Edge of Tomorrow (2014)
Find me when you wake up.
THE SUMMARY: Interdimensional aliens invade Earth via asteroid swiftly overtaking Europe, and an American Army public affairs officer must save humanity with his mech suit and a mysterious blood-borne ability to restart time and try again until the enemy is defeated. It’s basically a Groundhog Day-Stranger Things mashup. Some decent action eye-candy, but lacking in the philosophical or moral dilemmas that capture my interest and earn more Wickies.
FROM MOVIE-PICKER SERGE: Great action with believable characters, understandable moral dilemmas, powerful aliens and a happy ending against all odds.
THE BEST:
Tense action scenes and the unfair chaos of battle: There’s little that captured my interest in this movie except the action itself. The battle scenes are chaotic and messy, but believable, which is especially impressive given all the tech and enemies are futuristic fiction. The airborne deployment into battle is particularly excellent, and Cage’s first exposure to the fight is where the movie shines most. Cage is just as shocked and disoriented by the mayhem as the audience is, and what I appreciate about this scene is its depiction of the inherent unfairness of battle. Cage is perhaps the least prepared soldier in the fight, and yet he survives much longer than others based on little but luck alone. One can understand why survivor’s guilt becomes such a challenge for combat veterans. There’s no sense to who lives and who dies. The finest soldier may be the first hit, and the unit’s dunce may be the last man standing. It’s natural for the human mind to seek logic and justice in that scenario, but there is none. Such unfairness is the nature of war.
Perhaps you may wonder how I award this movie midgrade Wickies while finding only one broad point to praise, but the action is truly that good. Gritty, violent, futuristic, and thrilling - it’s a combination of factors not commonly seen, and worthy of a few Wickies on its own.
The first battle scene
THE WORST:
Live, die, repeat is right: At least the subtitle/motto is accurate. To be fair, this movie actually does the format decently well without wasting an indefensible amount of time, and while inserting new jokes or new details into each relived scenario, but whenever the premise is repeating moments in time, you will get repetitive scenes. There’s just no way around it. Frequently during the movie, I was thinking ‘yes, I get it - he’s reliving this part again,’ eager for the movie to hurry up and move on to how the plot changes and advances on the next attempt through the time loop. My complaint isn’t necessarily with this movie’s execution of that premise - I actually think it does the format pretty well - but of the concept itself, I’m not a fan. I don’t want to watch reruns. Maybe this concept was creative and interesting years ago - it’s not anymore. Ironically, it’s been done over and over again.
I don’t see the dilemma: Of course I don’t mean to call out movie-picker Serge, but he must see something here that I don’t - I see absolutely no moral or philosophical dilemma at all. What moral principles are challenged? What ‘right or wrong’ dilemma does Cage face in his journey through time? At least in Groundhog Day, another movie on which I was lukewarm, Phil learns through the ability to do whatever he wants by reliving the same day that there is greater value in living and treating people the right way, thus breaking the loop.
The only dilemma in this movie is winning the war, which could introduce some interesting ‘win at all costs’ scenarios, but never does. Cage makes no moral sacrifices in pursuit of victory, other than his unconvincing romance with Rita, which he arguably preserves anyway. There is no decision that Cage makes that’s debatable or questionable, thus nothing to think about later.
I don’t see the romance: I haven’t cared so little about a supposedly compelling romance since Last of the Mohicans. Part of that is by design, since Rita is supposed to be a mission-focused soldier with no time for such petty personal urges. With the long-awaited kiss at the end, their romance is supposed to mean something, but it really doesn’t. Because she’s stonewalled it the whole time with absolutely zero give, when she finally does give, it just feels forced and obligatory, not something she truly wanted. Indeed, the actual kiss was reportedly totally unscripted. Emily Blunt improved it, surprising both the producers and Tom Cruise himself.
Supposedly this spontaneity adds some authenticity we’re supposed to obviously see - I disagree. It wasn’t written in because it’s out of place. It’s out of character, and it adds nothing to the intrigue. It’s a forced romance that just wastes time.
The ending makes no sense: So let me get this straight - Cage kills the Omega, and then returns back to an altered D-Day timeline in which the Omega is now unexpectedly dead, roughly 18 hours before he actually killed it? How? When did it die, if he killed it the day after everyone is celebrating its death?
And why is Rita still in the same training facility if the war is now over? Why is she still training with yoga poses, instead of celebrating the war’s end with everybody else?
And why did Cage reset to a different point in time after killing the Omega? In every other ‘death,’ he resets to awakening from a nap at Heathrow airport. In the final reset, he awakens in a helicopter before ever being sent to Heathrow. According to one explanation, that’s because Cage initially lost the reset ability with the blood transfusion, and then regained it by absorbing the Omega’s blood, which established a new reset point. I don’t find that explanation satisfying. Why would gaining the reset ability at a later point in time establish an earlier reset point upon death? What exactly establishes these reset points? It’s completely unexplained and follows no apparent logic.
THE RATING: 3/5 Wickies. A perfectly fine way to crush a bowl of popcorn, but nothing to think about later.
YOUR RATING: Vote here ⬇
NEXT WEEK: The Truman Show (1998). Brokeback Mountain was again narrowly defeated in last week’s poll.
AFTER THAT? YOU PICK - VOTE! October’s nominations come from listener Serge. This is the last week to vote for Serge’s list - next week we will have a refreshed special list for the fifth Sunday of the month.
Want to be the movie nominator for the month? Here’s how - fill out the form below.