Transcendence Review

Director: Wally Pfister

Starring: Johnny Depp, Rebecca Hall, and Paul Bettany

Released: April 17^th 2014

To be honest I almost didn’t go see this movie. If you’ve read my blog for a while now you probably have noticed that Transcendence is on my list of films I am most looking forward to this year. However this movie has had a lot of bad press, almost every review I’ve read/seen has either been highly negative or completely mediocre. So I had to wrestle with the decision of actually taking it upon myself to go and watch the directorial debut of Christopher Nolan’s cinematographer Wally Pisfter. Last night however I had a lot of free time to myself, I had two hours to kill and I thought “what the hell” I’ll go and watch the movie, the worst that could happen would be that I’d be out of $8.00, I chose a cheap theater.  After having seen the movie I can say that I have absolutely no idea what movie everyone has seen, because Transcendence does not deserve the flak it’s been getting over the past week.

Transcendence is the tragic story of Dr. Will Caster (Depp), an expert in robotics who is on the verge of creating a superior Artificial Intelligence, along with his wife Evelyn (Hall) and best friend Max (Bettany). Tragedy befalls the trio at a conference when Will is unfortunately one of the many targeted by the anti-technology organization known at R.I.F.T., the incident leaves hundreds of scientists dead and leaves Caster fatally wounded by a gunshot laced with radiation.  During the last month of his life Evelyn decides to complete her dying husbands work by uploading his mind into the very A.I that they were creating. The result is tremendously powerful computer intelligence unlike the world has ever seen, but has the creation gone out of control? Is it targeting Humans for world domination? And is this A.I even Will Caster anymore?

That’s really as far as I can go without spoiling anything in this movie, and trust me there are some unexpected twists and turns. I think the movie is being targeted negatively because of the horrendous ad campaign that been associated with the film. Each trailer and tv spot has been labeling this as some sci-fi action thriller, and this is not the case. Transcendence is simply a science fiction story which deals with the personal subject of moving on with one’s life after the death of a loved one. Do not expect a Terminator precursor, instead go into this movie knowing that there won’t be many explosions and robo-action, you should be just fine.

I am not the biggest Johnny Depp fan, don’t get me wrong here the guys a good actor. I just feel he has been a little bit over hyped through the years; you can blame the Pirates franchise for that. He’s been known for taking niche roles, characters and films that only really interest him. Unfortunately most of these roles are either Tim Burton films or just Pirates of the Caribbean; we hardly have actually seen Depp in a movie where he isn’t hidden under layers of prosthetics and white makeup.  With Transcendence we finally get a movie where Depp is just Depp, and I personally think he was the perfect choice to play Will Caster. Even in the trailers I knew that Depps soothing and laid back voice would work perfectly as an A.I., I honestly don’t know why they haven’t copied his voice onto SIRI yet. Many people think that Depp was just acting for the pay check, but how is one really supposed to act when they are part human and part A.I? I think this has been Depps best performance since Sweeny Todd, the character of Will is highly intellectual, caring, and at the same time deeply terrifying due to the nature, and ambitions his intellect poses for the entire human race. Depp is technically really only on screen for maybe 30 minutes tops, the rest is just his face on a screen, yet his presence is felt throughout the entire film.

Rebecca Hall who was in last year’s Iron Man 3 plays Will Caster’s wife, throughout most of the trailers I thought I was going to be completely annoyed with her character. She is basically the star of the film, although Depps name is slapped on the poster this is Evelyns story as she deals with the loss of the love of her life. I can’t even imagine the pain it must be for someone to go through such a traumatic event like that, and to finally have the opportunity to turn back the clock and save the one you love, it’s really moving. However she is faced with a terrible choice as she begins to notice that Caster is quickly becoming more than what she had expected, and just thinking about her alone with this A.I is completely terrifying.

I find it amusing that Paul Bettany plays an A.I In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, because here he plays a man fighting against one, oh the parallels of film.  Max is a character that is simply torn between two worlds; he has been beside both Will and Evelyn for most of their careers and wants more than anything to have his friend back. However through his own research in the field of the Singularity Theory, he knows the potential danger that Will can pose for the rest of humanity, and he must make a choice, to stand next to his two friends, or to potentially see his best friend murdered again, but this time by his own hands.

The film also stars Morgan Freeman and Cillian Murphy (the movie is produced by Christopher Nolan remember) they are the hail marks of any Nolan film, but unfortunately they are more set decorations than anything else. Both actors are horribly underused in this film, even though they are just helping out a friend with his first big budget film. The movie also stars Kate Mara, who just got the gig as Susan Storm/The Invisible Woman in Fox’s Fantastic Four reboot. I found her character in Transcendence to be beyond annoying. Mara plays the leader of R.I.F.T, who in my mind is the biggest bunch of hypocritical extremists I’ve ever seen. I actually wanted her character to die the moment I saw her and loathed every time she was on screen, her characters motives are really horribly underdeveloped and she really has no purpose but to be there to move the plot forward. That is probably one of the only problems I had with the film, the character development never really exceeds past Will, Evelyn and Max. Sure they are the movies leads but every other character is just there to get them from point A, to point B.

Most of the criticism the movie has is that it’s boring, and dull. I find this to be completely untrue, I was completely engaged throughout the entire 2 hour run time; in fact I wouldn’t have minded if there was another half hour thrown onto the film. I found the journey of Will Caster be a completely interesting and engaging one. Sure this premise has been done before, but you can’t really take points off of any movies these days for something like that. Movies have been stealing themes from other films since the dawn of cinema, it’s nothing new here. It’s like if I criticized the Hangover for stealing the exact same plot as Dude Where’s my Car, the trip was different but the destination and starting point were the same. Transcendence on the other hand shows us something that most Robot Apocalypse films have never done, will I tell you? No, go see the movie.

Transcendence is nowhere near as bad as people are making it out to be, the movie does try and make you think about the ending, and if you were paying attention (which I find people hardly do anymore) you will find that the movie makes perfect sense and is a fun science fiction ride.

People are used to science fiction films being all about guns and the fate of mankind. But Transcendence is something different than that, and I think that is why it has been received as negatively as it has. I give Transcendence a

7/10

Go see this movie and make up your own opinion, what I’m going to say is going to sound incredibly stupid but just like the machines in the movie, we can’t all rely on reviews for films. Make your own opinion on this; see if it works for you, it just happened that I was highly entertained and at the end of the day that is what a movie is meant for.