Edge of Tomorrow (2014)

[Patrick Sun]

Title: Edge of Tomorrow (2014)

Tagline: Live, Die, Repeat

Genre: Action, Science Fiction

Director: Doug Liman

Cast: Tom Cruise, Emily Blunt, Brendan Gleeson, Bill Paxton, Jonas Armstrong, Tony Way, Kick Gurry, Franz Drameh, Dragomir Mrsic, Charlotte Riley, Masayoshi Haneda, Terence Maynard, Noah Taylor, Lara Pulver, Madeleine Mantock, Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Jeremy Piven, Beth Goddard, Assly Zandry, Sebastian Blunt, Ronan Summers, Aaron Romano, Usman Akram, Bentley Kalu, Mairead McKinley, Andrew Neil, Martin Hyder, Tommy Campbell, John Dutton, Harry Landis, Rachel Handshaw, Martin McDougall, Anna Botting, Jane Hill, Erin Burnett, Dany Cushmaro, David Kaye, Elaine Caulfield, Lee Asquith-Coe, Stuart Matthews

Release: 2014-05-27

Runtime: 113

Plot: Major Bill Cage is an officer who has never seen a day of combat when he is unceremoniously demoted and dropped into combat. Cage is killed within minutes, managing to take an alpha alien down with him. He awakens back at the beginning of the same day and is forced to fight and die again... and again - as physical contact with the alien has thrown him into a time loop.

Tom Cruise returns to the big screen with "Edge of Tomorrow". Harkening back to "Groundhog Day" with Cruise's character, Major Cage, seemingly able to relive a day over and over again. The story deals with humans having to deal with a threat that could mean the end to humankind. While it sounds like it could be a repetitive chore to sit through, the script is actually quite funny in spots (mining humor from the premise), and moves the film along at a nice pace, didn't really feel it slowed down much at all, and the amount of character development over the course of one day being lived over and over was a solid effort. Emily Blunt was fine as the face of the human military resistance. .

I give it 3 stars, or a grade of B.

 

[Robert Crawford]

Patrick,

Is this film worth seeing in 3-D or would 2-D be fine?

 

[mattCR]

Somewhere I guess my thoughts on this got deleted(?)

anyway, Patrick seems to have enjoyed this far more than I did. I found the plot fairly incoherent with some huge plot holes, including one that is revealed about 3/4 of the way through that upsets the entire layout of the film (for me) and an ending that just doesn't make sense with what we know to be true the rest of the film.
The effects are decent, I watched in 3D.. the monsters are 'neat' but I didn't see a ton of 3D effect that would make me do that again or prefer the 3D..

C-

 

[Patrick Sun]

2D was fine with me. Are there plot holes, maybe, but you either go with the premise or you don't. I went with the premise. I will say, it's amazing what you can get done in a day...

 

[Tino]

My favorite film of the summer.Better than Godzilla, X-Men , Spider-Man and just edges out Captain America. I thought it was entertaining from beginning to end. Action packed, exciting and smart. I had no issues with plot holes as it all made sense to me. Can't wait to see it again. Btw, I saw it in IMAX 3D and the presentation as usual was tremendous. Whether or not you should make that 45 minute drive Crawdaddy, I don't think I'm the right person to ask. Loved it. ***3/4 * out of ****

 

[Patrick Sun]

Metaphorically speaking, having seen the film, I would describe it thusly:

Spoiler

This is the cinematic equivalent of playing a life-action video game where you have quite a number of "lives" to use to get killed over and over again, as you through through the different hurdles to achieve the objective of the 'game' while learning what to do and what not to do, until you finally only have one life left, and you have to make the best of it going forward in the game.

And releasing this film on D-Day, the irony hasn't been lost on me...

