'After Earth' Movie Review: Critics Say Will Smith Action Movie Is a Snooze [TRAILER]
Despite Will and Jaden Smith's presense in the latest adventure film After Earth, critics are not raving.
The movie takes place 1,000 years following humans' abandonment of planet Earth and Will plays Cypher Raige, a famous interstellar ranger who lives on a new planet called Nova Prime. His son, Kitai (Jaden) is also an interstellar ranger but he lacks experience in the field. Still, due to orders from his mother, Kitai heads out on a mission with his father. An asteroid crashes into their spaceship, which leads to the two landing on Earth.
"Will Smith's presence, not just as costar but as originator of the story, seems likely to carry box office receipts beyond the benchmark of Shyamalan's previous picture, the wretched The Last Airbender," said The Hollywood Reporter. "But those hoping for a franchise should navigate elsewhere."
While Will and his son received remarkable reviews for their 2006 drama The Pursuit of Happyness, their collaboration on this film isn't as notable.
"[D]irector M. Night Shyamalan drains the spark from both their performances. Will's natural charm is lost in space; in its place is a stern, distant-father manner that makes him as warm as an android (that's not a spoiler, sadly)," reported New York Daily News.
Unlike Shyamalan's previous movies, including the Sixth Sense, this futuristic plot fails to grasp critics.
"This film, rather, is essentially one long anticlimax culminating in the inevitable duel between Kitai and the amorphous-looking ursa - a creature as shapeless and indistinct as After Earth itself," Variety noted.
Even the movie's life lesson didn't sit well with the critics.
"You might think you can see the movie's moral coming - that being a true hero means doing your duty despite your fear, that to turn yourself into a robot is to deny your own humanity. Except it actually believes Smith's character is right. Control everything. That's how you succeed," according to NJ.com.
After Earth comes to theaters on Friday.