Reminiscence is a sci-fi neo-noir about a vague future world where climate change instigated a war which polarized the class system even further. The movie takes place in the flooded streets of Miami where Nick(Hugh Jackman) operates a memory machine with his friend Watts(Thandie Newton). One day a classic femme fatal in a red dress Mae(Rebecca Ferguson) comes into the office looking for her keys and quickly develops a relationship with Nick before an unspecified time later disappearing. This launches Nick's obsession, as he relives his own memories numerous times to discover clues and traipses around the non-descript futurescape to follow up on them.
God bless the cast, Jackman and Newton particularly are pouring everything they've got(which is by no means insubstantial) into this ill-conceived, plodding, derivative, periodically incoherent narrative. But despite the absolute and total commitment of two of our finest living actors the movie remains totally inert. Ferguson does a decent job with an incredibly thankless, flat, borderline offensive role toped off by the fact she is retroactively fridged. Woof. The waste of talent is honestly startling.
The movie has the slick kind of non-descript future look one could expect from fair to middling scifi that has to use some random CG companies stock designs out of budget limitations. It works, I guess, but its not interesting or fresh. The score is fine if a bit overwrought and the costuming is effective if not particularly inspired. The main offender is the script. It's convoluted for no purpose, it lacks focus, the pacing drags, the characters are so focused on the plot they never develop, the movie is clearly conflicted about if it wants to be a romance, a mystery, or a scifi flick and the three separate aspirations are totally discordant. Genre bending can be tricky and here it is pretty much a total failure and as a result, despite all the promise, it doesn't deliver on any of its ambitious but overly numerous ideas.
An incredibly frustrating waste of time.
Currently in theaters and on HBO Max.
Don't See It.
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