ET phone it in

Rating: Null/10 (20 October 2012)

A decade since the previous film and fifteen years since the first, was anyone really looking for this film to be made? Well – apart from the accountants I mean. Despite this, MIB3 came to be this year and I could not have cared less as it entered the cinemas as yet another blockbuster seeking to carry a franchise on for longer than it probably should (although the previous film did that already). The plot here sees Tommy Lee Jones doing as little as possible while Will Smith goes back in time to work with a younger version of him (played by Josh Brolin). The story (such as it is) allows for the usual alien special effects and reasonable set-pieces but there is a common thing that runs through every aspect of the film: it really does just dial the whole thing in.
It is hard to describe but it does feel like a film that has been made because somebody calculated what it would cost against what it would make due to franchise legacy, retro-bump and good old fashioned blockbuster appeal. There isn't the energy and fun there was in the first film; it has its moments and it does seem to have the best intentions at heart, but it just doesn't come off. The comedy rarely drew a smile from me – the noise distracted me from my ironing but it didn't do more than that. The action set pieces are so-so despite the effects and generally I wasn't sure what was supposed to hook me into the film because it didn't make me laugh, didn't thrill me, didn't intrigue me and really didn't entertain me. It doesn't have the decency to be bad though – it merely goes through the motions in a way that did very little.
The cast involved mystifies me too – so many of them have no need to be in this film unless they had contractual obligations or the pay check was huge (which, given the budget, I guess it must have been for the majority of them). Certainly Will Smith has no need to do this film and he never seems comfortable doing his late 90's routine here – he has grown beyond that and he cannot make it work. Of course he looks like he is hitting every mark when you put him next to Tommy Lee Jones, who looks like he really would sooner be anywhere else if it were for the million or so dollars he is getting for this. Brolin does a good impression of his older version, but it is never more than an impression. Clement is never given anything of note to do while Thompson is just wasted without a doubt. Other faces are in here too, but nobody does anything worth mentioning.
Men in Black 3 is the result of a series of business meetings from a studio looking for a profitable summer movie; there can be no other real reason for it existing. This genesis infects the whole film and from acting to writing to set-piece delivery, it all seems to feel like it was dialed in and that the creative juices never flow. Distracting but really nothing more than expensive noise designed to extend a franchise for the sake of extending it.