Londons falling
Young adult novels are a dime a dozen and I feel like that’s because of how most of the stories seem to go. They are formulaic, painfully so (and yes, I get the irony of complaining about repeating structure when I write reviews, in the same way, every time) but when a Y/A novel has such a great setting and ideas and plays it too safe with story events, it feels like a missed opportunity. That’s what I feel this movie was
I don’t think I’ll be able to do the idea and setting justice but I’ll try my hardest. A thousand years in the future after the 60-minute war, major land masses have changed, and major cities now roam the “wastelands” on wheels while trying to devour smaller cities and steal their resources. It sounds absurd and it is but in a fantastical way, and visually it was incredible. The CGI was top tier and I wouldn’t expect any less from the director, who was one of the main heads at
The everything else is what bothered me. From the very predictable and often laboured script to the painfully obvious foreshadowing, nearly everything else was a disappointment. The acting wasn’t horrible, but it wasn’t amazing, the only real big actor in this, was Hugo Weaving and he is the best of them, but that still wasn’t enough.
There’s not much else to write. I’ve researched the books that this movie is based on and I feel like the changes they made were only really to accommodate Hugo Weaving as an actor and they don’t add to the narrative, story wise or structurally. This movie is based from the first book and as much as I liked the idea, I don’t know if this movie will do enough to justify a second film and unfortunately I don’t personally think there should be one. But damn did this movie look good!