Review of Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets (2017) by Kaptenvideo — 31 Jul 2017

„Valerian“ is a blockbuster adventure, by far the most expensive movie French have ever produced, and live action adaptation of long-run French comic „Valerian and Laureline“ (1967-2010).

It’s a fast-paced action filled adventure reminiscent of at least four modern classic sci-fi epics:

* „Star Wars“ for the variety of locales, characters and amount of backstory.

* „Avatar“ for the visual style and storytelling (especially the hidden meaning part).

* „Tomorrowland“ and Besson’s own „The Fifth Element“ (1997), for inventiveness and abundance of visual details, so the future societies shown are always interesting enough to just watch and explore.

But first and foremost, it’s the newest project by the legendary Luc Besson, who has three different sides to him as a filmmaker.

Younger people may know him mostly as producer of action such as „Taxi“ and „Taken“ series – thus he can be called the proud godfather of modern action subgenre which I like to call „eurotrash“. But he makes also „serious“ movies such as 1994’s „Léon“ and „1999’s „Joan of Arc“, which are surely among his most celebrated works.

The man also likes to explore ways of combining the sensibilities of mainstream and artsy cinema, where the result is far from „something serious“ but can not be strictly classified as just entertainment too.

The most well-known example of that is, of course, „The Fifth Element“. And if I am not mistaken, „Valerian“ would like to be something like that, too.

Yes, for the most part, it’s just an entertainment. But the story also has a hidden allegory or warning for humankind acting too stupid and selfish to save our future.

Some interpret it as a political message too but I can’t be bothered to go into that, maybe because I identify more with the humankind destroying itself part. Anyway, the hidden aspect is shallow enough to be disregarded easily, if you choose to enjoy „Valerian“ as just a joyride. Mostly.

So… what would you get if you could combine the look of „Avatar“ with the variety of „Star Wars“ and detail-richness of „The Fifth Element“ or "Tomorrowland"? Besson & crew have tried their darndest best and the result is visually magnificent indeed.

There’s so much to explore and enjoy, and the artists have dared to push their imagination to the limits. Thus it often feels more like a videogame or animated movie, rather than live action, but in a good way.

I have concentrated mostly on the good here, but there’s bad too. You know, the quite usual blockbuster weaknesses… general shallowness; continuing for too long; many of the characters are not interesting enough; for all the action, there’s a shortage of tension because the heroes rarely seem to be in any real danger – everything just works out for the best.

Personally, the biggest letdown was witnessing that Besson did or could not create more intriguing characters for famous actors appearing here. Clive Owen’s part is just lame and forgettable, Ethan Hawke and Rihanna are better but not exactly interesting neither.

On the other hand, young stars Dane DeHaan and Cara Delevingne are good enough to carry the movie. They have enough charm both alone and together to justify the starring roles. They will appear in 2017’s version of „Tulip Fever“ too, by the way – coming to Estonian cinemas in September.

But I would like to stay with the good stuff because „Valerian“ was clearly a labor of love for the people involved. And if you like sci-fi and/or action adventures, there’s enough entertainment here to deserve 139 minutes of your life.