REVIEW #142 Moonfall (2022)

Moonfall is the latest disaster movie to hit cinemas, the world is on the brink of annihilation when something knocks the moon off it’s orbital course. The only hope for humanities survival lies with two astronauts and a conspiracy theorist who thinks he’s cracked the mystery of the moon. The film is directed by Roland Emmerich.

CAST & THE ACTING 

The cast consists of three leads, Halle Berry as NASA director Jocinda, Patrick Wilson as Brian Harper and then John Bradley as K.C Houseman. I think they all delivered average performances at best, they failed to express any real emotion which meant I became quite detached from their characters. There were moments where you connected with John Bradley and you felt happy for him finally being recognised by NASA but other than that the performances were rather one dimensional. The rest of the cast didn’t do any better really, I think they were all let down by the writing for their characters. So not much to discuss here really, rather disappointing to be honest.

THE STORYLINE 

I didn’t expect the storyline to be impressive by any means, just from watching the trailer I expected it to be a very over the top disaster film. Sure that’s what we got for the most part but there was just so much going on that the audience gets dragged from pillar to post between multiple characters. The first act seems very rushed as well, it seemed like they found out the moons on a collision course for earth and provide a three week window and then suddenly it’s here and those three weeks have almost just been completely skipped. The second act gives more importance to Brian Harper and Jocindas kids, which just felt like scene filler to be honest. They didn’t really do any work to build up those characters so I wasn’t invested in their stories. The concept created for why the moon was off orbit and what the moon actually is, was actually quite intriguing. I wanted the focus to be more on that instead of what was going on down on earth. Unfortunately it did feel like they were cramming in as much as possible in the ending just to be able to justify a sequel, which is a shame. But it was entertaining, despite major plot issues, it is exciting and perfectly watchable.

CINEMATOGRAPHY & SPECIAL EFFECTS 

With these sort of films you can almost expect issues with the plot and the acting but you know you’re going to get some amazing visuals and special effects. That was the case for about 85% of the film. The large scale destruction combined with the gravitational effects of the moon being that close to earth did create some amazing scenes. That helped build up the excitement for the audience. My main criticism with this category is before the world starts falling apart there are some really questionable green screen moments. The background just didn’t look right in the frame at all, strangely when it switched to showing the world falling apart, that’s when it starting looking more realistic! But it’s certainly more positives then negatives in this section for sure.

OVERALL (4.5/10)

Just from watching the trailer I knew that this film wasn’t going to be great, I was expecting a silly over the top storyline but it transcends even that expectation. It had so much going on that it failed to establish a storyline with solid character development, this meant I wasn’t very invested in any of the characters. I will say that it was entertaining and once you forget about the cringey dialogue, you can actually just switch off and enjoy it. The ending felt like it was just trying to ram information down the audiences throat, to justify a sequel. In pursuit of that sequel set up, they created an awfully cringey ending that just actually had me laughing at it. Despite me raising some serious cons, I would actually watch the sequel as I think it would have some serious Independence Day vibes. I would say give it a go, although my advice would be to just switch off, not think to much about the technicalities and just try to enjoy the visuals.

Thanks for reading.

Callan