 

[Robert Crawford]

My favorite film of the summer.Better than Godzilla, X-Men , Spider-Man and just edges out Captain America.I thought it was entertaining from beginning to end. Action packed, exciting and smart. I had no issues with plot holes as it all made sense to me. Can't wait to see it again.Btw, I saw it in IMAX 3D and the presentation as usual was tremendous.Whether or not you should make that 45 minute drive Crawdaddy, I don't think I'm the right person to ask. Loved it.***3/4 * out of ****

My next IMAX showing is Transformers. I'll see this in 2D.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Saw this last night in IMAX Digital 3D. Was great seeing it on the huge screen, but I thought the 3D conversion itself was very underwhelming -- there didn't seem to be a lot of separation of elements, it was like one of those conversions where everything onscreen seems to happening in a depth behind the screen, but there wasn't much separation or distinction between items. On the plus side, I didn't notice any obvious ghosting or alignment issues, so seeing it 3D didn't take anything away from the film -- but didn't add anything either. If you like the large screen experience, the IMAX bigness of it makes it worth it. But if your choice is between a RealD 3D showing on a normal-sized screen and a standard 2D showing, I'd probably opt for 2D. (Editing to add that the theater had an unusual glitch - the house lights came up halfway through the movie, and never went back down. A few audience members attempted to find a theater employee, but we couldn't, so we had to live with it. The lights being on really killed the 3D effects in the second half of the movie, so the 3D may be better than what I experienced. I think the lights had been programmed for "Maleficent" which is significantly shorter and ran in the same auditorium earlier in the day.)

As for the movie itself, I enjoyed it, a lot more than I expected. If you've seen the trailer, you pretty much know everything there is to know... but where this movie excels in how it plays out its concept. It's Groundhog Day meets a videogame. Going in, I was afraid that I was going to be bored with all of the potential repetition, but I thought they did a terrific job with the editing at keeping the movie going. I was never lost and never bored.

To Matt's issue with the ending -- and please don't read this if you haven't seen the movie, because I'm definitely talking about the very end of the movie here:

Spoiler

Talking about the reveal 3/4 through, do you mean that the Omega creature wasn't at the location Cruise's visions told him it was at? I didn't have an issue with that. As for the very ending... the way I interpreted that was, whether the creature was an Omega or something else -- since it's never clear if what we're told about these creatures is fact or just everyone's best guess -- if the medium-sized one's blood could get him stuck in a one day time loop, it seems to reason that a more powerful one could get him stuck in a longer loop. I thought it was a cool, very Twilight Zone-ish ending that he finally "gets it right" and thinks he's going to die, but that it's okay, because he will have saved humanity... and then wakes up and finds that he's trapped in an even longer loop. Maybe he'll get out of it, maybe he won't, but I liked the uncertain resolution and the idea that he's potentially forever trapped doing this over and over.

 

[mattCR]

Josh-

Spoiler

No, the reveal of the fake out as to where the Mega was didn't bother me.. that seemed to make sense. No, the twist I'm referring to is the one where he took the day away from it, went into the city and sat at the bar. As he's sitting there we see the Nimix or whatever come speeding across the channel and attacking Britain, etc. while in the background planes are taking off. This killed me because if Britain was under attack, don't you think they would have figured out it was a blindside, or at worst just doubled back to save their own country? I didn't understand that.. it made the whole idea that it was a trap seem strange..

The issue I had with the end..

Spoiler

The problem I had with the end is this: We see him kill the Mega. He then bounces back 2 days after getting covered in it's blood. Fine. We learned from the Alpha that it would reset a day.. but they had postulated that the Mega just reset things 24 hours in order to make sure it didn't lose any alphas, and now that he had it's blood when he died it reset. He kills the mega and goes back 2 days. But when he goes back 2 days it's a different scene.. on the screens they are talking about how all of the Nimix are seemingly falling over dead and their armies are advancing, a sign that the Mega is dead. How is this possible when the Mega dies 2 days in the future from that time point? I didn't get it. It didn't make sense -to me-. It may be a cool twilight zone moment, but I just thought it was dumb. But again, YMMV

So, that's me. I get that a lot of people liked it. Hey, not every film is for everyone.

