Geostorm cost at least $120 million to make. In all likelihood, it probably cost more- budgets never take marketing and distribution into consideration, and Warner Bros. and Skydance shifted this thing all over the calendar and delayed it multiple times. Now, I'm not usually one to complain about the price of a movie. The business is excessive, and in this day and age, it's normal to see budgets balloon over $250 million dollars for just one project. In modern Hollywood, $120 million is nothing. But as I watched Geostorm, my mind immediately drifted to the budget and all that could have been done had that money been put to a different use. Cancer studies, healthcare, poverty resources- hell, with the money it took to make Geostorm, the producers could have just given the money to global warming scientists for research.
If you couldn't tell based on the almost deliberately atrocious trailers, Geostorm is one of the dumbest films of the year, or of many years for that matter. Yes, it's often hilariously bad, but it takes itself just seriously enough that you can't help but wish that it was worse. It's fun to watch when things get gleefully stupid (eggs frying on the street!), but much of it is so tediously functional in the most pedestrian way possible that you just wish the filmmakers had some sense of self-awareness. Why not embrace the sheer lunacy of a movie about controlling the weather? Geostorm is essentially a SyFy Channel film with all of the boring parts emphasized, led by a cast of C-list actors who were probably popular when the project went into production. Poor special effects, a cliche-ridden script, an absurd amount of stock characters- it's the disaster movie in its most horrifying form. But hey, at least it's better than The Snowman.
Oh yeah, you're expecting me to tell you what this movie is about. There is a story- and a surprising amount of clunky plot for a movie about natural disasters ravaging the planet. Essentially, a few years from now, the global warming epidemic reaches its worst point yet. The weather goes wild, and scientists around the world decide that the only way to stop it is to work together and create a system that controls the weather. It's like Pacific Rim, minus all of the cool parts. The countries of the world create Dutch Boy, a giant satellite system that keeps the world from completely imploding. There's a reason that they call it Dutch Boy, but it makes about as much sense as naming the alien Calvin in this March's slightly less terrible sci-fi film Life. Anyways, at the forefront of this innovative mission is Jake Lawson (Gerard Butler), our roguish hero and the man responsible for creating Dutch Boy. Unfortunately, Jake is a bit of a brash loose cannon, and the film begins with him being fired by his brother Max (Jim Sturgess) from the program that he created.
Three years later, and all seems well in the world. Max has a girlfriend (Abbie Cornish) in the secret service, but due to the nature of Washington politics (he works in the state department), they have to keep their relationship a secret. Jake lives in Florida with his daughter (Annabelle: Creation's Talitha Bateman), hoping to repair the relationships he damaged due to his devotion to Dutch Boy. But after a freak incident leaves an entire village dead in Afghanistan, Max realizes that something is wrong with the program. An additional incident in Hong Kong leaves thousands more dead, and it's now clear to everyone involved- there's a conspiracy to use Dutch Boy to wreak havoc. Max has no other option but to send Jake back into space, where he'll work with a team of experts to solve the problem. But who could be behind these nefarious attacks? Is it President Andrew Palma (Andy Garcia)? Or is there something even more sinister going on?
It's hard to pick the most ridiculous moment from Geostorm. Is it the scene where a giant clock announcing "TIME TO GEOSTORM" appears on the screen? Oh, what about the moment where an egg literally starts frying on the streets of Hong Kong before one of the most muddled catastrophe sequences in recent memory? And how could anybody forget the embarrassing attempt to re-enact the emotional climax of Interstellar, in which Jake Lawson pleads with his daughter that he'll return home one day? Geostorm is an endless series of scenes that just get dumber and dumber, escalating the absurdity and the sheer narrative tedium to a point that is simply cringe-worthy. It culminates in a moment where Andy Garcia proudly says "Because I'm the god*amn President of the United States of America!" And I'm really not sure if the film wants you to laugh or cheer.
That's the thing- Geostorm veers so close into comedic territory that it almost feels like a parody. How could anyone not laugh when giant hail begins crushing people by the dozens? The film covers such well-worn disaster territory, and there are times where it feels like the movie is in on the joke. But for every scene of hokey self-awareness, there are moments that I'm convinced we are meant to take 100% seriously. The audience is genuinely supposed to buy into the bond between Jake and Max, the love between Jake and his daughter, and the atrocious metaphors that become a prominent aspect of the film's resolution. Writer/director Dean Devlin and co-screenwriter Paul Guyot want us to invest in these tropes and stories that we've seen a billion times before, and it's truly laughable to watch the film bend over backwards to deliver elements that resemble real storytelling. People are coming to see ridiculous disasters, and I don't know why this film pretends that that isn't the case.
