Thoughtful and Interesting, But Far From Perfect

Rating: 7/10 (1 May 2018)

A joint scientific/military probe explores an unseen alien force that's taken up residence in the Florida swamplands and begun altering the wildlife. As you can probably surmise from the trailers, this is more of a slow, melancholy wander through the unknown than a guns-blazing action thriller, though there are some moments of noisy chaos.
Natalie Portman gets the close-ups, in a downplayed, nigh-emotionless role, but the unseen, undefined foreign creature has the heaviest presence. Fundamentally unfamiliar with our flora and fauna, it's been inspecting local life at a biological level, toying with genetic code and producing circus-mirror amalgamations that are just as confused about their own existence as we are. In many cases, the results are a beautiful sight to behold, but there's always a lingering sense of unease, something off and disturbing about what's unfolding before us. The worst of these experiments manifests when the human invaders are at their most over-stressed, an unsettling evening showdown with a lumbering, wailing behemoth. Not to give anything away, but it's the first time in years I've felt legitimately terrified by a monster on film.
There's a lot to unpack here, some tricky territory to navigate, and for the first hour it feels like we're walking in mud. Hurry isn't a word in Annihilation's vocabulary, even when it's being chased, and I think many viewers will find that off-putting. I'll confess that it does ultimately bear fruit, though the quality depends upon your interpretation. I enjoyed it more than the book, which gradually lost track of what made the concept so interesting in the first place, but it endures different troubles. If anything, I felt numb by the end. Slowly beaten down by the slog, the bland, frank, matter-of-fact leads and the lack of real answers.