Edge of Tomorrow

Great concept and intense action sci-fi film from the original Bourne creator.

 

Director: Doug Liman | Stars: Tom Cruise, Emily Blunt

Budget: 180 million | Box office: 30 million (1 week)

IMDb: 8.1 | Metacritic: 68

Edge of Tomorrow, Tom Cruise

This summer seems very promising for original sci-fi films. Even as the hugely ambitious Wachowskis’ Jupiter Ascending was just moved to next February, there’s still Chris Nolan’s Interstellar. But for me even more interesting is every year to wait and see some less known creators trying themselves in this genre. The hopes for Inception cinematographer Wally Pfister’s debut as director crashed with dull Transcendence. But another dark horse really exceeded my and it seems many others’ expectations.

I actually didn’t have much to begin with. I managed to avoid finding out more details about Edge of Tomorrow, except that the main idea is about dying and reviving again and again. That’s actually all you need to know before watching it – as usual in such cases less is better. Tom Cruise at least for me fits very well in sci-fi films, with Minority Report bringing back some of the best memories in all my film history. The cool thing is that here he’s not the usual tough guy, at least in the beginning. Emily Blunt was an unusual choice for such a supersoldier role, but it works very well too.

It’s very hard to write down any details about the film without risking to spoil and take the fun out of it. The main concept is really intriguing and it is well known for any videogame fan, but it’s really different to see it in a movie. It’s strange that nobody did such film before, at least a high profile one, except the famous Groundhog Day. Just add to that heavy military action, D-Day inspirations and immensely fast and fierce morphing aliens and you’ll get the picture.

The praise for all of this goes to director Doug Liman who was the main reason to watch Edge of Tomorrow. He directed the original Bourne Identity before giving this role to Paul Greengrass and staying just as producer. He also directed the famous Mr. & Mrs. Smith, a cheesy sci-fi attempt Jumper, but for me the most interesting and really underrated work was his last film before Edge of Tomorrow – Fair Game. The real story of CIA operative and her scientist husband, who became victims of government actions for criticizing Bush’s handling of Iraq, is really dramatic and worth to watch.

Going back to Edge of Tomorrow the only bigger problem is a 3D mode. TV manufacturers already publicly admit that 3D in TV’s was a shitty idea and nobody really wants it. Of course with cinema the case is completely different, but it’s time to stop converting every bigger film to 3D. For me the depth effects were minimal, the action too fast for such 3D conversion and I guess it would be more enjoyable to watch such film in “flat” 4K resolution. All the other aspects of Edge of Tomorrow including a thoroughly and realistically created battle suits are just perfect.

 

Edge of Tomorrow novel
Japanese origin
It would be too naïve to believe that Edge of Tomorrow is totally original film. Not surprisingly, it’s based on Japanese so called light novel (shorter illustrated story for young adults) named All You Need Is Kill by Hiroshi Sakurazaka. The novel was released in English in North America with the film’s name in the end of April.

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