129.
Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets
8.5/10
An adaptation of French comics named Valerian and Laureline, brought back an onscreen collaboration for it's digital effects, from the people that brought us Avatar, Van Helsing and Contact. From the trailer alone, I knew that this needed to be seen in the splendour of 3D. Luc Besson, the writer for the cult films, The Fifth Element and Leon, along with working on the Taken films, we can expect something interest and action packed. The film contains so many different alien species that each actor and actress had to read the 600 page, written by Besson, describing each one, in order to know how to react to each one they would come across. Now that is some dedication from both parties. I love sci-fi and mainly individual's own ideas on what they believe aliens and monsters look like. I loved The Fifth Element for this exact reason, along with the futuristic city and planets, delivered though stunning graphics at the time. Let's break this down and see if the movie is out of this world or will simply disappear into a black hole.
The film begins with a montage of a space station being built in the orbit of Earth to the music of David Bowie and the well chosen, Space Oddity. This songs continues as we watch the station grow in size, accommodating more and more nations from the World, who have finally created a space programme. Within a decade, species have all come to join the station with their own ships, bringing their own knowledge of the Universe and more importantly, peace. This montage is shown through many hand shakes, quickly shown as each welcoming officer is actually a writer or producer that Besson has worked with in the past. Soon, the station has become too big to be supported by Earth's gravity and actually becomes a danger, therefore it's pushed into deep space to begin a journey, where Mankind has never been. 400 years has passed and we are on the planet Mul. Princess Liho wakes in her massive shell of a house and picks up a small creature called a convertor. A little lizard, while she resembles a kind of whiter Avatar, with gill like ears and radiant skin. The setting is a beautiful sea front, bright blue sea and pearls are collected from the shallows. Pearls are actually the name of this species. The little balls are taken to the Emperor, who picks out on to give to his daughter. Most of the voices for this species are pretty high and the only way I could distinguish between the sex it the clothing that they are wearing. Liho receives the pearl, which she lets the convertor eat. These little things then reproduce the pearls and drop them back into nature as a way of giving back what the land has given them. Kind of like us chopping down trees and replanting two more in its place. As Liho is loving her view, dark clouds appear in the atmosphere as many small ships break through and come crashing into the land. The Pearls run to a close ship to find survivors, just as massive ship hurtles down towards the horizon, creating such an impact that an explosion threatens to end the planet. Liho is alone, running to the town centre to find no-one, but heading to the downed ship to see that her fellow Pearls and family members have closed the door for protection but the handle has snapped off. A massive wave of dust, fire and death heads her way as she accepts defeat in front of her parents. As she dies, she sends a bright blue wave through the Universe, which ends up waking Major Valerian from his nap.
Valerian is played by Dane DeHaan, who I've already witnessed as the Green Goblin in the Amazing Spiderman. He's a creepy looking bloke anyway, but his character in this is soon revealed as a bit of a ladies man. He's laying on a beach and thinks he has just woken from a dream about the planet Mul. He play fights with Cara Delevingue's character, Sergeant Laureline, before she actually turns the simulation off and we see that the are simply in one of their ship's rooms. They have a little tension about his past with other girls, the fact that he has forgotten her birthday and that they are coming to their area for the mission. Valerian wants to make things more serious between these two but her head is on the mission as they fly into the planet Kyrian, dressed as tourists to blend in. They take a call from a higher officer who fills them in, before meeting up with a ground team who take them to a market place in a yellow school bus. Valerian has to enter the market as the others wait outside and before he leaves, he asks his partner to marry him. Once we get inside the market place, we see some people walking around a massive area of sand. People need to put on a special visor in order for the marketplace to appear. Not only is it just widespread, but it's also deep into the ground. Just like we see the street in The Fifth Element, the marketplace is just as deep into the ground. He; stands at a map as we see the back of two characters staring at him but as he turns around, they have gone. He makes it to a meeting, deep in the dark part of the market between a fat pig like creature and what turns out to be the two people who we seen staring at him. These are Pearls and they have come to buy a converter creature of this man. They pay him with a pearl but not before an invisible Valerian steals both items and makes a run for it. Throughout the chase we get to see many different creatures of all shapes and sizes and this is something that really appeals to me, as each one shows their unique abilities for humour. Finally making it out with the help of his partner. One of the ground troops has used a device to control the mind of a guard in the tower. The massive pig guy, Igon, clearly voiced by John Goodman, releases a pet beast that chases the team down. The tower guard shoots at it, misses and the team are back on the bus for a getaway with a massive creature on their tail. It's catches up effortlessly, breaking its way into the top of the bus, just as Valerian calls his ship for a pick up. The two get on as the rest of the team are getting mangled, but the beast makes a leap and attaches itself to the top. Flying high enough, the creature loses it's grip, before plummeting back down to the ground.
As they head to drop off a report on their mission, they fly up to Alpha, the name of the massive space station we have seen being built from the start. It's massive, with plenty of traffic in and out. They meet Commander Arun Filitt, played by Clive Owen and with this guy's acting technique, we know he's clearly the villain of this movie already. He fills them in on something bigger, an infection from deep within the station is threatening to wipe everyone out. Many have gone to investigate, with no-one actually making it back alive. The higher command want the Major and Sergeant to protect the Commander for the foreseeable future, as the many will come for the convertor. Filitt requests to hold onto the little creature, which Laureline rejects. It's safer for her to hold it if he is the target. Once he leaves the room alone, he heads to a containment room, where he is holding a pretty beaten up Pearl. He tells his men to carry on trying to get information out of it. My guess so far is that this Commander knows what has happened to the Pearl's planet.
