I didn't quite agree with mck414's review, so I'll stick a full review here.
Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets is an adaptation of the "Valerian and Loreline" French comic series. The latest movie from Luc Besson, there are parts that are very reminiscent of the style he employed in The Fifth Element, although less successfully in this film.
The film is set hundreds of years in the future. Over the centuries, the international space station has grown and grown, eventually becoming its own independent world called Alpha, with civilizations from all over the universe working in harmony. City of a Thousand Planets tells the story of two federal agents of the human government, Valerian and Loreline, as they are sent on a mission to retrieve an object vital to the safety of humanity. Fairly quickly, they discover that their mission is not all it seems to be, and they are thrust into a decades old mystery of scandal and cover-up. They must race to unravel the mysteries and expose the players behind the scenes before all of Alpha is placed in danger.
Overall, the movie was ok. As I mentioned, the visual style is reminiscent of Fifth Element in various ways. The general tone of the movie also tries to capture a similar feel, falling short a bit, not the least of which is in the lead characters. The dialogue , especially between Valerian and Loreline, can be extremely stilted and artificial. There are also several "whacky" side characters and cameos that can be momentarily distracting. Lastly, the film attempts a running sexual/love interest tension between the two main characters which never really has any heat or reality to it. Possibly because Valerian comes off as mostly a douche.
The visuals were good, but not awe inspiring. For a movie with "Thousand Planets" right in the title, it felt like the film was basically limited to less than a handful of interesting environments, although a decent variety of alien life was depicted. I found the plot to be pretty straightforward, and kind of a standard sci-fi type of story. This is comic book sci-fi, and you should not go into it expecting sci-fi-fi epic space opera style entertainment.
There's no sex or nudity, very little foul language, and mostly "Men in Black" style violence, i.e. no human blood or injury but plenty of alien goop and decapitation type stuff.
I would say this is a decent popcorn sci-fi film. You won't kick yourself if you wait to see it on cable of Netflix, but I wasn't disappointed with paying matinee price at the theater.
Slowguy
(insert pithy phrase here...)
Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets is an adaptation of the "Valerian and Loreline" French comic series. The latest movie from Luc Besson, there are parts that are very reminiscent of the style he employed in The Fifth Element, although less successfully in this film.
The film is set hundreds of years in the future. Over the centuries, the international space station has grown and grown, eventually becoming its own independent world called Alpha, with civilizations from all over the universe working in harmony. City of a Thousand Planets tells the story of two federal agents of the human government, Valerian and Loreline, as they are sent on a mission to retrieve an object vital to the safety of humanity. Fairly quickly, they discover that their mission is not all it seems to be, and they are thrust into a decades old mystery of scandal and cover-up. They must race to unravel the mysteries and expose the players behind the scenes before all of Alpha is placed in danger.
Overall, the movie was ok. As I mentioned, the visual style is reminiscent of Fifth Element in various ways. The general tone of the movie also tries to capture a similar feel, falling short a bit, not the least of which is in the lead characters. The dialogue , especially between Valerian and Loreline, can be extremely stilted and artificial. There are also several "whacky" side characters and cameos that can be momentarily distracting. Lastly, the film attempts a running sexual/love interest tension between the two main characters which never really has any heat or reality to it. Possibly because Valerian comes off as mostly a douche.
The visuals were good, but not awe inspiring. For a movie with "Thousand Planets" right in the title, it felt like the film was basically limited to less than a handful of interesting environments, although a decent variety of alien life was depicted. I found the plot to be pretty straightforward, and kind of a standard sci-fi type of story. This is comic book sci-fi, and you should not go into it expecting sci-fi-fi epic space opera style entertainment.
There's no sex or nudity, very little foul language, and mostly "Men in Black" style violence, i.e. no human blood or injury but plenty of alien goop and decapitation type stuff.
I would say this is a decent popcorn sci-fi film. You won't kick yourself if you wait to see it on cable of Netflix, but I wasn't disappointed with paying matinee price at the theater.
Slowguy
(insert pithy phrase here...)