Too many borrowed pieces in this patchwork

Rating: 8/10 (18 September 2013)

This film is a fairy tale and I guarantee you it will end well. But it is also a patchwork of plagiarized elements.
The earth was destroyed, a destruction caused by the destruction of the moon by some not really specified cosmic war. The earth then turned into a wasteland submerged by tons and tons of dust, earth and rocks. The ruins are thus underground. The Golden Gate Bridge is reduced to two pillar tips sticking out of that dirt. That's a rewriting of H.G. Wells the Time Machine.
Two humans are living in the ring of satellites that overlook the waste land with a company of drones that are supposed to destroy all signs of life. Jack Harper is the man and the woman is supposed to be his wife. Jack Harper's memory has been erased to enable him to carry out his mission. Total Recall, second episode, the sequel. Everyday Jack Harper is supposed to go down on the surface to revive the drones that have been downed in the night. There is thus some kind of hostile life on this planet, living underground of course. That's Star Wars revisited. An underground resistance has been so often used that listing all the plagiarized connections would take many pages. That implies at this moment that the surviving humans who have fled the decaying planet are controlling the situation from some distant artificial planet. That is a black star like in Star Wars again. But who are these escapees?
But memory-deprived Jack Harper knows where there is a secret valley that is as primeval as the Garden of Eden. There Jack Harper has a cabin with electricity and a pile of vinyl records and a record player and all kinds of heirloom and he plays his records everyday when he manages to escape from the control of his "wife" on the surveillance satellite. The drones have never found that place. I guess Jack Harper's lost memory was not lost completely and the drones are not very swift.
Then one day a spacecraft crushes on the surface and there are four or five sleep-boxes with hibernating human beings in them. This spacecraft was called by a strange signal from the underground resistance. The drones are destroying the sleep-pods. Jack Harper saves one and takes the woman inside to his satellite base. The reaction of his official wife shows there is a real problem there. When he takes the woman to recuperate the "black box" of the space craft they are captured by the resistance and then things become iffy.
Let's have one more trip "Back to the Future" and then we have two Jack Harpers and maybe or maybe not two women and this saved woman (or her and her double) is revealed to be Jack Harper's real wife, two real wives and two real Jack Harpers. Then the initial Jack Harper recuperates some kind of memory. With the help of the resistance under attack from drones, he realizes that he has to fulfill the mission the other Jack Harper – but that is him in a way, at least if you accept the concept of doppelgangers – and his wife were entrusted with: to destroy the black star.
Officially one of his real wives is hidden in the secret valley, the other one is set in the sleep pod that is going to be delivered by one Jack Harper to the black star with a bomb in it. When he finally reaches his destination, o divine miracle, the wife has been swapped and replaced by the leader of the resistance who is dying of a wound gotten in the last battle against the drones. But the bomb is here, Jack Harper is determined and the final an massive attack of drones against the resistance is under way.
What will happen? A happy happening and glorious ending of course. The black star crumbles, the drones are grounded, the resistance is saved, the wife has a child and two or three years later the surviving Jack Harper reaches the secret valley with the resistance and we are in a Grimm-like ending when they are happy ever after, ever after Snow White's step mother dies dancing in red-hot metal shoes.
If you like soft horror fairy tales, rush to this one. Otherwise entrust it to your children who might have soft nightmares in the night. You will have to cuddle them with love.
Dr Jacques COULARDEAU