 

[Mark Booth]

OMG, was 'Edge of Tomorrow' a great movie!! Fantastic story, fantastic acting and fantastic special effects. It's got humor (the laugh out loud kind), suspense, adventure, drama and, of course, sci-fi! Frankly, it's about as close to the perfect summer blockbuster movie as I think I've ever seen.

The Booth Bijou gives 'Edge of Tomorrow' 6 out of 5 stars! That's right, it's off the charts in the entertainment department! Go see it on a big screen with a great sound system!

Entertaining with a capital E! Freakin' awesome movie!

In case I haven't been clear, I LOVED IT!

FWIW, I saw the 2D version in a fantastic theater (reserved seats) with a HUGE screen and 36-surround-speaker Dolby ATMOS system!

Mark

 

[Robert Crawford]

I watched the 2-D version yesterday in a movie theater with a 56 foot screen and Dolby Atmos system. I thought the film was pretty good and very funny in many spots. I loved the acting performances and felt this was one of Cruise's best efforts in years. A solid "B" grade from me. Actually, my grade might rise once I'm able to watch the BD of it and replay certain sequences of the film.

As to the plot holes, IMO, I think some of us need to recognize that most of these type of films have some issues that aren't easily explained as you wish, you can have a sit down discussion with the director and writer about those issues.

 

[Mark Booth]

Josh-

Spoiler

No, the reveal of the fake out as to where the Mega was didn't bother me.. that seemed to make sense. No, the twist I'm referring to is the one where he took the day away from it, went into the city and sat at the bar. As he's sitting there we see the Nimix or whatever come speeding across the channel and attacking Britain, etc. while in the background planes are taking off. This killed me because if Britain was under attack, don't you think they would have figured out it was a blindside, or at worst just doubled back to save their own country? I didn't understand that.. it made the whole idea that it was a trap seem strange..

The issue I had with the end..

Spoiler

The problem I had with the end is this: We see him kill the Mega. He then bounces back 2 days after getting covered in it's blood. Fine. We learned from the Alpha that it would reset a day.. but they had postulated that the Mega just reset things 24 hours in order to make sure it didn't lose any alphas, and now that he had it's blood when he died it reset. He kills the mega and goes back 2 days. But when he goes back 2 days it's a different scene.. on the screens they are talking about how all of the Nimix are seemingly falling over dead and their armies are advancing, a sign that the Mega is dead. How is this possible when the Mega dies 2 days in the future from that time point? I didn't get it. It didn't make sense -to me-. It may be a cool twilight zone moment, but I just thought it was dumb. But again, YMMV

So, that's me. I get that a lot of people liked it. Hey, not every film is for everyone.

Addressing your concern in your first spoiler:

Spoiler

My take is that by the time Cruise gets attacked on the bridge by the Mimics, it is much later in the day. At that point, the attack on the beach in France has already failed and the Mimics have crossed the channel to attack Britain. So, yes, by then the United forces would have figured out it was all a trap, but by the time they figured it out it was too late. The ships you see taking off isn't the force that is going to invade France, it's additional forces kept behind to defend Britain.

And your second spoiler:

Spoiler

My take is the Omega is controlling time for the HUMANS. The United forces keeping living the day over and over in a loop, but, for the Omega the time is linear. So, once the Omega is destroyed, the last jump back for a loop in time for humans is to when the person that destroyed it arrived on the scene of the battle, so to speak.

I admit that the above, from a pure, logical sense, is the weakest part of the plot. But I also don't feel it's necessary to overthink it. It's a summer blockbuster "popcorn" flick. For popcorn flicks, we are supposed to "check our brains at the door" to some degree. The idea is to sit back and be entertained. And, DAMN, was it ever entertaining!

Mark

 

[Chuck Mayer]

Exceptional film. I'll probably die a little inside when this film bombs this weekend and TF4 has a record opening in 3 weeks.But Cruise is as good as he has ever been (minus Frank Mackey) and Emily Blunt is hard and subtle. The direction and pacing are quite good, and the film flows quite smoothly through an intriguing set of sequences. Strong, strong summer blockbuster. And a breath of fresh air in a season known for sequels, reboots, and retreads. Well worth seeing on the big screen, with good action set pieces, better narrative structure, and plenty of great (occasionally dark) humor.

