Review of City of Ember (2008) by Jake W — 23 Dec 2010

The City of Ember was, in my opinion, a major disappointment. I read and liked the book before there was news of the movie adaptation. I was interested in how modern media would take on this book, but I tried to maintain a neutral position every single time I thought about the movie. Not to mention the promotion of the movie by everyone's favorite six year-old, Fred.

I also heard that the movie wasn't favored by critics. This kinda came as no surprise to me taking the fact that almost all movies that were based on a book as popular as "The City of Ember" turned out disappointing.

So I went to see the movie. I was impressed with the organization of the story-telling of the pre-crisis in the beginning. Beyond that, I was left confused.

Unlike in the book, there was no emotional bond between me or either of the protagonists. The introduction of the characters was alright, but the movie did a terrible job introducing the current condition of the city, unlike the book. In the movie, Doon said "The city is dying", and that was the end of that. Beyond the infamous blackouts, there was little-to-no explanation of the other problems in the city, which included food shortage, disease, and...umm...monsters. That's right. Giant, mutated rats that haunted the halls of the Pipeworks. This idea probably came from some idiot on the set that cleverly got the screenplay writer very drunk and manipulated him into writing giant rats into the film. Disgusting. And there was no such existence of a worthless scumbag of an idea in the book.

Now I'm going to talk about the climax of the story. Why? Because as soon as the introduction of the story was finished, the movie instantly jumped to the climax. And the rising action was consisting of one increasingly predicable attempt to solve a small puzzle one after another, all leading up to one ultimate goal, which was too simple, too predictable, and too boring. After a while of "Okay. Okay. What to do next...", you began to see a pattern that the entire climax, which is 85% of the reason why people will watch a movie, is based on the theme of answering one question after another. Is that so bad? Well, it wouldn't be if the protagonists didn't seem to have some form of precognition, which allowed them to find out what to do next and how to do it as soon as they came face-to-face with another puzzle. Unacceptable.

Okay. Positives of this movie...the design of the city was favorable. It had a less modern theme than the book, which actually had a decent effect on the feel of the city. That is, "Work to survive. No time to play". For the most part, the cast was favorable. The costume was great, except that every now and then it would be a bit of a distraction from what was going on...not that whatever WAS going on was worth paying attention to.

Bottom line: Do yourself a favor and save a few bucks on renting the book. You'll be MUCH less disappointed.