Well, here’s a minor problem: I’ve already seen this week’s big new release. Most of the rest of what’s at the multiplex is a movie I have already seen, a sequel to a movie I haven’t, and a sports documentary. I mean, I could go see The Sound of Freedom, but I am a bit reluctant to get into that debate. So, since the big release was Mission: Impossible, why not go with another Tom Cruise movie I have somehow missed? It just so happens that Edge of Tomorrow is available on Max. I hadn’t seen that before.
Why hadn’t I seen it before? I am not sure, but that terribly generic title probably didn’t help.
Aliens known only as the Mimics have invaded the Earth. These masses of tentacles don’t really talk or say what they want, but they’ve managed to capture most of Europe. Major Bill Cage (Cruise) is a public affairs officer from the United States, sent, he thinks, to offer some PR help to the general (Brendan Gleeson) planning a massive invasion of Europe from Great Britain. Cage isn’t entirely right: he’s doing PR work from the front lines. Having zero combat training, Cage naturally fumbles around with the power armor, particularly since he’s got less than a day to prepare. Stuck in a squad of soldiers that don’t seem to exactly be the best and the brightest, Cage manages to get a bit further than he thought he would, but he’s still killed, not long after witnessing the death of the one of the military’s best alien killers, Sergeant Rita Vrataski (Emily Blunt).
However, something odd happened. No sooner does he die that Cage wakes up again, 24 hours earlier. He tries to share his knowledge of what happened with his assigned platoon sergeant (Bill Paxton), but no one believes him. He likewise manages to avoid a few issues, but he still dies. And then he wakes up again. He keeps learning from mistakes, but he still keeps dying. At one point, Vrataski tells him to find her before, once again, they both die. It turns out Vrataski used to have this power. It came from the aliens. There are some basic rules, but the bottom line is Cage’s life resets every time he dies. But some of the aliens also have this power, and time is running out. Can Cage figure out a way to stop the MImics once and for all? And why were they called the Mimics? They didn’t imitate people or anything. They were just good at hiding.
I think the bottom line for a Tom Cruise action movie is, well, it’s a Tom Cruise action movie, and those are generally entertaining. Some are better than others, but they at least have a premise that sets them apart from other movies of the genre. I won’t say they’re all necessarily smart, but they do tend to be based on interesting premises. Edge of Tomorrow, shoddy title aside, is just such a movie. Cruise dies an unknown number of times in the course of the movie, but he keeps coming back, and his knowledge of what’s going on allows him to try again, with only Vrataski and one friend of hers being convinced as such. It does play a bit like how someone might play a challenging video game, but it’s still a charming idea. Besides, it is a nice change of pace to see Cruise, in the early scenes, as a guy in an action movie who absolutely does not know what he’s doing.
I won’t say it’s perfect, though. Blunt’s character barely gets any development beyond some tragic details to her backstory, and it would be nice if Cruise doesn’t get the girl in the end, so why she should feel anything for a guy she’s known a day or so doesn’t make a lot of sense. Granted, she usually doesn’t, but Cage seems to value her life more than anyone else’s for some reason when he has theoretically known them all the same amount of time. I can play along with that, but the climactic final scene was a bit on the dark side, making it hard to make out what was happening on my TV. But those are actually minor complaints for what was basically a solid popcorn movie. You know, like most Mission: Impossible movies.
Grade: A-
0 Comments