 

[Bobby Henderson]

My girlfriend and I had a great time watching The Edge of Tomorrow. Sure, there were some plot holes and a forced ending that smelled like it came down from on high by the global media corporate bosses. The spectacle, fast pace and some clever humor involving those day re-sets made up for it. As long as you don't think too hard about paradoxes you should have a good time.

I was more impressed by this movie on the technical end. The visuals were great. The sound mix was great. We watched it on the Cine Capri screen at Harkins Theaters Bricktown 16 in downtown Oklahoma City. The movie was shown in 2D, but with Dolby Atmos. This is the best mix I've heard in Dolby Atmos since Gravity. The sound designers worked their butts off on this one. There's a lot of stuff in the Atmos mix you simply will not hear in terms of sound panning, sound positioning and overall audio environmental layering like you would in Dolby Atmos. Conventional 5.1/7.1 stinks compared to this. And Auro 11.1 hasn't got anything on Atmos either. IMAX really needs to step up their game in terms of sound; their 2 speaker cabinet surround sound approach is downright laughable compared to Atmos and it doesn't even measure up to Auro 11.1, which is merely an elaboration on conventional 5.1 audio.

I too will be disappointed if this movie doesn't do well at the box office. Despite some nit picks in the story line it's still a good, entertaining movie. It's not the slightest bit boring at all. I liked this movie a lot more than Godzilla or Spiderman 2.

 

[Wayne_j]

I saw this yesterday, a very enjoyable movie.

I saw it in 2D on a newly opened RPX screen, I was hoping that my area finally got Atmos, but that was not to be.

The screen was huge and the picture was bright with 2 4K projectors projecting on it. The audio system was good and had high quality articulated bass, but unfortunately it lacked a lot of the tactile response that I like to get from bass in a movie.

I might try it again next week on IMAX.

 

[Tim Glover]

Any thoughts on the 3D is worth it? I am going 2moro and wanted to see what you all thought.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Any thoughts on the 3D is worth it? I am going 2moro and wanted to see what you all thought.

I wasn't too impressed with the 3D conversion -- I don't recall there being a lot of separation between objects, for the most part it seemed that everything was at a pretty set depth, where it was like looking through a window, but that everything was the exact same distance away. On the plus side, I didn't see any ghosting or alignment issues, and there was nothing about the 3D that took away from the film. So it wasn't a negative, it just wasn't as big of a plus as I thought it would be.

Two caveats to this, though -- I saw it in IMAX 3D, and I want to mention that seeing it on the hugest screen I could find definitely made an impact. The other thing was, my theater goofed and turned the house lights on halfway through the movie, and they stayed on until the end. Too much ambient light kills 3D, so there might have been some 3D goodness that I couldn't fully enjoy because of the conditions.

If there's a chance to see it in IMAX or one of the so-called premium formats that has it on a giant screen, I say go for that (whether it's in 3D or 2D). But if the choice is between a standard RealD showing on a smaller screen, or a regular 2D showing on a similar sized regular screen, with that choice I'd probably say 2D is good enough.

(I love 3D and I try to see everything I can that has a 3D version in 3D -- but at the same time I can tell when it's not mindblowing, and I didn't think the 3D here was.)

 

[Tino]

Hi TimI agree with Josh. I also saw it in IMAX 3D, more for the IMAX not the 3D. 3D was fine but not as good as some other films. I say just see it on the biggest screen possible whether 3D or 2D. Hope this helps.

 

[Tim Glover]

Thank you Josh & Tino Appreciate the feedback. There's not an IMAX here in Monroe LA but a decent sized screen. Bossier City LA has a "fake IMAX" but it's 90 miles away.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

No problem, Tim -- and yeah, I'd say go for the decent sized screen nearby, this is not a 90 mile drive kind of movie!