Film review: 'Oblivion' is like an expensive piece of art that receives praise but no buyers

Film: Oblivion
Cast: Tom Cruise, Morgan Freeman, Andrea Riseborough, Melissa Leo, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Olga Kurylenko, Zoe Bell
Director: Joseph Kosinsk
Rating: **1/2

There comes a point while watching Oblivion where you can't help but chuckle and wonder if this truly is Tom Cruise's version of reality being played on the big screen.  Most of the stuff characters say  during the 90 odd minutes is supposed to be ‘deep’.  It isn't as profound as the blue or red pill scene from Matrix, but there is a conscious attempt from the film maker to rise above the banal and be something else.  So as the cast and crew grapples with the intricacies and subliminal messages the film seeks to deliver, we like Cruise have a baffled, ‘what’s going on dude’ expression through the proceedings.

Jack Harper (Cruise) and Victoria (Riseborough) are an ‘efficient team’ living in a post-apocalyptic world on space station that works on sustaining life after  the moon has been  completely destroyed and the earth is empty of any habitation. There is a lot of technical mumbo jumbo about droids and scavengers (creatures that attack Cruise and his team) with some brilliant visuals and barren landscapes that look like scenes from a planetarium documentary. Jack and Victoria report to a digital interface named Sally who controls their command centre and heads their team. Despite the safety and security of his existence, Jack is constantly troubled with recurring dreams where he’s proposing a mysterious woman (Olga Kurylenko) over looking the Manhattan skyline. We also have Morgan Freeman in one of his sketchiest roles as the leader of the scavengers dressed in dark robes smoking on a cigar.

Claudio Miranda's cinematography is top notch. Visually the film is a winner on every front. There will be moments when you get a sense of dejavu and compare it to Ridley Scott’s Prometheus.  Both use the grey tone to accentuate their setting and make use of ground breaking digital effects. Oblivion’s pace is a major problem. The film feels lethargic especially in the second half where Jack mulls over the decisions he has to make and is caught in the middle. Also Cruise seems like he’s out to prove something. We watch him strip and show off his chiselled torso and give  close ups of his smug  face in an effort to prove he's still in it to win it ? At no point do we feel connected to Jack or concerned about the actions that might affect his future.

Oblivion is like an expensive piece of art that receives praise but no buyers.