It would be one thing if it actually succeeded at any of its silly aspirations. But in addition to displaying uninteresting stock characters, we learn nothing of actual substance about the people that inhabit the world of Geostorm. Trust me, I know that it feels ridiculous to analyze the characters in a disaster movie that looked like an unprecedented fiasco from the trailers. But at every turn, Geostorm makes an attempt to emotionally engage the audience in its story and characters. That it ends up being so bad is a byproduct of both its inherent stupidity and the fact that Devlin and Guyot actually tried to make a real film. There is an ISS engineer in this film played by Alexandra Maria Lara who has a pretty prominent role as Gerard Butler's right hand woman. And yet we know absolutely nothing about her. We barely learn anything about Jake or Max, let alone Andy Garcia's idiotic president or the one-note villains or any other supporting characters. Why they even tried to turn this dumb concept into something serious will blow my mind for the rest of time.
It also doesn't help that Geostorm looks like it was made a decade ago. I know that this thing has been in the works for a while, but there's no reason for a modern blockbuster to look this ugly. The special effects look like something out of a TV movie- there's no crisp sheen or precision to them whatsoever. If you're going to make an "event" film where the basis of its appeal lies in its big, massive action sequences, those scenes better be good. Geostorm was probably shut down by Warner Bros. and the financiers during re-shoots and post-production after they realized that it wouldn't make money, but that's no excuse for releasing a film with sequences that look like something out of a mid-2000s video game.
I'll be honest though, Geostorm is good for a laugh. It's not the most miserable movie I've sat through in 2017- although it'll be hard for any film to ever beat The Emoji Movie in terms of sheer awfulness. I saw this movie with a friend basically as a joke, and we had a great time laughing and cracking jokes at just about every aspect of this nightmare. But I think we have to ask ourselves- is this really an acceptable outcome for a mega-blockbuster? Look, this has been a great year for big-budget films, and I think that all those claims about the death of cinema are absolutely absurd. But when people discuss those ideas, they're talking about things like Geostorm, a film with no actual artistic aims that was dumped on a busy weekend despite a large budget. When people look at the kind of films that are being released and see something like this, it's easy to feel nothing but dismay. Geostorm might be fun to laugh at for everybody who's in on the joke, but it's the kind of disaster that I hope we never have to endure again. Nobody wins with a film like this.
THE FINAL GRADE: D (3.2/10)
Images courtesy of Warner Bros.
Poster via WB/IMDB
If you couldn't tell based on the almost deliberately atrocious trailers, Geostorm is one of the dumbest films of the year, or of many years for that matter. Yes, it's often hilariously bad, but it takes itself just seriously enough that you can't help but wish that it was worse. It's fun to watch when things get gleefully stupid (eggs frying on the street!), but much of it is so tediously functional in the most pedestrian way possible that you just wish the filmmakers had some sense of self-awareness. Why not embrace the sheer lunacy of a movie about controlling the weather? Geostorm is essentially a SyFy Channel film with all of the boring parts emphasized, led by a cast of C-list actors who were probably popular when the project went into production. Poor special effects, a cliche-ridden script, an absurd amount of stock characters- it's the disaster movie in its most horrifying form. But hey, at least it's better than The Snowman.
Oh yeah, you're expecting me to tell you what this movie is about. There is a story- and a surprising amount of clunky plot for a movie about natural disasters ravaging the planet. Essentially, a few years from now, the global warming epidemic reaches its worst point yet. The weather goes wild, and scientists around the world decide that the only way to stop it is to work together and create a system that controls the weather. It's like Pacific Rim, minus all of the cool parts. The countries of the world create Dutch Boy, a giant satellite system that keeps the world from completely imploding. There's a reason that they call it Dutch Boy, but it makes about as much sense as naming the alien Calvin in this March's slightly less terrible sci-fi film Life. Anyways, at the forefront of this innovative mission is Jake Lawson (Gerard Butler), our roguish hero and the man responsible for creating Dutch Boy. Unfortunately, Jake is a bit of a brash loose cannon, and the film begins with him being fired by his brother Max (Jim Sturgess) from the program that he created.
