Regency Enterprises, Summit Entertainment, Bazelevs Production,
Emile Hirsch, Olivia Thirlby, Max Minghella, Rachael Taylor, Joel Kinnaman, Veronika Ozerova, Dato Bakhtadze, Yuriy Kutsenko, Artur Smolyaninov, Pyotr Fyodorov
Sean (Emile Hirsch) and Ben (Max Minghella) are young software designers who have traveled to Russia to close a big deal, only to find out that their Swedish partner Skyler (Joel Kinnaman) has stolen their whole design and double crossed them. They head out to a bar to commiserate and meet two American girls Natalie (Olivia Thirlby) and Anne (Rachael Taylor). Suddenly beautiful lights appear in the sky, and the five of them go out into the street when suddenly the lights split apart, and become alien beings surrounded in energy, looking to kill everything alive in their path. This sends the party out to escape, team up with some Russian survivors, and try to figure out how to save the planet.
This is a very unique sci-fi thriller. It has some serious holes and some very unusual things going for it which caused a lot of people to really hate on it. I didn’t find it that awful. The “aliens” were quite different and had some awesome powers. But the characters do some crazy things that will make you wonder why, and it is set in Russia, so the Russians are the good guys, which is kind of unusual for American audiences, although there is nothing wrong with that. We’re faced with two American girls who for some odd reason keep lapsing back into British accents for no reason. Some of the actions just don’t make sense.
But it has suspense, and will keep you on the edge of your seat, kind of like “Battle of Los Angeles” in a way. The characters are decently portrayed, and the acting isn’t bad at all. Special effects are fairly awesome. All in all, it’s a little bit flawed sci-fi thriller with enough good things to make it worth watching if you love sci-fi and have the time to give it. Not for everyone, but for sci-fi thriller fans, it’s not as bad as most reviewers would have you believe.
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