Curiousness persuaded me to check out a few of the several video reviews of the science fiction film by director Gareth Edwards, The Creator, on YouTube. The headlines in most, if not every thumbnail, had an uncanny ambiguity to them. Something felt off by a mile.

Almost every review was made up of select keywords that were paraphrased into opinions. The reviews told me facts obvious to anyone who has seen the film’s trailer — that, despite apparent inspirations from Apocalypse Now, District 9, Children of Men and the back-and-forth narrative-weaving shenanigans of Christopher Nolan, The Creator looked fabulous.

Further, they all told me that its somewhat weak storytelling (depending on who was talking) is relegated to the backseat by the production design and visual effects. It’s an 86 million dollar film that apparently has no business looking like a 300 million dollar film.

The last fact was hammered in with brute force, as if one is obligated to include this information. The entire exercise reeked of a conspicuous marketing campaign.

There is nothing objectionable in The Creator other than the utter lack of a good story

The Creator is set in the future, where AI-powered robots have become a part of the routine grind. They cook in homes, help deliver babies and serve at diners. They are indispensable… until a bomb blast incinerates Los Angeles. Apparently, the robots did it for some reason that is never got into.

The destruction of LA, however, is enough reason for the United States to enter retaliation mode (the 9/11 reference hits right on the nose). North America deems the machines illegal terrorists, and begins a man — ahem — robot hunt.

Joshua Taylor (John David Washington), an American spy with an amputated arm (a useless detail in the script), is in search of a programme called the Nirmata (Nepalese for ‘the Creator’). When the film opens, Joshua has infiltrated a rebel group in New Asia, a region that defies the United States and gives equal rights to artificial life robots.

A good man with a good soul, he also has a wife (Gemma Chan), with a child on the way. Their romantic evening is devastated by a splinter team sent by Nomad, a surveillance system hovering above the Earth that combs the cities, mountains and oceans of the world with sweeping scans meant to find terrorists.

Believing his wife to be dead, Joshua is recruited by the military years later to lead a mission to finally kill the Creator, aka Alpha One, aka Alphie (Madeleine Yuna Voyles) who, surprise, surprise, has the body and personality of a calm and composed 10-year-old girl (I know it’s an anomaly, but this is science fiction after all).

As the trailers foretold, Joshua escapes from both his American overlords and local pursuers with the intent to destroy Nomad. Apparently, somewhere in the uninvolving storytelling, Joshua has become attached to Alphie.

Not being a part of a franchise, adaptation, or a priorly made movie, does not excuse an “original” film for its lack of originality. The Creator is overlong and hackneyed and reeks of every reference above, including Elysium and some undeniable tropes of the cyberpunk genre.

Yuna Voyles, in her debut, is a wonderful find. However, I cannot agree with the world that this is a performance for the history books. Such bloated enthusiasm takes the credit away from the brilliant work of child actors such as Haley Joel Osment, who pulled off a better-than-human AI robot in Steven Spielberg’s AI: Artificial Intelligence — a film made 20 years ago that still puts subsequent forays into the genre to shame.

Washington’s performance is perfunctory at best. His work and his character carry echoes of his portrayal of the Protagonist from Nolan’s Tenet. Edward’s take is a little too Nolan-ish as well. The story is surface-level deep that banks on the premise to carry it through.

A screenplay (by Edwards and his writing partner Chris Weitz) that was less cliché-driven would have helped the “original” argument one keeps hearing about. The cinematography by Greg Fraser (Dune, The Batman) and the music by Hans Zimmer (Dune, Blade Runner 2049) are not worth writing home about either.

The Creator was cut down to two hours from a five-hour cut. I would like to think a better film was left somewhere on the editing room floor.

Also starring Alison Janney and Ken Watanabe, The Creator is released by 20th Century Fox and HKC Entertainment. The film is rated PG-13 and playing in cinemas throughout Pakistan

Published in Dawn, ICON, October 8st, 2023