"Live. Die. Repeat." That's the tagline for the scifi action thriller Edge of Tomorrow, attempting to describe in a few short words the imaginative stretch this movie asks its audience to take. The plot is fairly linear and common: mindless hive aliens bent on humanity's destruction. It's the way the story is told that challenges: snatches and bursts, mirroring the paradoxical chaos and stillness of a soldier's life. Despite these leaps, the movie has a core emotional story that resonates, an anchor point to hold fast to amidst the fray of war.
Based on a Japanese novel, the movie follows hotshot military recruiter Major William Cage (Tom Cruise), someone who admits to his general that he's afraid of blood and yet just convinced thousands to join the global defense forces combating a mysterious yet deadly alien scourge that's decimated Europe. London alone remains free. Cage and the military have promoted the recent victories by Special Forces Sergeant Rita Vrataski (Emily Blunt) as a rallying cry, but he soon learns just how desperate the battle is when he's forced to join a small ragtag group of soldiers, J Squad.
His laughable skills are quickly put to the test during the next day's D-Day style engagement, ending in his death. But (and it truly is no spoiler to reveal this next bit) he wakes up to an officer throwing boots in his face, demanding he suit up for battle. Cage soon learns that Vrataski's amazing battle prowess is due to a similar ability, and both desperately seek to finish the war time after time after time.
This movie has been likened to a video game, and that genre's influence is felt from the start. The opening montage of staged news clips and disjointed social video instantly evoke the setting, and the method by which Cage gradually increases his skillset is akin to a player's method of testing solutions in gameplay. While the setup is straightforward, the style is inventive. It took me a while to appreciate the often confusing barrage of images and noise that assaulted me toward the beginning of the movie: we're barely allowed to meet our protagonists before they're thrust into the crucible, and the initial set of restarts fly by in a nightmarish barrage of carnage.
But the tension these moments induced in me perfectly mirrored that of Cage, and really any young soldier suddenly thrust into a situation that no amount of training can truly anticipate. This film showed the most rage I've seen from Cruise in a while. He transforms from the cocky officer to the bewildered recruit (and eventually, hardened soldier) in perfect tandem with the movie's pace, which propels the audience on the same journey. We ourselves have to learn how things work in time with him, are at first horrified and amazed by his predicament and grow jaded to its effects with terrible ease, taking death for granted and even desiring it in order to achieve the ultimate objective. While better war movies have been made, this one really drove home to me the toll that repeated fighting takes on an individual.
Director Doug Liman paces the movie well: the initial frenetic action gives way to a quiet, almost peaceful middle, supplying the audience not just with additional information about Cage's and the alien's abilities but also good old fashioned character moments. These interludes really drive home the weariness war can bring on, sometimes prompting apathy, other times provoking dire resolve.
The gaming style also shakes up the traditional savior paradigm most movies fall into, where a single individual's specialness is all it takes to win the day. Cage must die repeatedly in order to reset the day and hopefully win the war, true, but his abilities are brought on by an accident (and are just as vulnerable to being lost). He must train hard in order to actually achieve his potential. His fellow soldiers all are just as capable (more so toward the beginning) and are necessary to carry the day.
Even necessary figures of authority are shown to be people, good and bad, with varying abilities. When we first meet a scientific specialist rattling off important information, we like Cage are set to view him as the fount of all of knowledge (and exposition) we're primed to expect from such characters. By the time we meet this same man again, though, we've learned more than him, seen more, discovered that his knowledge is incomplete and requires correction. The scientist, as he himself readily admits, knows only what the soldiers can report back to him.
By movie's end there's of course some nods to traditional thriller tentpoles: a big climatic battle, sexual tension, some logical handwaving at plot threads not fully developed. But by this point we're as ready as Cage is to finish this war, any way necessary. Some have expressed disapproval for the ending (which would be a spoiler to reveal), but I found it appropriate given the movie's playful tone (yes, it is actually comedic throughout) and even as a slight subversion of the kill-a-major-character-for-drama trope. After all, in this story, war is more like purgatory than hell. For survivors, that's probably a better metaphor anyway.
The special effects for the film are top notch, though I particularly appreciated the integration of "real" and staged filmmaking more than the alien depictions. Despite the amazing care and detail that went into these truly creative beings, I have a feeling they won't age as well as the rest of the movie.
Fortunately the movie doesn't depend on technology in any form to really reach the viewer: the character's struggles and appeal are built layer by layer throughout in a manner that's ripe for repeat viewing. There's a lot of concern about gaming's growing impact on our culture. But one of the cinema's great weaknesses is the necessity of sticking to the same, almost cliched two act structure it's clung to since its birth. While not completely remaking the genre, Edge of Tomorrow shows that a borrowing from a new artform can bring fresh life to an old idea, telling certain stories in a way that couldn't be explored otherwise.
This movie is rated PG-13 for intense violence and some explicit language. I don't think I could have appreciated most of the points in my review as a young teenage, but I'd recommend it for those approaching actual conflict eligibility (18 and older).
