M. Night Shyamalan’s After Earth (2013) Movie Review
Starring: Isabelle Fuhrman, Jaden Smith, Will Smith, Zoe Kravitz
Directed by: M. Night Shyamalan
Genre: Action | Adventure| Sci-Fi| Fantasy
Runtime: 100 Minutes
The Director – Screen writer M. Night Shymalan, who made films like The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable then made films like the Lady In the Water, The Happening, The Last Airbender and now After Earth.
It’s been seven years since father and son Will and Jaden Smith have been on screen together (after 2006’s The Pursuit of Happiness) and I was really hoping for an incredible reunification on the big screen since the two are so good together.
A crash landing leaves teenager Kitai Raige (Jaden Smith) and his legendary father Cypher (Will Smith) stranded on Earth, 1,000 years after cataclysmic events forced humanity’s escape. With Cypher critically injured, Kitai must embark on a perilous journey to signal for help, facing uncharted terrain, evolved animal species that now rule the planet, and an unstoppable alien creature that escaped during the crash. Father and son must learn to work together and trust one another if they want any chance of returning home.
It’s very clear that Will Smith stepped back and let his son to take over and be the hero of the film, but fans will be disappointed with this. Will Smith’s character isn’t likable from the start and I kept hoping see some development in his character, but it never happen. We can understand why his character was so one sided. Jaden Smith lifts the tedious screenplay into semi watchable movie. The best scenes of After Earth was when Will gave his speech on fear & when Jaden conquered his fear in the end.
M. Night Shyamalan literally does almost nothing interesting, although to be fair to him, this is below par material from the start. There’s truckload of plot holes in After Earth, the visuals are limited and dull and for a summer movie that could have been a blockbuster, it’s just another Shyamalan let down. Here are few plot holes that kinda raised my eyebrows;
· – The movie states that every animal/plant on Earth has evolved to kill humans, but humans have not been on Earth for over 1000 years so it would be impossible to evolve to kill humans specifically. Evolution is a process that takes constant interaction to occur.
– – Despite the abundance of lush foliage, there is a marked absence of oxygen.
– – It’s left untold that URSA (an Alien Species) that is blind and smells humans through fear, walked on the land without Bumping into Something.
– – Why are humans incapable of accommodating their space crafts with some sort of anti-asteroid technology
– – Insisting Something can’t happen seconds before it actually happens: Cyper says asteroid field is about to explode. Pilot dismisses it. When Cypher says to wormhole out, Pilot says is impossible. Cyper Says to Kitai URSA can’t escape the skip.
– – A condor saves Kitai sacrificing itself where everything evolved to kill humans. Seriously Shymalan you wanted to give its death to have meaning…
For a science-fiction thriller, I really expected the visuals to protrude and add to the story, but overall it looked like a television movie. And the similarities to Star Trek just don’t help at all. On the whole, After Earth a gigantic, boring, nonsensical, poorly written and directed piece of shit conceit project.
Survi Review: 1.5/5
Theatrical Trailer:
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