A pastiche, but with a sly humour of its own

Rating: Null/10 (30 November 2003)

This is a great big fat comic book of a movie with characters to match (`Bruce Willis saves the World'). I watched it only because it was a slow Sunday night on TV, and the small screen and commercial breaks didn't help. But it has a cheeky charm, plenty of action, villainous villains (though the biggest villain is an unseen force) flamboyant sets (Brooklyn circa 2300 may be stolen from Fritz Lang's `Metropolis' but is nonetheless very impressive.) You can empathise with the heroine, reconstructed from a few cells, when she sees the city for the first time.
I won't go into the logical inconsistencies in the plot; this is not a movie with a plot that bears much analysis. The future presented is more of the same, but worse, so that in 2300 people will still be going to Las Vegas style resorts, except that they will be in outer space. This does make you think why we bothered with space flight at all. Essentially this is a French film but with two unusual factors; a big Hollywood star, Bruce Willis, and a fairly big budget, $US90 million. (The film more than recovered its costs but did better in non-US markets). Its also a very personal film with Luc Bresson both directing and writing, and casting Mrs Bresson , the gorgeous Milla Jovovich, as the heroine (she does fit the bill nicely, dyed red hair and all).
It is possible to trace almost every scene back to some earlier film or series. Apart from `Metropolis' there's the Egyptian scenes with John Bluthal and Luke Perry in the style of `Indiana Jones', the death star from `Star Wars', the casino battle with overtones of `Casino Royale', the snogging in the escape capsule reminiscent of James Bond  you name it, Bresson has taken it from somewhere. Not a great deal of acting is required in these circumstances, though Ian Holm makes the most of his opportunities as Vito the priest. Chris Tucker is appallingly over the top as DJ Ruby Rhod and I fervently hoped one of the minor monsters would blast him, but to no avail. Gary Oldman put in a ho-hum performance as the evil entrepreneur (called `Zorg' for heaven's sake), but was labouring under the handicap of being a villain without a motive. Why would he want the Earth to be blown up? Had he insured it with some Intergalactic Lloyds?
This kind of cultural `borrowing' is quite common in French movies  all those French film noir films with Hollywood ancestry for example - but usually the French contrive to put their own stamp on the finished product. This film is such a jumble, and so vague in its intentions it is impossible to regard it as more than a pastiche, though done with a certain amount of sly humour and plenty of resources. I think Gaumont were very lucky to get their money back.