kevway Having enjoyed this sci-fi, boy-grows-to-manhood story with my 11 year old son, I had to take his reaction into consideration. After Earth has serious shortcomings, and the unreadiness of Jaden Smith to take on the main character role and prevent the audience from noticing that he is indeed acting (by his over-acting) is the one major flaw. As a moral tale, or an heroic fable, it seems plenty good enough for the less sophisticated audience, especially when its better qualities are weighed in: there is the expert direction by M. Night Shyamalan, a feast of diverting special effects, and a hackneyed but effective plot culminating in an exciting climactic struggle, over self, and over doom itself in many forms. Its nomination for "Worst Movie of the Year" is a disgraceful pile-on for crowd following show-offs. How about worst movie of 2013 with a budget over $130 million? -- OK, maybe a nomination, but not a winner, even then. So why all the disdain? It is burdened by the regrettable appellation of "vanity project", which may be forgivable if your vanity project is Citizen Kane or Gladiator, but here Will Smith left his jaw open for the upper cut of envious wannabees and the aforementioned pilers-on. He asked for it, and he got it, Royal Flush style. Anyway, if you want a sci-fi film your 10 to 14 year old children will love, this film is fine, and the family values promoted, if in a bit ham-handed way, are still valuable for teens and pre-teens in our doubt-filled post-modern epoch.

clivemcgee-74112 Not a great film but not a bad one either. So let's deal with the negative stuff first. It is a Sci-Fi film with some major plot holes, but I cam live with that, since I feel that Sci-Fi is mostly glorified fairy stories anyway. The main problem is structural and was brought about from the onset of making this movie. It is based on a 'story' by Will Smith, with him and his son playing the main characters and that is where the main problem lies, this is obviously a film driven by Will Smith's star power to enable his son to get a leg up into movie stardom. So the main roles has the 'Fresh Prince of Bel Air' trying to be an extreme iceman and a rather whiny, weedy boy playing an iceman in waiting. This was a tough ask for me. Will was doing best to be all stoic and militaristic which left Jaden Smith to do most of the acting, and to be the emotional centre of the film. And although Jaden is acting his little socks off, I can't help feeling of the thousands of young actors who would have much more believable in this role. So this film had a weak centre simply due to casting, but then this was always going to be the case here.OK so now to the good points. This is one of those films that looks like it's giving us that old movie cliché where a hero is created out of extreme adversity and it does that, but it is being deliberately undercut by the effect this macho individualistic behaviour has upon a family dynamic. This gave the film it's heart and kept me watching it and caring about the characters right to the end.Another key moment that kept the impetus going for me was the incident with the condor which echoed the main theme of 'family' in this film. It was a lovely moment, but I could see it might be difficult for others, because it seemed thematically and ecologically it didn't belong in this film. The back drop scenario of this film follows the depressing trope of - Space as a war zone for empires, being populated with rather extreme creatures. Space is a wonderful blank canvas of ignorance where you can create good old fashioned monsters, and although I enjoy watching a good monster, I don't believe in these movie space monsters. I find it hard to imagine a clear ecology for them and I personally have problems with Hollywood's desire to pedal these rather dubious Darwinist scenarios. So this film was also saved for me by the life affirming message that the condor's behaviour symbolised and which undercut the 'brutal universe' trope. This film also had a hint of mysticism which suited me. Oh, and all those M Night Shyamalan shouters and haters....Get a life !

Ilikehorrormovies This movie is so damn boring, has terrible acting yet worst kid performance from Jaden Smith, slow pacing, and terrible story. I do like some stuff of the film but still doesn't save the movie and I know it try to be the Star Wars of 2013 but fail on a bad note. At least it was better than Fant4stic because this film has more action and more interesting things. Please don't buy this crap film! I'M BEGGING YOU! BELIVE THE CRITICS!

Samiam3 Will and Jaden Smith have crash landed on a hostile planet; the only two survivors on a ship that looks like a set made of plastic and egg cartons. "Everything on this planet is evolved to kill humans", Will says. That planet is Earth, Will has broken both legs and is immobile. It has fallen to Jaden to retrieve a rescue beacon from the rear half of the ship which has broken off and is 100 km away.The real star of the movie is the scenery. There is so much forest that this could just as easily have been another planet. Making it Earth adds nothing simply because Shyamalan has side stepped the decision to make this a film about environmental impact. Instead After Earth is constructed as a survival story meant to bring out the bond between father and son. At this, After Earth fails. The script is thin to the point of feeling non-existent, and both Jaden and Will fail to sell. Will Smith, as the 'good soldier / poor father' gives the kind of bloodless, over composed, performance that recalls the cardboard acting style of the original Star Trek. He does not even attempt to find his humanity, but I can't say I blame him. With a script that gives him nothing to work from, why should be bother. The camera spends more time on Jaden, who has even less of a character to work from. He is a disoriented video game character in a game that lacks vision.On this Earth, the temperature drops five degrees every ten minutes at the end of the day, and there are some neat shots of the green canopy fading to snow white. There is also a nifty but short sequence where Jaden dives off a cliff and into a cat and mouse chase with a Condor. Otherwise, the obstacle course is surprisingly boring. After Earth climaxes with a battle against a big CG creature, which looks like a George Lucas reject.Shyamanlan fails as a writer and director to craft the elements needed to build tension. There is no feeling of a 'race against the clock', other than Jaden's limited supply of Oxygen tablets nor is there the feeling of terror lurking in the vegetation, recalling the Village and Signs.James Newton Howard, has done some phenomenal scores but this is not one of them. The sound track has a very empty feeling, and is just as lazy as everything else in this picture.