4/5 Predestination Enjoy Ethan Hawke? Time travel? What about gender-swapping heroine hero’s? If you answered yes to any or all of the following questions, Predestination may be the movie for you. This small-scale film, which will likely never see a release as wide as regurgitated garbage like Taken 3, is by far one of the best things you will see released this month - and you can watch it right now on iTunes. Any plot details I give have to be slim, for this is one of those movies where juicy spoilers start popping up in the first few scenes. In the year 1981, time travel was invented and a whole new breed of secret agent was born: the “temporal agent.” Temporal agents go back in time to prevent disasters from happening, usually by killing the criminal before they are able to carry our their deeds. Ethan Hawke is one of these agents. To be the biggest name by far on the bill, Hawke plays a somewhat subdued role in the film - up until the final act, at least. For the majority of the movie, he is undercover as a barkeep listening to the tragic tale of one of his patrons. With a large chunk of the first hour dedicated to this loner’s story seen through flashbacks, it becomes clear that this nobody is actually a somebody in the story. “The Unmarried Mother,” the pen name for our storyteller, has a tale filled with bullying, aborted space travel, isolation, servitude, lost love, pregnancy, kidnapping, and ultimately, an unwanted sex change operation. I know all of these details our illusive, but seeing how all of these pieces fit together is eighty percent of the fun ‘Predestination’ has to offer. The other twenty percent belongs to a strong cast whose talent manages to pull you through the more difficult patches of the movie. I have already mentioned the | Directors: Michael & Peter Spierig Starring: Ethan Hawke, Sarah Snook Writers: Michael & Peter Spierig |
subdued Ethan Hawke, who is as charming and charismatic as ever, but the real standout here is Australian actress Sarah Snook. Judging on her previous film, last year’s junky, Southern Gothic horror tale Jessabelle, I would have never guessed I would be sitting her singing her praises just a few months later. In Jessabelle, all I could think about was her subpar southern accent; but here, Snook comes into her own as an actress and gave me far more to enjoy. Rarely in movies does an actress have the task of playing male and female roles, and it’s even more of an anomaly when they actually pull it off. Snook is one of these few who manages to convincingly pull off a transitioning male in a way that is heartfelt and not distracting.
The Brothers Spierig, whose previous film was 2009’s futuristic vampire thriller Daybreakers, are also coming into their own as artists - though at a slightly slower pace than Snook, I must say. Only real storytellers could pull off a yarn with this many spinning spokes. Sure, they drop the ball a few times, exposing a couple plot holes, but it’s hard to gripe when you watching directing with this much life and energy. Even with the story mapped out in Robert A. Heinlein’s “All You Zombies,” on which the film was based, no ordinary Joe could have brought this tale to the big screen successfully. They remind me of the Wachowski brothers at the beginning of their career - not the latter parts. If they can keep putting together thrill rides like this, they may just get one of their movies a spot in the theaters alongside whatever crap Liam Neeson films next. Here’s to hoping.
The Brothers Spierig, whose previous film was 2009’s futuristic vampire thriller Daybreakers, are also coming into their own as artists - though at a slightly slower pace than Snook, I must say. Only real storytellers could pull off a yarn with this many spinning spokes. Sure, they drop the ball a few times, exposing a couple plot holes, but it’s hard to gripe when you watching directing with this much life and energy. Even with the story mapped out in Robert A. Heinlein’s “All You Zombies,” on which the film was based, no ordinary Joe could have brought this tale to the big screen successfully. They remind me of the Wachowski brothers at the beginning of their career - not the latter parts. If they can keep putting together thrill rides like this, they may just get one of their movies a spot in the theaters alongside whatever crap Liam Neeson films next. Here’s to hoping.