Aeon Flux

The year is 2415, almost 400 years after 99% of mankind has been wiped out by a virus. The remaining people are now living inside a walled city, and following the directives of a “big brother” type of regime. Of course, some of them don’t like it, take part in an underground force of rebels and aim to defeat their fascist leaders. What ensues is a woman by the name of Charlize Theron prancing around in very tight-fitting black outfits and kicking man-ass. Also, the film is not as bad as you’ve heard.

Expectations always play into how one ultimately feels about certain movies, and I’m sure the super-low expectations that I had for this film (which the studio wouldn’t screen for critics—always a sign of a horrible movie) and its pretty lame-looking trailers had something to do with me ultimately enjoying most of it, despite noting certain problem areas and its short run-time. In fact, I can see how this might’ve been a much better movie had they padded it up a little more, with more background to start things off, stronger character development all around and more interesting secondary characters. They say that some of these action/sci-fi flicks are only as good as their bad guys and if that’s the case, Marton Csokas (Kevin Spacey with hair to me) and Jonny Lee Miller certainly didn’t bring much charisma or panache to the screen. In fact, if it wasn’t for the very lovely Charlize Theron and her engaging and confused character (we learn about her as she does), I would surely have tuned out early on, as the film tosses plenty of action sequences our way, but much of them would have no meaning were Flux not in my zone of interest. Another thing in my “zone of interest”? The skimpy and tight outfits that she wore throughout the film, but that’s neither here nor there (well, it’s probably “here”, but I’ll leave that for another day).

That said, an interesting lead character and fun action sequences wouldn’t mean a bowl of shit if the whole thing was stirred inside of nothing, but even then, the film surprised me with a number of revelations, as well as a central concept that intrigued me, and should interest anyone who appreciates science-fiction tales that deal with cloning, human memory and yeah…even “love”, man. Its plotline did feel a little bit like an “episode of something” instead of a full-blown movie though. The film also goes by a little too fast, doesn’t really develop any of its other characters, uses slow-motion and flash-backs too often and surely would have been “deeper” were it not PG-13 or cut down to the levels to which it seems to have been cut (it barely runs 90 minutes). It’s also pretty serious all the way through (a few “light moments” might’ve helped), but I would definitely still recommend it to folks in theaters, particularly if you enjoy watching Theron strut around in catsuits kicking ass, and enjoy science-fiction stories in general. That said, it will likely go down easier on DVD, where they will hopefully provide us with a longer and unrated version of the movie that might even have me considering it to be a “good” motion picture, as opposed simply “passable”. Whatever the case, the studio certainly nailed the poor film down inside a coffin by not screening it for critics and giving the whole world the impression that it sucked big-time ass. It doesn’t…it’s actually pretty decent.

(c) 2021 Berge Garabedian