Zack Snyder movies, whether you like them or not, always seem to require a lot of digestion. But in this instance, after watching his 134 minutes of an adventurous and partly blurred half-plastic film Rebel Moon — Part 1: A Child of Fire, there is little urge to dissect its many shortcomings.
Rebel Moon is Snyder’s take on the classics through Akira Kurosawa and George Lucas. The characters are well positioned, there are lots of nice myths made up by writer-directors, great big action scenes in the old style with a lot of set dressing, not much else except clean designs, which doesn’t matter for him and a Goliath needing to be slayed. However, all these things make up an incredibly clumsy copybook science fiction mishmash that oscillates between science fiction spectacle déjà vu and plain cliché. Additionally, why should it exhibit strange blotches where details were supposed to perfectly fall into place? He did employ something similar in his Justice League post-credit scene. That pushes the viewer back some more from disbelief suspension.
Firstly Rebel Moon is now undeniably a Zack Snyder movie where every second reflects his trademark cinematic language and he was totally in control here excluding any apparent compromises that might creep up later on and show themselves off in his R-rated cut. It is only an example of what he can do within the frame of filmmaking such as when our protagonist Kora (Sofia Boutella) talks about her past life. With stirring music in the background and gorgeous cinema slow motion photography shot on green screen CGI-tinged pixels, we see bits showing she had lost her lover before massacring foes and raising her leaders’ flag while they further explain nothing about her character at all. Nevertheless, you don’t empathize with her even though you fully appreciate the gravity of the moment and get what Snyder meant with this particular passage.
Rebel Moon Part 1: A Child of Fire
Director: Zack Snyder
Cast: Anthony Hopkins, Sofia Boutella, Ed Skrein, Charlie Hunnam, Staz Nair, Djimon Hounsou, Doona Bae and more
Runtime: 134 minutes
Storyline: An ex-soldier and a farmer travel across the galaxy to unite a team of soldiers to fight against the despicable Admiral Atticus Noble and his army.
In the persona of Anthony Hopkins, Jimmy’s voice narrates, introducing us to a star system still torn apart by civil wars following the death of the Motherworld royal family, including Princess Issa. A divine child believed to have resurrection power. After King’s death, several subjugated states revolted with Balisarius as Regent.
On planet Veldt, Kora lives quietly on her farm until Admiral Atticus Noble (Ed Skrein), Balisarius’ horrible marionette together with his Imperium-army troops (soldiers) land there hunting for rebel leaders specifically Bloodaxes. Still, these space Nazis with their uniforms on aren’t going anywhere without making some sort of deal—rather through force—with the villagers. Kora, an isolated ex-Imperium member turned farmer, and Gunnar (Michiel Huisman), decide to emulate The Magnificent Seven, facing Noble and his squad.
They go on a trip around the universe to find other soldiers like them, those with good reasons to fight against the regime, and one can feel how uniformly they come aboard together like slices of equal sizes put together in a string. They are all alike – lively at times and dull at others – but the only saving grace is that their designs look really cool.
This brings us Kai (Charlie Hunnam), who is, among other things, an egocentric rogue. Tarak (Staz Nair), who has been captured by slavers, later frees himself and rides away on the back of one of these lion-like bird things. Yet it remains known about General Titus (Djimon Hounsou), a remorseful Imperium general turned alcoholic that he gets his “Oh my God! What have I done!” scene and some fake dialogue with Kora. Nemesis (Doona Bae) has two swords that glow like light sabers; she’s also got the anguish of a mother losing her child during her battle against Harmada, a spider-like alien that abducted said child for vengeance. And then there is Bloodaxe but nothing much can be said about this.
So after you see this outcome from miles away this bunch of misfits just goes straight towards what would have been an epic showdown between two teams if not for it being exorbitant nonsensical pompousness that borders upon pointlessness – make your best out of guessing how it will unfold.
But as much as Kora managed to share the mythology she created with us, does it mean she can support even one sequel not to mention an entire franchise? Even Boutella cannot convey world-weariness other than through few consistent expressions here and there. The remaining characters are almost your typical plastic action figures except for a few interesting backgrounds they still have to tell before their time comes.
Read Rebel Moon Review on Fmovies
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