Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Transcendence

This is topic Transcendence in forum Film Handlers' Movie Reviews at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.

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Posted by Stu Jamieson (Member # 4626) on 04-26-2014, 08:27 PM:

There's a war on for the minds of people and the enemy is artificial intelligence. At least that's the viewpoint of the extremist group, R.I.F.T. (that's Revolutionary Independence From Technology, to the unlearned), and they're willing to take murderous action to win their war.

Dr Will Caster (Johnny Depp), leading AI researcher, is but one victim of R.I.F.T.'s murderous rampage. Shot with a radioactive slug and with just weeks to live, his beloved wife Evelyn (Rebecca Hall) uploads Will's mind into his quantum supercomputer thus saving his life - or at least his existence. With instant access to vast online resources, Will's research is greatly accelerated but the power which comes with almost unbounded knowledge greatly alarms both R.I.F.T. and the US government.

First time director, Wally Pfister, poses some really interesting questions on the nature of consciousness, human toil, knowledge and power, but from about the midpoint on, he becomes obsessed with whether Will's conscience really has been uploaded to the supercomputer, whether he is good or evil and how his love affair endures with his wife in virtual form. But these are all Hollywood tropes and are far less interesting than the fundamental principle at play here and that is that knowledge is power and how the subsequent threat of that power puts good and evil in the balance.

Whether the holder of that power is actually good or evil is almost beside the point (in the context of a movie); the pointed question is: should anybody wield that power at all? By reducing this principle to a mere love story and to questions of whether the protagonist is good or evil does the story a disservice and perhaps speaks to the lack of confidence of a first time director in his own abilities; lacking the confidence to stay the course on the true message of the film and surrendering to a vehicle which merely delivers entertainment.

In this regard, Pfister seems to miss the point of his own movie. The film could have been great. It starts drawing on interesting historical events such as the Koreshian siege in Waco but ends up a tired mash-up of HAL 9000 with Invasion of the Bodysnatchers.

Interestingly, the film is executively produced by Christopher Nolan (Pfister is his cinematographer) and, in truth, would probably be better had he directed it.

6.5 out of 10

Posted by Jonathan Goeldner (Member # 4854) on 04-26-2014, 09:33 PM:

I'm still on the fence if I want to see this, the RT rating is a vicious 18%

Posted by Stu Jamieson (Member # 4626) on 04-26-2014, 10:52 PM:

I presume this has bombed badly in the US? It has received a strangely limited release here.

Posted by Terry Lynn-Stevens (Member # 7349) on 04-27-2014, 12:04 AM:

It was bad, but it wasn't great and it didn't really need to be made. It reminded me of movies that that were released in the late 80s and early 90s.

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 04-27-2014, 12:56 AM:

quote: Stu Jamieson
First time director, Wally Pfister, poses some really interesting questions on the nature of consciousness, human toil, knowledge and power, but from about the midpoint on, he becomes obsessed with whether Will's conscience really has been uploaded to the supercomputer, whether he is good or evil and how his love affair endures with his wife in virtual form. But these are all Hollywood tropes and are far less interesting than the fundamental principle at play here and that is that knowledge is power and how the subsequent threat of that power puts good and evil in the balance.

This smells like the "Save the Cat" formula B.S. at work. Let's not bother really exploring and pursuing what's possible with a story premise. Instead, let's do clip-art style methods that agree with the known formulas and are friendly to focus groups.

Posted by Stu Jamieson (Member # 4626) on 04-27-2014, 01:07 AM:

^ I think that's exactly what it is. Nolan could make a much better movie out of this. Cronenberg could make a fabulous movie out of the ideas present here.

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 04-27-2014, 11:24 AM:

When I first heard about Save the Cat I thought it was some kind of satirical joke. It's not. Many screenwriters follow it like a bible and if they don't they'll have some producer riding their ass until they do follow it like a bible. Or they have the choice to do something else for a living. IMHO, it's part of what is making so many Hollywood 2 hour movies have a strange kind of forgettable same-ness to them.

Maybe this explains why I haven't bought a new movie on Blu-ray in nearly 4 years. Since 2010, all of the movies I purchased on Blu-ray have been older movies, like the remastered version Robocop for instance.

Even for movies I enjoyed experiencing in the theater, like Gravity in Dolby Atmos, I just haven't bothered buying the Blu-ray once it was released. Maybe I might get around to buying that one, perhaps when it is seriously discounted. But by then I'm sure HBO will be playing the living hell out of Gravity in a couple or so months and I'll get sick of it anyway.

Transcendence is turning out to be quite a flop. I expect at least a few of this summer's big event movies to bomb. Perhaps that might give us some hope the decision makers in Hollywood will realize Save the Cat formula is no guarantee of success and at least in some cases it may bring about failure.

Posted by Jonathan Goeldner (Member # 4854) on 04-28-2014, 05:42 PM:

lesson learned: just because you're an acclaimed DP doesn't mean you'll be good at actually directing a feature length film ... [Wink]

Posted by Julian Antos (Member # 5497) on 04-28-2014, 06:08 PM:

Curious to hear if anyone has been able to see a print of this as it had a non-DI workflow. I'm sure it looks great in 35mm (regardless of the quality of the movie itself).

http://motion.kodak.com/motion/Publications/InCamera/FilmStock/VISION3_250D_Color_Negative_Film/Pfister_and_Hall_Go_Above_and_Beyond_in_Transcendence.htm

Posted by Terry Lynn-Stevens (Member # 7349) on 04-29-2014, 12:34 AM:

quote: Julian Antos
Curious to hear if anyone has been able to see a print of this as it had a non-DI workflow. I'm sure it looks great in 35mm (regardless of the quality of the movie itself).

http://motion.kodak.com/motion/Publications/InCamera/FilmStock/VISION3_250D_Color_Negative_Film/Pfister_and_Hall_Go_Above_and_Beyond_in_Transcendence.htm

I also read that according to Pfisfer, he saved the studio over $300,000 by using 35mm film and skipping the DI work flow.