For all its flowers, it doesn't even stop to smell the roses.

Rating: 4/10 (22 July 2018)

For all its pretences of being 'highbrow', meditative and 'smart' science-fiction, 'Annihilation (2018)' relies so incredibly heavily on overt and repetitive exposition that it would be difficult to call any aspect of it 'ambiguous'. This becomes very grating, very quickly because all of its ideas are spelled out through stunted delivery of a subpar script, one that's over-explanatory, repetitive and totally not representative of how actual people speak to one another. For example, "it's not like us... it's unlike us" is a real line and there are plenty more like it. Overall, there's little to like here, considering that the actual experience is a dry and dull one regardless of its eventual payoff (or lack thereof). The visuals, which are supposed to be a big draw, don't even work all that well, with some instances of copy-paste CGI and sometimes generally subpar digital work standing out strongly and making the world even less believable than it already is. Plus, the cinematography is generally too bloom-heavy and slightly muddy for my liking, despite its purposefully 'UV-filter' feel. In general, it feels as though the film is perhaps aiming too high, trying to convey a 'mind-blowing' concept that just isn't there, and it ends up feeling pretentious and aloof because of it, unable to withstand the pressures put upon it by its own creators simply because it isn't well conceived, or executed, enough to do so. It seems to be asking us to wait through the less interesting segments because it will have a reveal that will make it all worthwhile, but there are two problems with this. Firstly, the 'reveal' (which isn't so much one big thing as several small ones) isn't strong enough to retroactively remedy the picture's weak points, not the mention the fact that several of its plot-points lack a consistent logic and don't stand up to all that much scrutiny. The second problem is that this way of thinking is flawed in the first place. No matter how great a final reveal is, no matter how much it changes the narrative in retrospect, it can never make up for a boring experience. If the picture is good, it will be entertaining the first time around, even if it is more so the second (with the knowledge gained from having already seen it). This flick decides it is okay to be dull because it reveals information periodically and has 'big ideas' it wants to explore, but there's nothing all that complex and everything is explained anyway. A second viewing wouldn't be anymore 'rewarding' than the first. There's always the possibility (or probability), however, that this wasn't on purpose. It's not entertaining simply because it fails to be so. It's so concerned with its underlying themes and ideas, and hammering them home to us to the point they become obvious, that it actually forgets to be enjoyable. 4/10