The Day The Earth Stood Still

When faced with a boring movie during the holiday season, you can only use one quip, so I am going for it. BLAH humbug!

Jennifer Connelly stars as Dr. Helen Benson – a biologist raising her dead husband’s child, Jacob (Jaden “Yes, my daddy is Will” Smith). One day, a massive object is spotted hurtling towards New York City, and she, along with other scientists, quickly are gathered to come up with options before it crashes and destroys us.

However, the object turns out to be some sort of extra terrestrial sphere that lands in Central Park, and who walks out? Whoa! It’s Keanu Reeves as Klaatu – an alien being who says he is here to save the planet. Don’t celebrate so fast. He said he was here to save the planet, not the humans who inhabit it (Uh-oh).

Are the aliens here to destroy us and take over Earth?

Can Helen influence Klaatu?

The Day The Earth Stood Still makes you feel like time is standing still, while the actors are standing still, and the plot is standing still. This is supposed to be an action-packed movie, isn’t it?

Instead, director Scott Derrickson and writer David Scarpa deliver a flat, unemotional film with an extremely simple plot and simple dialogue. The Day The Earth Stood Still has no flow, no rise and fall, no big tension to get the audience emotionally involved and a weak climax that has no impact because the viewer has given up hope for entertainment by that point.

Sadly, Reeves perfectly fits with the rest of the movie, and I don’t mean that as an insult. Like he is supposed to as the alien, Reeves shows no emotion at any time throughout the movie, puts out a creepy vibe, and looks at the other characters and audience with no emotion. That’s what he’s supposed to, while everyone else could use a bit of pep and vigor.

Scarpa produces a script that wants to, but barely touches on some bigger themes. Maybe Derrickson and the editing team minimized it, but Scarpa tries to inject some commentary about human responsibility for the planet. We get many allusions to us not taking care of environment or a human predilection for violence, but Scarpa doesn’t make the case, and seems to assume we all have some sort of liberal guilt and will just nod our heads in agreement before bowing them in shame.

The Day The Earth Stood Still is boring.

The Day The Earth Stood Still is rated PG-13 for some sci-fi disaster images and violence.