John Carter's Renaissance

John Carter vs. The Royal Adults is a 2018 Australian-British tech noir science fiction film written and directed by Guillaume Canet. This is the thirteenth installment in the Sonic Cinematic Universe and the film is a co-production between Australia, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg, Poland, Ireland and Canada. The film stars Taylor Kitsch, Francois Cluzet, Svetlana Khodchenkova, Julia Vysotskaya, Gilles Lellouche, Gérard Darmon, Pierfrancesco Favino, Alexander Petrov, Toni Servillo, Hiroyuki Sanada, Leïla Bekhti and Jamel Debbouze, it tells the story of John Carter and a French police detective Barthélémy Karas in the distance future investigating the kidnapping of a scientist Ilona Tasuiev who may hold the key to eternal life in a futuristic and slightly dystopian Paris. John Carter's Renaissance is the first installment in John Carter's "Dystopian Trilogy", succeeded by The Royal Adults, Upside Down, High Life and High-Rise. It is an five-part anthology film constructed as a triptych: it contains three distinct stories connected by stories that are either set in the future or in outer space in the style of dystopian. Renaissance interweaves several plot lines in a nonlinear arrangement. Principal photography took place during February 2018 in Studio Babelsberg in Germany, Berlin, Paris, Vancouver and Alberta.
==Plot==
The film opens in a future Paris with scenes establishing the kidnapping of 46-year-old scientist Ilona Tasuiev (Julia Vysotskaya), who works for the megacorporation Avalon. The focus transitions to John Carter (Taylor Kitsch) and police captain Barthélémy Karas (Francois Cluzet), as they defuses a hostage situation by killing the hostage-takers. Afterwards John and Karas are given the job of solving the mystery surrounding Ilona's disappearance. John and Karas begins by contacting Dr. Jonas Muller (Gérard Darmon), a former Avalon scientist familiar with her. Muller had been working to cure progeria, a genetic condition which affected his brother. Muller worked for Avalon as their top scientist but left after he failed to find a cure and his brother died. He took up new work at a free clinic. Muller tells John and Karas that "No one ever leaves Avalon", throwing the corporation under suspicion. John and Karas visits Paul Dellenbach (Gilles Lellouche), one of Avalon's CEOs and questions him about Ilona. On suggesting he may have been sleeping with her, Dellenbach replies "I sleep with my wife, I sleep with my secretary, I even sleep with my sister-in-law but I would never sleep with one of my researchers". After following a series of dead ends, the Police station tells Carter and Karas they are tailing Illona's car through Paris. Eventually they captures the driver (Jamel Debbouze) after a chase which ends at the Eiffel Tower. The man turns out to be a henchmen of Farfella (Toni Servillo), an Italian mobster and a childhood friend of Karas. John and Karas returns the criminal to Farfella who in return gives him security footage of Illona's kidnapping; it shows her car being stolen by an incredibly old man. John and Karas asks Ilona's sister, Bislane (Svetlana Khodchenkova), who works for Avalon to break into the company's Archives to discover what Muller was researching. The sister discovers that Dr. Nakata (Hiroyuki Sanada) worked with Muller in a quest to find a cure for progeria. But they destroyed all evidence of their work when some of the children they were testing on started to mutate. John, Karas and Bislane then escape because accessing the closed file has alerted Avalon security. Later Karas opens up to Bislane and tells her that he and Farfella were raised in the casbah where they worked with gangs. After a drug run went wrong, they ended up in a holding cell. Farfella escaped but Karas was left to the mercy of the other gang. John and Karas puts Bislane under false arrest to protect her from Avalon. Meanwhile, Ilona is shown confined in a cyber ball which is being controlled by the old man. Eventually John and Karas tracks down Muller. He explains that he took Ilona because through her research she has discovered the secret to eternal life (as he himself did 40 years ago); but knowing what the consequences would be if Avalon acquired such knowledge, he kidnapped her. John and Karas tries to encourage the old scientist to hand himself in but Muller is mistakenly shot by a police marksman. John and Karas then deduces that the mysterious old man is Muller's younger brother: now immortal but trapped in an elderly body. John and Karas calls on Farfella who hides Bislane from Avalon while also getting a fake passport for Ilona. However the mega-corporation's security are also closing in on the Parisian sewer where Ilona is being held captive. After a short battle, John and Karas are mortally wounded rescuing Ilona. However she refuses to take the fake passport to start a new life. Instead she tells John and Karas she wants immortality by giving her discovery to The Horde of Darkness. Reluctantly Karas shoots her in the back as she leaves towards The Horde of Darkness. as Master Xehanort (Domhnall Gleeson in an uncredited role) watches all this happen through a live feed from through his camera drone. As Karas lies mortally injured from a gunshot wound, As John leaves, he imagines himself apologising to Bislane for killing her sister for which she forgives him. The film closes with Muller's little brother living as a tramp, throwing his picture of him and his brother into a burning bin. The final scene shows an advert for Avalon with an old woman becoming young again saying, "With Avalon, I know I'm beautiful and I'm going to stay that way." In a post-credits scene