Watched Aeon Flux again this afternoon (the 2005 live-action movie starring Charlize Theron, not the early 90’s animated shorts from MTV). I saw this originally when it came out in the theater, but hadn’t seen it since. It was good on a second watch, although the story is a ‘revealer’ – meaning the first viewing is the best viewing – assuming you like the movie of course.

So there are many departures here from the animated shorts, in part because many of those are probably (still) unfilmable, even with CGI help. Many of them are ‘experiments in fantasy’ – as noted in the disclaimer at the start of each – and aren’t intended to be a coherent ongoing plot or in most cases even connected to one another (Aeon dies in many of them at the end).

I think the approach taken in this movie is better – use inspiration from the original(s) and recycle scenery, action, and story elements where you can, but come up with an original plot that stands separate in its own right. Admittedly, this can be a tougher way to go if fans of the original start picking apart the new interpretation – but it can work if done well – think Blade Runner, which uses many core elements of the original PKD story but then departs in its own way. Another great example is Minority Report, which has *more* story than the original, because the original PKD story wasn’t a novel to begin with.

Here, they succeed in telling a new Aeon Flux story, and also a ‘complete’ story (not just an exploration of some weird scenario resulting in her death anyway). I think the production values and casting and special effects were also very good and effective, but not overdone. No Matrix-style ‘bullet time’ in the fight scenes, and no overdone CGI that just takes you out of the story (ask the last three Star Wars movies about that one!).

I guess my quibbles with this would be the following:

1) in the featurettes also on the DVD, one of the producers says at one point she doesn’t know of any other sci-fi film like this one – I beg to differ – Logan’s Run? Last city on earth, far future, time-limited population, computer-controlled, purported utopian society (although much more obviously driven by hedonistic sex and drugs/recreation by comparison) – there are several parallels. There are other similarities in anime too, but that’s not live action, so you’d have to begin comparing back to the original AF animation in that case?

2) They don’t develop the other characters enough for effective back-story. You certainly find out more later, but early on you are kind of in the dark as to WHY it’s a utopian society? It’s supposed to be a city of 5M people, surely someone is pursuing new science, trying to expand beyond the city’s borders, etc.?

3) Who the heck is The Handler (the leader of the ‘Monican Revolution’, played by Frances McDormand)? A person, computer program, figment of Aeon’s imagination, or? And is she only in ‘pill’ format (they ingest a pill when they communicate with her)? And how was she created in the first place? They never explain, semi-major plot hole.

Otherwise I agree with one of the IMDB reviewers – definitely a B+ film – i’ve seen far worse that cost far more (see previous post on Star Trek:Insurrection) – this movie came and went pretty fast in the theater and I think the marketing done for it was pretty bad, which ultimately helped cut its release time short I’m sure.

There are hints in the Wikipedia article that there are another 30 min. of footage out there – perhaps a director’s cut could be issued someday in the future? I’d definitely watch it again to catch that….?

candybowl

Tags: 00's, animation, fantasy, malevolence, movies, TV

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