Even before focusing on its story, The Creator astonishes with its phenomenal visual treatment, reminiscent of both Star Wars and Blade Runner. The mind-blowing work of cinematographer Oren Soffer on the picture, coupled with brilliant special effects, sets and AD, immediately make it a benchmark of the genre.
It is too beautiful
The film is a succession of breathtaking immersive futuristic scenes, a sort of dreamlike mix between Akira and Apocalypse Now. It's simple, we haven't seen such a convincing and original sci-fi cinematic universe since the first Star Wars, or more recently Dune by Denis Villeneuve.
A scenario not up to the subject
A remarkable visual demonstration serves a much less impressive scenario, which struggles to establish solid and lasting narrative issues. We then navigate into unknown SF land with a character whose quest we have difficulty understanding, the latter asserting in the middle of the film that if humanity disappeared, it would be good news, before finally trying to save a robot-child who has not yet released two sentences constructed in an hour of feature film. It's not much to get attached to and yet you'll have to be content with it. We then advance blindly and forcefully towards twists and turns and a visually incredible, but predictable outcome. It is true that the caricatured characters and the very limited acting of Denzel Washington's son do not help much. As for the treatment of his main subject which is AI, Gareth Edward never does better or different from what James Cameron has already done with Terminator 1&2. The emotion it strongly seeks to arouse never reaches its peak, not helped either by Hans Zimmer's musical score.
If The Creator's screenplay had lived up to its visual ambitions, the film would have been a landmark in the history of sci-fi cinema. In the end, just a good popcorn movie, and it's not that bad.
