late 40’s, after World War II, a reporter with an anger problem learns he’s part of a trans-dimensional conspiracy.
About: Written as a spec, represented by UTA with Benderspink (The Hangover and upcoming Leap Year most recently) attached to produce, there’s some big companies behind this thing.
Writer: Colin Trevorrow has sole writing credit on the script I read. He has several credits on IMDB, including “Gary: Under Crisis” which sounds vaguely familiar. He recently signed on to write Disney’s Pet Robots so apparently he’s doing something right.
Philip K Dick is a great writer. He uses weird, sci-fi plotlines and techniques to reveal unsettling facts about the conflicted personalities of individuals and the inherent chaos in group logic. Colin Trevorrow is no PK Dick. And even though he’s littered World War X with all kinds of time-traveling, people from the future changing the past, and eerie visions of an alternate future, none of these things exist for a larger or more looming reason. He’s utilized plot-lines without thinking about what they all add up to, what they mean. Dick was absolutely bat-crazy insane, but he always had a larger symbolic reason for his work. Trevorrow is flash bang. The events in World War X form a story, but I’m not really sure what he’s saying about the future, our time now, or life in general. And if you’re taking a large enough leap to ask people to imagine an alternate 1945, the very least you can do is provide a good reason.
That being said, I’m not going to try and reveal a thorough plot line of World War X. It’s so convoluted it’s stupid, but basically, a trouble reporter with an anger problem is led into a secret cult that tells him he’s part of a brotherhood that will fight for a soon to arrive prophet. Later he finds out the prophet is actually a time traveler terrorist from the future who inseminated a bunch in the past using his time machine so he’d have an army of crazy-ass warriors to defend him when he rose to power. That’s the main thrust. These twists are sort of crazy because Trevorrow makes the mistake of thinking by manipulating what we assume is correct in the story that he’s entertaining. When in fact, what he’s doing is confusing the audience and slowly withdrawing us from the little story that is present in World War X.
Others have said, more kindly that Trevorrow took on a subject that was too grandiose for his two hours. Carson Reeves called it Feature-itis. Now here’s what’s wrong with that. If this were an adaptation, or if what Trevorrow was trying to do had a heart behind his storyline, then I could see this point. But considering this is a spec from an original idea, Trevorrow flash-banged without a solid story core.
That being said, this is the most entertaining of the bad sci-fi films I reviewed this week. It’s not bad. There’s a story here. It works as a story. I wasn’t bored, but when I finished I was immensely dissatisfied.
Scooby Doo (Complete Crap)
Atilla (Poor, Few Redeeming Qualities)
[X] - Wedding Crashers (Mediocre)
Hot Rod (Good)
Definitely Maybe (Pretty Darn Good)
Isla Prospects: There’s a main female role that’s kind of a love interest for the protagonist. This isn’t an Isla role. I think she’d do wise to steer clear of Sci-Fi or overly dramatic films.
What I Learned: Sometimes titles can be ridiculously misleading. While World War X sounds like a souped up version of Independence Day, in reality it was more of a weak Philip K Dick influenced film dealing with faked identities, alternate realities, and group delusion. As a result, when I watched this film I kept expecting a full out battle. I never found one. Resultantly, I was bummed when I was got to the 110th page and realized the story I expected was cooler than the story I had read.
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