Three years later, and all seems well in the world. Max has a girlfriend (Abbie Cornish) in the secret service, but due to the nature of Washington politics (he works in the state department), they have to keep their relationship a secret. Jake lives in Florida with his daughter (Annabelle: Creation's Talitha Bateman), hoping to repair the relationships he damaged due to his devotion to Dutch Boy. But after a freak incident leaves an entire village dead in Afghanistan, Max realizes that something is wrong with the program. An additional incident in Hong Kong leaves thousands more dead, and it's now clear to everyone involved- there's a conspiracy to use Dutch Boy to wreak havoc. Max has no other option but to send Jake back into space, where he'll work with a team of experts to solve the problem. But who could be behind these nefarious attacks? Is it President Andrew Palma (Andy Garcia)? Or is there something even more sinister going on?
It's hard to pick the most ridiculous moment from Geostorm. Is it the scene where a giant clock announcing "TIME TO GEOSTORM" appears on the screen? Oh, what about the moment where an egg literally starts frying on the streets of Hong Kong before one of the most muddled catastrophe sequences in recent memory? And how could anybody forget the embarrassing attempt to re-enact the emotional climax of Interstellar, in which Jake Lawson pleads with his daughter that he'll return home one day? Geostorm is an endless series of scenes that just get dumber and dumber, escalating the absurdity and the sheer narrative tedium to a point that is simply cringe-worthy. It culminates in a moment where Andy Garcia proudly says "Because I'm the god*amn President of the United States of America!" And I'm really not sure if the film wants you to laugh or cheer.
That's the thing- Geostorm veers so close into comedic territory that it almost feels like a parody. How could anyone not laugh when giant hail begins crushing people by the dozens? The film covers such well-worn disaster territory, and there are times where it feels like the movie is in on the joke. But for every scene of hokey self-awareness, there are moments that I'm convinced we are meant to take 100% seriously. The audience is genuinely supposed to buy into the bond between Jake and Max, the love between Jake and his daughter, and the atrocious metaphors that become a prominent aspect of the film's resolution. Writer/director Dean Devlin and co-screenwriter Paul Guyot want us to invest in these tropes and stories that we've seen a billion times before, and it's truly laughable to watch the film bend over backwards to deliver elements that resemble real storytelling. People are coming to see ridiculous disasters, and I don't know why this film pretends that that isn't the case.
It would be one thing if it actually succeeded at any of its silly aspirations. But in addition to displaying uninteresting stock characters, we learn nothing of actual substance about the people that inhabit the world of Geostorm. Trust me, I know that it feels ridiculous to analyze the characters in a disaster movie that looked like an unprecedented fiasco from the trailers. But at every turn, Geostorm makes an attempt to emotionally engage the audience in its story and characters. That it ends up being so bad is a byproduct of both its inherent stupidity and the fact that Devlin and Guyot actually tried to make a real film. There is an ISS engineer in this film played by Alexandra Maria Lara who has a pretty prominent role as Gerard Butler's right hand woman. And yet we know absolutely nothing about her. We barely learn anything about Jake or Max, let alone Andy Garcia's idiotic president or the one-note villains or any other supporting characters. Why they even tried to turn this dumb concept into something serious will blow my mind for the rest of time.
It also doesn't help that Geostorm looks like it was made a decade ago. I know that this thing has been in the works for a while, but there's no reason for a modern blockbuster to look this ugly. The special effects look like something out of a TV movie- there's no crisp sheen or precision to them whatsoever. If you're going to make an "event" film where the basis of its appeal lies in its big, massive action sequences, those scenes better be good. Geostorm was probably shut down by Warner Bros. and the financiers during re-shoots and post-production after they realized that it wouldn't make money, but that's no excuse for releasing a film with sequences that look like something out of a mid-2000s video game.
I'll be honest though, Geostorm is good for a laugh. It's not the most miserable movie I've sat through in 2017- although it'll be hard for any film to ever beat The Emoji Movie in terms of sheer awfulness. I saw this movie with a friend basically as a joke, and we had a great time laughing and cracking jokes at just about every aspect of this nightmare. But I think we have to ask ourselves- is this really an acceptable outcome for a mega-blockbuster? Look, this has been a great year for big-budget films, and I think that all those claims about the death of cinema are absolutely absurd. But when people discuss those ideas, they're talking about things like Geostorm, a film with no actual artistic aims that was dumped on a busy weekend despite a large budget. When people look at the kind of films that are being released and see something like this, it's easy to feel nothing but dismay. Geostorm might be fun to laugh at for everybody who's in on the joke, but it's the kind of disaster that I hope we never have to endure again. Nobody wins with a film like this.
THE FINAL GRADE: D (3.2/10)
Images courtesy of Warner Bros.
Poster via WB/IMDB
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