John David Washington makes a valiant attempt but is ill-suited to the material at hand in ‘The Creator’.
In the distant future, humanity wages war with Artificial Intelligence after a nuclear attack on Los Angeles. One soldier, Sergeant Joshua Taylor (John David Washington) is tasked with finding the creator (Nirmata) of the AI and destroying the fabled new superweapon that has the power to destroy the world as we know it. Taylor himself is still not over the loss of his pregnant wife, Maya, in a botched military operation.
Director Gareth Edwards shot into prominence with Monsters (2010), a low budget movie with DIY effects and a clear sense of visual spectacle. Hollywood took notice and soon he was tapped to direct the Godzilla (2014) reboot, a flawed but interesting film with some spectacular setpieces. Edwards then directed Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), a troubled production which saw Tony Gilroy taking over reshoots and final cut. With The Creator, Edwards continues to explore some of his pet themes from Rogue One like the futility of war and the thin line between good and bad when faced with conflict.
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This time the evil is Artificial Intelligence, or is it? Edwards lays on the allegory thick, situating the AI in the jungles of Vietnam, now called New Asia, a geographical entity which covers Vietnam, Thailand, India and Nepal, but is notably missing China — a storytelling concession necessitated by economic reasons, assuming the movie even gets a theatrical release in China. There are several scenes comparing the slaughter of AI to the slaughter of the Vietnamese, suggesting that American Imperialism is doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past. However, these scenes, one of which depicts a mass grave, border on offensive, which puts Edwards in the tricky position of perpetuating the very bias he’s trying to address.
Taylor eventually finds the superweapon, only to realise that it is a young simulant — a cross between a robot and a human. Taylor, who was enticed into the operation with the news that his wife might still be alive, goes on the run with the child in the hope of finding Maya. He nicknames her Alphie, and forms a bond with her as they are chased by both sides. Taylor eventually understands the pointlessness of war and decides that getting Alphie to end the war is the only way forward. However, the script’s haphazard plotting is unclear as to why the destruction of the massive human-run sky drone known as Nomad equates to the end of the war.
It’s obvious now why LucasFilm wanted Gilroy to deliver the final version of Rogue One. Edwards’ storytelling, while expansive and richly themed, is messy and unclear. Complexity gives way to confusion, and basic plot details are extremely muddled. Ralph Ineson’s General Andrews, who sends our protagonist on his mission, has almost all of his lines ADRed to try and provide some semblance of coherence to the plot, but it doesn’t help. Edwards helpfully breaks down the film into sections — The Creator, The Child, The Friend, and The Mother, but there’s no particular rhyme or reason for how the sections are delineated.
The story raises some thorny questions like why the Western military still uses automatic translators and robots, while declaring AI the enemy. One particularly stunning sequence involves the use of robot suicide bombers by the West. But Edwards is uninterested in engaging with these contradictions on a deeper level, content to just shock audiences with a radical idea.
On the performance front, John David Washington makes a valiant attempt but is ill-suited to the material at hand. He’s much better playing inscrutable cool or bubbling anger rather than sincere and love-lorn. It’s a register he’s unable to tap into, and the movie suffers heavily as the audience is unable to invest in either of the primary relationships. Newcomer Madeleine Yuna Voyles acquits herself well in the role of Alphie, but it’s really not much of a workout. Gemma Chan as Maya is serviceable. More interesting is The West Wing’s CJ Cregg herself, Allison Janney, playing against type as a hard charging team leader driven by revenge, but she, like everyone else in the movie, is hamstrung by the weak writing and confused character motivations.
It’s still an achievement in this IP-driven age to secure a theatrical release for original big budget sci-fi, and the film does reward viewers on spectacle and visual world-building. More filmmakers should be allowed swings at this scale. Unfortunately, this particular swing is a big miss.
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- Source: https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/entertainment/the-creator-review-clumsyclunky-colonial-critique-crashesimpact_17256071.html
