The Tomorrow War…Malice In Plunderland

The Tomorrow War (Amazon Prime)

Starring: Chris Pratt, Yvonne Strahovski, J. K. Simmons, Betty Gilpin

Directed by:  Chris McKay

Rating: * ½

“They are  hungry, we are food,” says a character about  monsters  gobbling up the global population. Watching this  film, I felt I was  being devoured  by one of those monsters. It was  hungry,  and  I  was  a  fool.Burp.

So how bad  is  this badass  blizzard-belching   big-screen thunderstorm  shrunken to the  size of  your  phone or wherever  you want to groan while  braving through  2 hours and 20 minutes of  unintelligible comicbook subversion and outerspace  prattle?The  Tomorrow War  is  not a  film.  It is a  series of video games  strung together  by a director who  pretends to tell a story  when all he really wants to do is move  on to the  next action sequence.

There is  scant  attention to detail  or character development.  To take one example, why is Chris Pratt’s  Dan Forester so  uppity about his father, played by   the  brilliant  J K Simmons, the  only halfway decent performer in this  ham-fest?Their one confrontation sequence is  shot   with cautionary repose, so that Mr Pratt inadequacies  as an actor are not  exposed.

Those,  the inadequacies, there are  in plenty. Pratt always gives  the  impression of being a  brat  trying to act all grownup  and tackling  situations that are way beyond his intellect.Here  he  is assigned  to save the  world from a  foreign  invasion, a task our Hollywood heroes have been handling since  Bruce Willis in Armageddon. Bruce  looked convincing in the job.Where  there  is  a Willis, there’s a way.

Chris Pratt is  neither  intellectually nor emotionally  equipped to  handle  such a global crisis. When he  meets his daughter Muri Forester (Yvonne Strahovski ) after  several years his introductory line is  about whether she  spells Forester with one  r.Errrr,how does that  matter? Unless  he is trying to find  out if she’s his daughter or not in the most discreet  way he can.

Discretion is  not one of  the strong  virtues of this in-your-face  adventure saga as subtle as a fart  in  your face.The   sprawling narrative abounds in such stupid witless exchanges making us wonder why  the characters  need to speak when they have nothing to  say. They are clearly there  to support the action sequences which are  designed like  gigantic funfare treats  for  children  who have just passed their  exams  and have been   promised a  treat  by their parents.
I looked hard for one solid convincing scene  or dialogue  in this  unwieldy crap-a-thon.  I came away with nada…nothing…nil.

Devoid  of  style  and substance  The Tomorrow War  is  a futile  fuel-free fitful  fantasy-voyage into a future where aliens will rule the world.I think we have  more to worry  about right now  than hungry  aliens.  How about famished  citizens who don’t know  where there  next meal  would come from? The budget of this  indecently  exorbitant Malice In  Plunderland  could feed the entire hemisphere  of Covid casualties.The  gobbling  goblins  of this  gooey monster  movie didn’t scare  me. The  brains behind this absurdist  bullocks did. Who thinks up such nonsense? My undying respect to the  writers  for having sold this idea  to  the studio.