Rebel Moon - Part One: A Child of Fire
Is Seven Samurai just a genre now? I’m pretty sure we’ve seen enough to consider it a genre.
It’s Seven Samurai if <PERSON> and <PERSON> wanted an inter-planetary story with no character development and decided to replace their action choreography with lazy slow-motion, all the while giving a huge middle finger to the entire concept of show don’t tell.
What’s most frustrating about this though, alongside its lack of character motivation (I mean, with Nemesis we don’t even see her recruitment, they literally just pop up as a member of the team) is the absence of stakes or problem solving. They really don’t conquer any obstacles throughout the whole movie. 952
Every “problem” they face is solved through convenience and slow-motion fight effects that try to cover up the plot armor as best it can.
The world-building rests entirely on knock-off Dune-esque aesthetics and is entirely devoid of any political, cultural, or geographic structures. There’s just some vague bad guy empire force out there in bad guy clothing that’s trying to hunt down a completely un-contextualized and equally vague rebel force.
No idea how either of them are situated in a wider world, what kind of dynamics contextualized the plot… it’s just bad guy has strong fascist army who picks on farmers and good guys have cool face paint and like farmers.
Anyway, said more than I need to honestly. It’s just Seven Samurai in space except with really poor writing and direction. 999