There was a time where 20th Century Fox was synonym of excellence, with films like the original Star Wars trilogy. But nowadays, we are forced to say that 2008 in a really hard year for them since pretty much every single movie released got poor reception from critics, poor reception from the box office, or even both. And to be honest, only one of their movies went well, and it was Horton Hears a Who!, and I donât think thatâs what you really want. We are all waiting for this distribution company to pull off something great one day to finally stop this series of fails, and our new contestant is City of Ember. So to all the people that want the downfall of 20th Century Fox to stop, I say⦠well, itâs not so bad.
Close to the end of the world, a group of engineers and architects builds an underground city called Ember. The city is made to last 200 years and decides to build a box that will be given to every mayor of the city that contains the instructions to leave the city after that time. Eventually, the box gets lost after the death of one of the mayors, but the citizens still live their normal life without it. But when the generation for the electricity begins to have longer and longer breakdown, two kids, Lina and Doon, decides to find the way out of the city, even though it is harder than it sounds.
For starters, let me tell you that I have not read the original book. In fact, I never heard about it before this movie was announced. But still I can say that from what I saw that its base is pretty good. It is far from a masterpiece, but it succeeds at giving us a post-apocalyptic story for kids⦠Yeah, I know. For kids. So if you want something a little more true to the genre should go see somewhere else. But Iâm evaluating City of Ember as a kid adventure movie, so thatâs not what I want. Unfortunately, while the basic plot can be considered for the genre, the style of the entire film has a certain problem. It doesnât look a bad or messy as it should be, after mankind almost died 200 years ago. Maybe the costumes reflect this period of time and civilization is so screwed they donât even have telephones anymore, but I seriously think that this aspect should have been improved.
The action is also lacking in this movie, even if I donât think that it is such a bummer after all since I donât think it really needed some. I mean⦠City of Ember doesnât really need battles against giant enemy crabs, because this story is more of adventure than anything else. The main characters must just find the way conceived by the architects of the city with the help of a big metal box. But near the end, we begin to some true action and maybe the reason why there wasnât so much before: the CG sucks. Actually, I should say that the budget wasnât good enough to put breathtaking scenes or scenery. When they get down the tunnel at the end of the movie, pretty much anything doesnât look right. Itâs sad because with not some much more money, they could have made this good-looking and believable. Well, as much believable this overall plot can be.
To be fair, the major problem for me wasnât the lack of action in the film, even though it is something that is worth mentioning. The biggest flaw I saw in the movie was the plot holes that the writers did for this movie adaptation. Now donât get me wrong, I know we canât put an entire novel in a movie of 2 hours. But still, we miss some important things that should have been said in the film but they are nowhere to be found. Most importantly, what are the motives of the bad guy? We never really say anything about it. Now some might say that he is just a lazy man that only wants the luxury that he already has (if there is luxury). But sadly, I had to make use of some logic to tell you since City of Ember doesnât do that. Itâs weird because the movie only lasts 95 minutes, which isnât that long. I may have past some other key moments that were in the book but not here, but I havenât read the novel so I canât really come up with anything else.
When it comes to both casting and acting of this film, I must say itâs just okay. Actually, I should maybe add details, so let me just say that some actors are good, and some are not. They are not all at the same level and in the end, it becomes pretty average. For example, Harry Treadaway (who plays Doon, the boy protagonist), never seems sure of anything. He has this look on his face that never works. And it distracted me for sometimes. But at the other side, the actors in the entire film is the mayor, Bill Murray, which simply does its best in the film. Too bad we donât know some important things about him but⦠hey! Itâs not his fault. He just did his best and he was pretty good. The rest of the casting is also good, but not great.
One thing that I want to mention, before closing this review, is Poppy. Poppy is the little sister of Lina, and she is truly a superhuman. She is only a 3 year-old girl, she is very small, but wait. Hereâs the thing: she can climb incredibly high ladders and run as fast as her older sister. And considering Lina works as a messenger, which consists to run from point A to point B with a message (remember, there are no more phones or earth), what the hell?! Are 3 years-old so grown up that they donât have any kind of dizziness? And if you answer me âYes.â, then âOh wellâ¦â.
City of Ember is simply a good little family adventure movie that sure can be enjoyed by some people. In fact, I kinda did. But at the same time, it doesnât really pull anything off to stand out, even with their steampunk style that isnât that great to begin with. So if you only want a simple movie for kids that can do the job, you might give it a go. So is it finally the end of the awful year of 20th Century Fox? Actually, no. The thing is that we saw how this film performed at the box-office, and it grossed only 3.2 millions. Sorry, Gianopulos. Better luck next time⦠which is next week.
