Review of Mortal Engines (2018) by Thefrog — 31 Aug 2020

I loved this movie in terms of environment: its production values are through the roof and the steampunk aesthetics are all but perfect. It's a wonder to look at, if you just accept the base tenet of steampunk, i.e. everything depicted is impossible, really really impossible, implausible. You can't build flying fortresses powered by steam, you can't build practical steam computers and you can't build fast moving cities that weight millions of tons. Steampunk is like high fantasy: just assume that it's magic and you can enjoy it.

The story left me a bit unimpressed but that happens with almost all action movies, this one is actually not bad at all, just not my thing.

There's a reanimated and almost indestructible man/robot thing, who is unfortunately underused and thrown away. Removing him from the movie altogether would have probably been better.

What I really disliked? FOUR stupid planes taking out all anti-air defenses of a supposedly formidable city-fortress, which has its own, deadly aviation. This is not steampunk-style suspension of disbelief, this is plain old stupid.

And yet, what bugs me the most is the perfect adherence to the conventions of today. Western society is wasteful, violent and self-destructive, as exemplified by its huge moving, polluting cities, and who to better incarnate its spirit than a straight, white man, drunk on power? Eastern society, on the other hand, is peaceful, loving and caring; who defies the mass destruction power of the Evil West? A perfectly balanced multi-racial crew, led by a young woman and a Japanese trans lady, who can fight like Bruce Lee against dozens of bloodthirsty goons but apparently not against a single, relatively normal guy.

And the Wall, the Great Wall that separates western Hell from eastern Eden, isn't it a USA/Mexico wall in reverse? The ending, with the Chinese Governor extending a welcoming hand to the western refugees is a clear j'accuse against our civilization and its selfishness. All right, all right, it wouldn't bug me in the least if such a hamfisted political statement came from China, or maybe India; after all, we do the same (or used to). But why should a western production beg such generic, commercial forgiveness for unclear ancestral sins? I mean, really, do these guys think that China, India, Japan, Africa are such perfect places to live in, in peace and harmony with nature? I think they know perfectly well this is not the case, they just decided to go the way the wind is blowing and reap the reward of conforming to political expectations.

Still loved the cities and Hugo Weaving's character.