After Earth Review - OR - I Am Smith

Plot

In the distant future on a newly colonized world, Cypher Raige (Will Smith) is a respected captain and a Ghost, capable of fighting without fear and therefore able to kill Ursas; indigenous monstrous blind beasts that can smell fear, trained to kill humans. His son Kitai (Jaden Smith) wishes to be like his hero father and spies his opportunity after being asked to join him on a training mission. However, a meteor shower destroys their spacecraft, forcing it to crash-land to Earth. Only the Raige’s survive and, with Cypher left lame with two broken legs, it’s up to Kitai to adventure through the brutal terrain and set off the distress beacon.

Where better to get away from a volcano's signal scrambling smoke that at its peak #AfterEarthLogic

Review

Hollywood is no stranger to the power family. Its history is strewn with them, from the Baldwin’s, to the Sheens, to the Culkins to a thousand others. Newest to the fray are the Smiths, captained by the Fresh Prince himself. His daughter Willow is a pop starlet, his wife a film producer and his son Jaden a budding film star. After Earth marks the second double act from Smith and son, but the first time the young pretender has been old enough to take a starring role. The whole project has been a well-documented gamble, but has it paid off?

Apparently not.

As a technical exercise After Earth performs impeccably. The CGI is perfectly fine – nothing special – but the production design is something else, actually managing to stand out with a unique, almost tribal, aesthetic. It doesn’t always work, but kudos on the effort. The scenes set on the animal ravaged Earth are suitably lush and gorgeous, drowning in colour and plant-life. If nothing else, it can’t be denied that After Earth is pretty.

Elsewhere however…

It’s all perfectly functional sci-fi fodder: full of needless jargon, nonsensical plot twists and cringe-worthy dialogue. It’s nothing special but neither is it particularly egregious or insulting. The characters on the other hand, considering that there’re only two of them, are less forgiveable. It’s hard to tell who’s less likeable - who’s less developed - and it can therefore be difficult to care about their underdeveloped father-son/love-hate relationship.

The Wii-Too, where you are the game.

To put it plainly, the main issue here is Jaden Smith. His bewildering angst, sudden strops, bizzare inflections and general impression of inexperience doesn’t make for particularly attractive or engaging company. And when, for large periods of time, he’s the only company you’ve got…the going isn’t good. You can’t help but wish he’d had the broken legs and Will ‘Cooler-Than-You’ Smith could have gone twerking through the deadly undergrowth. Except then of course you’d be left with his equally annoying cries of pain…bottom line, mercy killing is okay sometimes.

That After Earth was a vehicle for Will Smith – who produces and is an un-credited writer and directing assistant – and his rampant egotism is clear from the off and proves that the bloke should really just stick to acting. It’s so ham-fisted with its themes and narrative developments that it must either assume that its audience is mentally challenged or, more likely, it’s own writers were. The prologue pre-amble – or Before Earth *snrk* – is either a geniusly satirical interpretation of woeful Hollywood writing or its dictionary definition. The amount of subtlety can measured by the thimble and the character’s initial development is as far as they go, almost like the writers forgot what they were doing.

Will Smith may as well march into the room and bellow ‘son, we have relationship issues!’ while waving a neon sign strobing ‘FEAR FEAR FEAR’ for all the good his glum-faced, hilariously monotone, too-hurt-to-be-understood thang does for him. Jaden too, upon being told that his character ‘like, really really wants to be like his daddy but also kinda doesn’t but does kinda’ took that to mean ‘act like a cartoon army soldier.’ Watching him mince his way past a bevy of fellow recruits is a moment of genuine hilarity.

Will Smith's turds are famously destructive.

So it’s as well written as a crusty a dog turd – the sort that’s started turning all white and weird, much like Jaden’s supposed ‘smart suit’ where ‘smart’ means be any colour that doesn’t camoflauge – spends 90 minutes reaching a conclusion that it as good as shows you in the opening flashback, is as developed as a slap in the face and generally lacks any discernable ‘point,’ whatever the hell one of those things is. And yet…After Earth is still a perfectly watchable film, the epitome of sci-fi fodder where jargon, plot-holes and paper-thin characters don’t matter because the glargon meter just went all suptertinzic and the hyperglockulene is running out faster than the nibblybumfluffs.

Chase scenes often feel genuinely tense, action is handled with enough nuance and skill to work and everything looks absolutely gorgeous. If switching your mind off for 90 minutes is what you’re looking from in a film – and I’m pretty sure such a recommendation is printed at the bottom of After Earth’s posters – you can’t really go wrong.

As a final message, let’s take a moment of silence for our fallen hero, M. Night Shyamalan. It’s only until the final credits that the film admits that he directed it – like it was holding back a dirty little secret – and while it would be nice to say that such an act is unjust, well…he’ll always have Sixth Sense.

Sir Willem Smith here photoshopped to look younger than his son.

Verdict

After Earth does so much wrong that it’s almost too easy to criticize. And yet there’s just enough there that, had this been something other than a vehicle for the Smith family and the inherent stigma that follows, it could and should be considered the epitome ordinary sci-fi.

2/5

It's like the film in short:

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