Jupiter Ascending

This week saw the release of the Wachowski siblings’ latest film, the sci fi bonanza, Jupiter Ascending. The movie treads some very familiar territory for the Wachowskis who directed, among other things, the Matrix trilogy. For one thing, it’s another “chosen one” narrative, but this time, instead of the wooden Keanu Reeves as the savior of the world, we get Mila Kunis playing the improbably named Jupiter Jones, a workaday drone who cleans toilets for living but then finds out she is the most important person in the world because she is actually reincarnated space royalty and, in fact, the rightful owner of planet Earth.

The other familiar idea here is that, once again, the human race is being used as livestock. In The Matrix we were a food supply for evil robot monsters, and in Jupiter Ascending, we learn that these powerful royal families from space actually stock planets with people, allow them to grow to the point of overpopulation, and then harvest them so they can be turned into intergalactic Oil of Olay. That’s right. The evil space-baddies process a hundred human beings to one champagne bottle-sized portion of eternal youth potion. A trio of these eternally young villains discovers Jupiter’s reincarnation and decides to eliminate her because they want Earth’s harvest for themselves. The action really begins when she is rescued by Caine, the genetically engineered ex-solider played by Channing Tatum. Caine is part wolf and apparently part Vegas stripper from the look of him.

The movie is a mile wide and an inch deep. Mila Kunis is a charismatic actor, but her character doesn’t behave in ways that make sense. While she does scream at appropriate moments, Jupiter is surprisingly cool with being chased by assassins, being rescued by a dog man too afraid to love, hopping from planet to planet, and finding out that she is essentially queen of the earth.

The dialogue drags along like the rusted out muffler of a ’79 Malibu. This is particularly true in the occasional quiet, romantic moment between Jupiter and Caine, Those moments are supposed to be romantic, but the entire script seems as though it was carved in a block of Velveeta.

The thing that saves Jupiter Ascending (for me anyway) is the fact that the Wachowskis are great visualists. It’s as though they gave their art director 175 million dollars and a bag of crack and said, “Go for it, dude.” Space ships bursting through crystalline curtains of ice, swarms of bees dancing in unison over an Illinois farm, Jupiter’s bonkers headpiece when she’s about to get married – all over the top, ornate, and beautiful. You could watch a lot of the movie with the sound off and probably have a better experience.

One odd thing is that with all the Wachowski’s attention to detail and large budget, the film still has some terrible special effects makeup. One of the characters has big alien ears so fake looking you would think they were bought on November clearance at a going-out-of-business Halloween store in a Florida strip mall. Clunky dialogue might be subject to interpretation, makeup that looks carved out of wax isn’t.

  
Jupiter Ascending isn’t a good film, but it is fun. Arial dog fights over a glossy Chicago skyline with Channing Tatum skimming away on his anti-gravity boots, winged dragon men being used as royal enforcers, and Eddie Redmayne giving a performance that appears to be from a different movie entirely? It is a fantastically great bad movie.