Air ? 2 out of 5
When I first read about this film, I was pretty excited to
see it. Its story sounded like a prime
breeding ground for some cool and dark sci-fi, the cast is composed of two
actors I really enjoy, it?s produced by Robert Kirkman?the man who gave us The
Walking Dead?and it was directed and co-written by the guy who wrote one of my
all-time favorite video games; Red Dead Redemption. How could Air go wrong? Well, it can in just enough ways...
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| On the plus side, Col. Saul Tigh from Battlestar Galactica was the president in this film's reality. |
In the near future, chemical warfare has destroyed most of
the world?s population and left the air un-breathable. The government quickly built an underground
bunker where the world?s leading scientists, thinkers and, most likely, best
bakers of sweet pastries and snacks were collected and put into cryo-sleep. Each of these facilities has two maintenance
men who wake up every six months to do routine inspections and make sure the
future of the world is sleeping well.
One day, two workers; Cartwright (Djimon Hounsou) and Bauer (Norman
Reedus), get up to do their jobs but an accident causes one of their sleep
terminals to be destroyed. Now they are
faced with a choice: One of them has to
die or they try to figure out another way.
As hopeless as it feels, things only get worse when they learn a
startling truth about their job and the facility they operate in?
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| "Who?" |
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| Remember: Keep your Reedus stored airtight because if air gets to it, it will die. And if it dies, people will riot. |
Some of the things that work really well with Air is its
cast and its concept. The story is a
simple sci-fi feature that is built on a solid foundation of isolated and
claustrophobic tension. This future that's
presented is a realistic way and I really dug how the equipment that Cartwright
and Bauer are surrounded by looked antiquated in some areas and modern in
others. It really helped show that these
facilities were quickly thrown together in order to preserve the human
race. Additionally, both Hounsou and
Reedus are doing excellent job and really carrying the film?and that means a
lot since they, realistically, are the only ones to the cast. Granted, Reedus isn?t really pushing his boundaries
and playing something we haven?t seen before.
For all intents and purposes, he?s just playing a slight variation of
Daryl Dixon but he?s still entertaining in his role.
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| "Here ya go, Rick--I mean, Cartwright." |
The problems I had with Air start with the fact that the
story doesn?t dive deep enough into a lot of points of tension or conflict. After the sleep terminal is destroyed, Bauer
and Cartwright are left with a really difficult decision: Do they try to repair the unit or do they
sacrifice one of the chosen few so that the other maintenance man doesn?t have
to complete their work alone?
Sacrificing an innocent to save the life of another innocent is a
hardcore moral decision and one that should have been a big point of conflict
and suspense in the film but, ultimately, it?s a short scene that is fixed way
too quickly. Instead, the film then just
decides to have the conflict for survival be between Bauer and Cartwright and
the film spins into a generic battle between the two. This could have worked but the characters are
introduced so fast and their point of conflict brought about so quickly after
the more interesting sequence involving a moral choice is swept under the rug
that it was hard to invest emotionally in their disagreement and war for
survival.
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| The twist at the end is that the bad air was all a big prank from some super- intelligent apes. |
Another element I didn?t enjoy about the film and really
stole all suspense and interest was the inclusion of a deus ex machina from the
writers. Cartwright has visions of his
wife when he?s awake and even goes as far as talk to her while he?s doing his
work. This is fine and it goes a long
way to show the heartbreak he is going through.
However, this quickly becomes a weak point of the film when it is used
to solve any problem or minor hardship that he is facing. There are points in the story where he and
Bauer have obstacles and barriers in their way and rather than have them figure
it out (they are in charge of keeping and maintaining the facility, so they
should have it covered), the mirage of Cartwright?s wife shows up and shows him
what to do to get them out of their mess.
Sure, his wife is a figment of his imagination so his subconscious is
really telling him how to fix the situation but this presentation just feels
lazy and like a plot device to just keep a story that is already moving very
slowly on its rails and moving forward without any form of complication.
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| The scene where she explains to him where to find the toilet paper after the roll runs out was a little weird, too. |
It?s possible that my expectations for Air were too high but
the final product was fairly disappointing.
I did enjoy the concept and the performances from Reedus and Hounsou but
the story is pretty bland and it?s conflict seems to be actively avoiding going
the deeper route and, instead, settles for something far more generic?and that
extends all the way to the very, very predictable twist in the story. Air looks decent and definitely had a lot of
potential to be a science fiction film with depth and substance but, in the
end, just felt more like a better SyFy original from days gone by. A time before all their movies involved weird
monsters and tornados with sharks in them.
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