User Reviews

This is a German/Swiss Sci-fi movie set somewhere between 100 and 150 years in the future. The wealthy elite escaped an earth where disasters and climate change made the planet uninhabitable. However things aren't going as planned on Kepler 209 either so they hope to return after 2 generations.

They've sent a first mission but lost contact so they sent a second mission to try again and to find out what happened with the first mission.

The production level is excellent, this never feels cheap or low budget and it can hold it's own to flicks with double the budget. Acting, score, pace, directing, editing, etc is all at a professional level. Critics who do this for a living can probably give a more nuanced view but never was it so bad that it bothered me or broke the illusion.

This is a dark and at times depressing film with a minimal story that reminded me of The Road (2009) but even a minimal story needs to make sense.

In a Hollywood blockbuster with loads of action and explosions you know you are basically looking at a live action comic book. For those movies I'm way more tolerant for illogical events (for example the dance-off in Guardians of the Galaxy), but this movie aims at the thinking sci-fi fan.

The massive plot holes really start to bother you after a while. Without spoiling anything for you I'll give a few examples just from the premise. They have solved interstellar travel but somehow still use tech from the 1960's to land ? Why did they send astronauts when they could have used drones, robots or even androids for the first recon ? If the planet is radioactive and uninhabitable, why don't they wear suits ? Was it a one way suicide mission or how are they going to get back? The list goes on and on.

For the Spocks among us this will be a huge let down and nothing but wasted potential and the Action Jacksons will find this boring and slow. Good for a one time watch but this could have been so, so much more.

I always wonder how writers and directors can be so careless and sloppy when putting these productions out. I love any sci fi that can stimulate the imagination or pushes past the edge of science reality, but this one is frustratingly, completely unscientific and illogical!

~3/4 of Earth's surface is water, and they sent a spaceship that can't float?! (that gave me a laugh) The mudders kill Blake's Capt but she makes friends with them? The mudders have a big bonfire at night, but there's zero plants, let alone trees, anywhere on Earth!. I wonder how the mudders made their bows/arrows, too. Everyone has good condition (cotton?) shirts and pants, and tarps for capes...From where?! All day it's relentless fog and rain but at night we see stars. Earth has long been destroyed, but they still have a boat with diesel fuel? The mudders are portrayed as savages, yet they could navigate that boat after they escaped, to return directly to their settlement? Scientifically, a viable human population needs ~4,000 to 10,000 people to ensure genetic diversity to avoid inbreeding (=doom!) There were only a few dozen total, both colonies. If Earth's surface is devoid of land animals and plants, what will the rest of the Keplers eat once they get here?

There were some other annoying details, too, to add yourself.

This was completely unsatisfying, once finished. Three stars for the decent actors.

Lots of water, yet everyone is filthy. So, how do the "savage" people survive? What's their food source? Water source? Perhaps a little bit more reality is in order; it could have good possibilities, but not yet. Also, where's this gasoline coming from? At least "The Road Warrior" had that covered & understood.

Acting is okay. Direction and cinematography is quite good. The plot is everything you've ever seen before + non sensical. I'm not mad at this film - just disappointed.

The biggest sin is that this movie is a "good guy vs bad guy" film, rather than an exploration of human civilisation two generations apart in a dystopian world. Main character realises that (wow what a shocker) that her side are actually the bad guys! Painfully obvious story without any layers or dimensions. Gibson, the main antagonist, is painted as an evil authoritarian with no angles, whilst Blake, our protag, is stone faced nobody that doesn't do anything but have the plot move her forward. Talking about the characters...

We don't see the characters so much to develop. Our main protagonist never smiles. We never see a moment of what makes her happy. Her stone face stoic attitude is boring and doesn't change once in the entire run time. The relationship between herself and her dad feel shallower than the mud plains the entire film is based on because we don't see them interact in any genuine father-daughter chemistry. Even in the flashbacks, she's dead pan serious, as is her dad.

The mud plains make for a very pretty set piece. However, if the entire film takes place on said mud plains, it becomes visual noise. The environment could easily become a character in a plot like this - but it isn't. Forget about all the plot holes for now - why are people living on a tidal plane anyways? It's further exacerbated by the endless fog that permeates the screen. The third act has more fog than it has story beats.

The plot holes. Positive reviews say ita forgivable but it really isn't. There's meant to be some level of believability to make the story stand on its own legs:

1. Landing ships without landing capabilities? These are interstellar travelling humans and they can't land a ship? The entire film would be over if they landed anywhere but the sea and sent communication back.

2. Landing into a body of water; and your ship sinks instead of floats. Space pods can land on water and float. Our great pods in this film sink...

3. They mention data monitoring and communication buoys relaying information of earth. These things can't/don't even collect information outside of the weather...

This is a sci fi film for the first 10 minutes. Then it isn't anymore - so this isn't really for sci fi fans.

I'd like to spend more time reviewing this film but that would mean putting more effort into this than the writers did in trying to make a cohesive and compelling story.

Trust me when I say I really wanted this to be good. The premise is deeply interesting and the it starts off with a bang.

Unfortunately it ends in a whimper.

The cinematography, the cg and the concept are really good, i will give them 8 out of 10, but the plot just minus 3 stars.

There are so many plot holes the makes this movie doesn't make any sense.

If there is a someone who can speak English in the tribe, why won't the protagonist ask them something ? Or Why didn't that English-speaking indigenous one just tell her what happened on the earth?

If the protagonist want to stop the information transmit back to kepler, why she just jumped on that bad guy after he transmitted it ?

Oh, and at the end, i don't even know the protagonist want to stop it or not.... The position of the protagonist just went back and forward that makes the whole movie really confusing....

So much potential here, but the writer ruined it.

First of all, I don't understand many of these reviewers' complaints. It's not an action movie like "Star Wars" or "The Fast and Furious". So to say its slow and boring --- what did they think they were watching?

Secondly, I know the science doesn't make any sense. It's not a science documentary. It's fictional entertainment. I can separate the science logic (or illogic) from fictional entertainment.

Many of these reviewers didn't even know what was happening. It explains right in the beginning "in text" that humans destroyed the Earth and the rich and well connected left for another planet. Two generations later they are coming back to see if Earth is habitable again. They lost contact with the first mission. And the Nora Arnezeder character (Blake) arrives on the second mission. They eventually find that the first mission survived and split into two opposing factions of save the indigenous. Or use them as sex/reproduction slaves.

I know the science doesn't make sense. Space capsules are designed to float. Not sink. And even if they did, they would not wash up on shore right next to the girl who was swimming.

And it doesn't make sense that all or most of the world would be reduced to mudflats that go underwater at high tide. And re-emerge at low tide. Even in the worst case scenario --- nuclear war combined with global warming apocalypse --- there would still be mountains, hills and above sea level land with trees, birds and land animals. A lot less land if all the polar ice melts. But still plenty.

I too was disappointed that they went the route of good guys fighting the bad guys. Instead of a scientifically logical exploration of the Earth two generations after humans left.

But I thought the acting was good. Nora Arnezeder was terrific. The dialogue was good. And so was the action. (Although it didn't make sense that when Blake tackles the bad guy into the water at the end and chokes him to death, he wouldn't try to shoot her. You can clearly see the gun before, during and after the fatal fight.)

It's not a science documentary. It's fictional entertainment. Movies often over-exaggerate to make a point. And try to provide dramatic entertainment.

7 out if 10 for me.