We can fast forward through a few good scenes that we don't
really need to delve too far into. The Commander calls a council to discuss the
infection growing, the Pearls break in, cover everyone in blue 'goo', kidnap
the Commander, Valerian follows them, turning into a chase scene in their
ships, ending with them both disappearing off the radar and into the infection
itself. All in all, with some beautiful scenes. Now that Laureline has lost
contact, she is apprehended when she wants to track him down and after fighting
off her two guards, she is approached by three bird-like aliens. These remind
me of grey witches in 'Hercules', who shared an eyeball. Although they have
their full features, their knowledge was shared between the three, so killing
one means that all the knowledge would be lost. They agree to help for the
right price and take her to a pirate who catch a quartex jellyfish for her,
helping her to track her partner down. Finally getting the job done, she heads
off to find him.
Locating him and his crashed ship, he's been outers all this
time and on the edge of a cliff that contains pink butterflies. She goes to
touch one, just as Valerian tells her not too. The main reason is because they
are bait for a much larger problem. She's caught like a fish on a line and is
pulled up by large aliens. Valerian knows the only way to help her is to get
caught too, but he blows the head off his fisherman and sees Laureline being
carted off in a cage. As he follows the trail and the story flips on who is
saving who, they are in a sketchy part of Alpha. He can't pass the guards to
get to Laureline so must go and look for a shapeshifter in order to help him
out. He's in the red light district and is invited into a club, which has a
shapeshifter on show. The owner is played by Ethan Hawke, who takes his gun off
him for safety, not knowing he still has one stowed away in a disguise. The
dancer and shapeshifter is Rihanna, playing a character named Bubble. The scene
is mesmerizing for Valerian and me, as she changes outfits, songs and image. As
he asks her for help, all she cares about is her performance and the fact that
she can't leave in fear of being killed. Valerian's gun falls out in the sight
of the owner, so he's quickly stunned as the two escape, with Bubble disguised
as the owner himself. She attaches herself onto Valerian and turn the two of
them into the ugly alien that has taken Laureline. In the mean time, we see the
female Sergeant being forced to try dresses on by some sort of idiot member of
the alien species. It reminds me of the mannerisms that are shown by Gollum in
Lord of the Rings, once the creature is happy. She is finally put in some sort
of wedding dress and massive white hat, with the top cut off, exposing her
scalp. The disguised duo make it into a massive hall as a line of aliens are
carrying different plates of food to their leader, which he doesn't seem to
enjoy any off them. The dopey alien is standing next to him, excited for each
one, until its spits them back out. Laureline is carrying some sort of red
jelly but it soon becomes clear that she is actually on the menu. The exposes
head is soon victim to some sort of cutter, like one that would chop the end of
a cigar, but before the process is complete, Valerian and Bubble spring into
action. saving her and making an escape once the leader is scalped instead.
They have escaped down a vent, trying to regroup but finding that Bubble wasn't
so lucky in the chaos. She hears that she was the greatest performer before
turning into dust.
Further into Alpha, they make is too a wall of colour, just
as a Pearl walks out to greet them and take them inside. Walking through the
wall, they see a big group of Pearls and their leaders, Emperor Haban and his
wife. As the two Humans demand answers, we too learn that 30 years ago their
planet was destroyed, the part we knew, but Commander Filitt was the one that
caused it. He didn't care for the planet as the ships he was fighting where
sent hurtling down into it. That's why he killed everyone who knew and locked all
of the files away. This coincides with the rest of the control room finally
unlocked the documents and working it out. He has any staff that knew about
this, killed. They can rebuild their world by using the convertor and pearl
that Valerian and Laureline possess. We find out that the reason Valeria has
been seeing all of this is in dreams was due to Liho's spirit possessing him.
Laureline has to convince her Major to not follow orders for once and to give
the items to the Pearls. They have survived all this time by fixed the crashed
ship from the beginning. The Commander wakes up and is soon but back out as
Valerian sparks him in the sweet spot. He has set the robots to attack the
soldiers that have arrived outside the coloured wall and also to attack the
people in the command centre. He wanted the Pearls destroyed and wouldn't stop
until all loose ends were sorted. Some Pearls and Humans are killed as Filitt
orders the attack, even after being woken back up to stop it all. Finally, the
good side wins and the Commander is exposed for everything and arrested. The
Pearls use the items to create a simulation of their home planet before
blasting off into space. Liho can now rest in peace and the two are ejected
from the ship, to enjoy some much-needed time off before the rescue team
arrive. Valerian proposes again, this time with a ring made from a pearl. As
she promises that she will be the only one on his list, the camera zooms out
with the two sharing a kiss.
The film was beautifully made, with plenty of species,
terrains, vehicles and landscapes on show. I'm so glad that I chose to watch
this in 3D. The Pearls resemble a lot of the Avatar qualities and so does the
story to an extent. A species forced from their home by man, putting up a fight
that they don't really want to, in order to live once again in peace. Once
problem was that maybe the story was too obvious, as if the audience couldn't
work things out for themselves. The acting is the most intense, with passion at
a minimum from two main stars that I haven't been blown away by in the past.
Overall, this wouldn't be a film for someone looking for massive twists, but
something very safe, visually breath-taking and has a nice story. It acts like
a detective storyline, mixed with a conventional sci-fi movie with a satisfying
ending. I will be going to see this once more before it leaves the cinema,
that's for sure.
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