Full Movie Reviews
Rating of
3/4
"Oblivion" by Yojimbo
Yojimbo - wrote on 10/22/2014
A technician servicing the last outpost on a post-apocalyptic Earth recovers an escape pod dating from before the war which challenges everything he thought he knew about the world. As you can probably guess from the presence of Mr. Scientology, Oblivion is very much a mainstream sci-fi crowd pleaser, but thankfully it is done with enough reserve and intelligence to avoid the kinds of brain dead Bay-isms that plague modern cinema. To knowledgeable sci-fi aficionados the plot will seem very familiar and predictable, "borrowing" as it does from classics such as Planet Of The Apes and The Matrix, and if you've seen one film in particular (I won't name it as it would be a spoiler extraordinaire) then the big "twist" will be more than a little obvious. But Oblivion is attractive, slick and …
Rating of
2/4
Tom Cruise being Tom Cruise again.
memento_mori - wrote on 08/10/2013
I was very interested and was anticipating this movie, simply because of the director and because I wanted to give a Tom Cruise movie another shot... And no shots will ever be given again.
I am tired of Tom Cruise. He made great movies in the nineties, with some pretty great performances attached to the movies, too. But ever since the last Mission: Impossible movie, he started playing the same character over and over again. Oblivion is no exception.
To name a few positives, the special effects and music are quite good in this. The score by M83 had a very pre-techno vibe, continuing the tradition after Tron Legacy had Daft Punk. But that's it.
The script is quite lazy and doesn't let anything happen to the characters. At the end of the movie, it feels like we're exactly where we …
Rating of
2/4
Oblivion review
Daniel Corleone - wrote on 08/02/2013
A film dominated by a great soundtrack, stunning visual effects and scenic locations. A case where style over substance is implemented. It's plot however and pace were questionable and dreary. The swift beginning about the background on Earth felt rushed and the story feels exhausting to follow. Obviously Tom Cruise shows an earnest portrayal but unfortunately the two ladies were uninteresting. The drones were the only thing from keeping this sci-fi flick from spiraling to mediocrity. Action sequences were insufficient and the romance of Victoria "Vika" Olsen (Andrea Riseborough) and Julia (Olga Kurylenko) was a bore. Jack Harper’s (Tom Cruise) character maybe impressive but lacks appropriate character development and Morgan Freeman’s role felt like an old Morpheus. …
Rating of
2.5/4
Blatantly Derivative
Looneymanthegreat - wrote on 04/25/2013
Oblivion is basically just a random hodgepodge of ideas, scenes and twists from the some of the most important Sci-Fi films of the past fifty years. Unless the most recent science fiction film you’ve seen is A Trip to The Moon, this probably won’t do much for you.
Oblivion was directed by Joseph Kosinski, the guy who directed Tron: Legacy and he brings the same level of visual grandeur and visual originality to this movie. Unfortunately Oblivion doesn’t have the inventiveness or energetic pacing of Tron, and even after a solid first act quickly gets bogged down by an exhaustingly disappointing series of twists and action sequences.
I imagine they created some sort of famous science fiction flick wheel of fortune to determine each plot point and visual after they ran out of …
Rating of
2/4
Review: Oblivion
MikePA - wrote on 04/21/2013
You want some more mediocre sci-fi? Say hello to Oblivion, the latest film starring Ethan Hunt himself. As the film begins, I was mostly underwhelmed by it and only particularly interested in a sub-plot involving this woman Tom Cruise's character sees in his dreams - which showcases some of the better acting talents Cruise possesses. But in the second half of the film, that interest really died down for me as the film got more and more complex and ridiculous. Director Joseph Kosinski (director of Tron: Legacy - a film that I feel is very underappreciated) and the writers have a tendency of throwing a lot of surprise twists at you, but instead of providing shocks, it makes you a bit frustrated because of how much more complex it gets without really exploring those ideas enough to make you …
Rating of
2.5/4
Oblivioon
lastonetoleave - wrote on 04/20/2013
My View: Oblivion (2013) After decades of war with an Alien race, most of Earth has been destroyed. Jack (Tom Cruise) is one of the last few humans stationed on the planet. His job is to repair drones on the surface, kill any aliens still remaining and extract Earth’s few remaining resources. But Jack finds a crashed spaceship, a spaceship that will change his life. This is a big mess of a film that seems to steal ideas from other movies, even other Tom Cruise movies, and the film has plot holes the size of Tom Cruise’s ego. While I did think the film looked amazing, he special effects were outstanding and created a future Earth that was almost unrecognizable, but they don't make up for the lousy script that had an ending that I absolutely hated. My Rating: Cable
Rating of
2.5/4
Am I Seeing Double?
Chris Kavan - wrote on 04/20/2013
I was hoping that Oblivion would be the first great film of 2013 - and while it has plenty going for it, I'm still waiting to be blown away. My main issue with Oblivion is that it mixes so many elements from previous sci-fi film that it never really finds its own voice. Visually, it is stunning but the plot is a bit too rehashed and the characters a bit too flat to be truly outstanding.
Let's start off with the special effects - as this is the highlight of the film. We've seen earth destroyed in plenty of films - but I have to hand it to Oblivion - they make New York look truly like hell has hit. From the Empire State Building to the Brooklyn Bridge being buried to a bombed-out Giants Stadium - a post-apocalyptic setting has rarely been captured so well. Along with the background, the …
Rating of
2.5/4
Could have been so much more!
Zeljka - wrote on 04/18/2013
Hm. I am still trying to figure out what do I think of this movie. Special effects were great. Actors were great too, but somehow not enough used, especially Morgan Freeman and Coster-Waldau - any actor could have been on their places, the difference wouldn't have been noticed. The story though -- despite some quite melodramatic moments and repeats that could have been skipped -- was interesting till the last third of the movie, when... I do not wish to spoil the movie to you, so let me say only that the denouement was brought to viewers as if we were God forbid mildly stupid. It could have been much shorter, with less explicit for-dummies explanations, and with much more stress on the foe who - as it turned out in the end - wasn't so impressive at all. Pity, I expected much of this.
