Mortal Engines

Official Australian release date: 6/12/18. Viewed: 7/12/18.

Director: Christian Rivers

Actors: Hera Hilmar, Robert Sheehan, Hugo Weaving, Jihae

Genre: Action / Sci-Fi

Rating: M

     

‘Mortal Engines’ is apparently based on a book, but I’ve not read it. Maybe if I had, the film would make a bit more sense… As it stands, it came across like a mix of ‘Into The Badlands’, ‘Wild Wild West’ and ‘Terminator’ – but with none of the best bits from any of them. Plot is that Hester Shaw (Hilmar) is trying to get vengeance against Valentine (Weaving) for killing her mum, and she’s helped by Tom (Sheehan) & Anna (Jihae). The catch is it’s 200 years in the post-apocalyptic future and most of the world’s cities are giant mobile tanks, for some reason.

A number of questions – why is the bad city/tank “London”? Why did they turn bad? Why is an Australian (Weaving) playing a Brit? Why do two 30-year-old’s find it so hard to kiss? Is that an American “PG-13” thing? How to the physics of the city/tanks work? Seems like they wouldn’t be able to move anywhere near as fast as they do. Where does the fuel for the plane/blimps come from? Why are there Terminator-like resurrected cyborgs?

Anyway, there’s some nice visuals, but lots of too-fast camerawork and plenty of CGI, which is both good and bad. Both Hilmar and Sheehan are likeable. Not sure if the side plots with Kate & Bevis, or Shrike, were needed. I’m sure some teenagers may like this, but there’s really nothing too novel here at all.

Overall: Average attempt at sci-fi.

Gav's Rating: 2.5 stars.