Good popcorn flick.

Rating: 8/10 (20 April 2013)

Joseph Kosinski created and co-penned Oblivion 8 years ago, and reported to his opinion his "debut" movie. Oblivion was is a graphic novel, illustrated by Andrée Wallin. However he got his feet wet at Disney first with the release of Tron Legacy where he proved to be a competent director. However, Disney dumped Joseph. I hope it makes Universal a ton of money.
The story boast of a world that can no longer sustain life and is being dismantled for what properties it does have: Water. Nearly 90% of the planet is is radioactive from a war between aliens and man, which resulted in the destruction of the Earths moon. The premise is set around aliens still surviving on the planet that want to interfere with the plans to remove the planets water. Drones are set in place to protect the massive units that are set about the task of sucking up all it can. When a drone is down, a skeletal crew that populate various areas of the inhabitable part of the planet to find and fix the drones. Know this, the drones are not particularly people friendly. Enter Tom Cruise.
At 50, Cruise is well preserved, easily pairing up with the beautiful Andrea Riseborough and Olga Kurylenko. As plots within plots slowly unfold, I found myself thinking "Whaat?" at times only to answer my own question with "Eh, OK. I'll roll with that". Eventually, more people enter the foray and you realize there is more to the planet then was first let on. Enter Morgan Freeman. Thank god he's not narrating the movie! The scope is epic, the feel is lonely, and the color quite gray for the most part. There is a strong storyboard presence throughout, and no doubt Andrée Wallins conceptualizations are the primary influence. Keep your eyes open for tons of sci/fi homage. That in its self made for some moments of "aha" and a slight grin. Definitely a PG13, but there was thankfully no adult content, just some moments of violence. See it in a good theater. Don't know if I would have seen this at full price but at a little over 2 hours, it was definitely enjoyable for me and company.