- March 6, 2025
The visual spectacle of "Oblivion" helps soften the blow of familiar sci-fi retreads.
BY MIKE CAVALIERE | ASSOCIATE EDITOR
If you really wanted, you could make a critical or complimentary case for Tom Cruise's latest sci-fi actioner, “Oblivion,” and both arguments would be equally valid.
On the one hand, the movie’s a feast for the eyes, following Jack Harper (Cruise) as he breezes through a deserted Earth in a sleek bubble jet, fixing broken down drones so that they can continue protecting the planet from “scavs,” enemies who blew up the moon to start World World III.
Jack and his partner, Vicka, are the last humans on Earth, civilization’s “mop-up crew.” But in two weeks, their jobs will be over and they'll head to Titan, Saturn's biggest moon, where the rest of mankind retreated to start over.
But a lot like director Joseph Kosinksi’s 2010 debut, “TRON: Legacy,” “Oblivion” is really more about its looks than its story — so much so that it’s even hard to pick a favorite shot.
Is it one of the beautiful, quiet moments with Jack and Vicka -- maybe as they glide through a swimming pool suspended above the clouds in their futuristic glass house? Or is it one of the grittier scenes, when one of the death-machine drones faces off against a pack of scavs?
The film is absolutely chock full of visual spectacle, which makes the familiar science-fiction devices a lot easier to swallow.
With shades of “Terminator 2,” “2001: A Space Odyssey” and even "Wall-E" and “The Matrix,” “Oblivion” borrows bits of story of style from all of its favorite sci-fi flicks to more or less repackage them. For genre purists, this could be pretty frustrating -- the story actually gets less interesting the more plot points are revealed. But even with all the borrowed material, "Oblivion" never completely crosses into eye-roll territory.
It looks so good, it never feels stale. You don't watch this movie as much as you gawk at it.
In spite of its shortcomings, “Oblivion” feels kind of like the perfect date movie. It’s a film that’s better on the big screen, where its seamless special effects can really be lapped up. It’s easy to watch but never gets too silly.
With all of the money that was dumped into maintaining this crazy-high a level of production, “Oblivion” seems like exactly the kind of ultra-accessible, Hollywood popcorn flick Kosinski and his crew set out to make. Just don’t go in expecting much more than that.
CRITICAL MASS
“Oblivion” (PG-13, 2 hr. 5 min.)
Director: Joseph Kosinski
Released: April 19, 2013
*** (of five)
Even at 51 years old, Tom Cruise still brings a ton of cool to action roles, and that helps “Oblivion” achieve its goal of being, if nothing else, awesomely sleek and stylish. Morgan Freeman and Melissa Leo also star. If you missed it opening night, consider this your second chance.
Rotten Tomatoes 58% fresh (of 170 critics)
IMDB 7.2 (out of 28,721 fans)
Richard Roeper Fresh
Peter Travers, Rolling Stone Rotten
*For more of Mike Cavaliere’s movie reviews, and for Netflix Instant Watch suggestions, visit www.JustQueueIt.com, or search for Just Queue It on Facebook.
