Atmospheric but dull

Rating: 5/10 (20 October 2019)

Recently rewatched this after seeing it in the cinemas. There is no denying it is visually and atmospherically stunning, but the original is such a classic - with so many other imitators - that living up to it would be unlikely. There were some interesting aspects that could have been pushed further: the framing in terms of climate change and ecological collapse was really interesting and I loved the scenes at the dump for conveying the sense of decay. But where the atmosphere was interesting, everything else just fell flat. Nowhere was this more evident than in Jared Leto's character Wallace. Everything about the script, the plot, and Leto's acting just came across as bloated and needlessly wordy. The last third of the movie lags terribly in the beautiful Las Vegas setting, before being redeemed by a stunning fight scene in the ocean. I can't help but feel there are similarities to Ridley Scott's Prometheus alien sequel which just drowned its own pretentious wordiness.