When I say I’m disappointed after watching this that’s putting it lightly. Lisa Joy has co-created what I believe to be one of TV’s best offerings currently in “Westworld” so I was beyond excited to see what her directorial debut had to offer. Reminiscence has a stellar cast, a fascinating premise, a futuristic setting saturated in neo-noir vibes and some beautiful visuals… but it’s just boring. By all means it should work but the film is less than a sum of its parts.
The main problem with the film is it just feels lifeless, there’s no energy to the scenes, even in the action it feels so static. The voiceover work by Hugh Jackman is reminiscent of Harrison Ford’s work in Blade Runner, it permeates the entire film and Jackman sounds so bored giving long speeches of exposition that it only enhances the boring atmosphere.
The world the film has set up is so interesting; climate change has ruined the planet and flooded cities and it’s so hot during the day that humanity has been forced to become a nocturnal species. The story the film chooses to tell however isn’t even half as interesting as the world it takes place in. The chemistry between Jackman and Ferguson is extremely unbelievable yet it’s the linchpin of the film, this makes for a thoroughly disastrous combination. The film decides to skip over the majority of their relationship to get to the mystery which does no help for trying to make their love believable.
The first two acts are meandering and drag their feet so much so that the third act – which has a fairly interesting twist – falls completely flat and fails to have the desired effect. The ending then seems to just uproot and abandon what we’ve previously seen and is just plain boring. This was an unfortunate miss from Joy, the world that was built deserved a better script but sadly this film will be forgotten and left in the past.
★1/2
