Atlas

Atlas borrows from many superior sci-fi movies (think Blade Runner, The Terminator, Pacific Rim and even some UI elements from Minority Report) and mixes all these facets into something that is less entertaining, less thoughtful and less interesting.

The logic in the movie is exceedinly stupid and to go along with that, the dialogue is cringeworthy – when a character heroically sacrifices themselves for the greater good, their final battle cry is: “Eat shit!” The control scheme for the mech is based on matching the movement of the human controlling the mech – how does the movie deal with an upgraded mech with four arms? It doesn’t show the human’s movements anymore. When a situation calls for stealth, what does the main character do? Stomps in noisily in a mech and is surprised that the baddies have spotted them.

This movie spends an inordinate amount of time with us cramped inside a mech cockpit watching Jennifer Lopez argue, befriend and talk with an AI. It may have worked with a better script, but given the quality of the dialogue in Atlas, it was not a pleasant way to spend time.

The visuals of the movie looked fake and as if they were rendered in a mid-tier videogame. The green/blue screen work is not very well integrated.

I almost stopped watching 30 minutes into the movie and I should have. But I stuck it out to see if the filmmakers could land this one. They couldn’t.

Streamed on Netflix.