Director: Ridley Scott
Art is the expression of ideas and emotions that may not always be comfortable or easy to experience, while entertainment is for the soothing of the masses. For decades there has been a battle in Hollywood between the studio executives interested in creating mass entertainment and the filmmakers behind the camera interested in creating timeless art. But in Prometheus there is a slight variation in that battle, because it seems that the filmmakers themselves are interested in creating a fun entertaining movie, but also exploring big ideas at the same time. Unfortunately, and perhaps predictably, this ends with a failure, but that failure is still more interesting than most everything Hollywood has put out this year. The movie explores fascinating ideas, notions, and symbols pertaining to creation, rebirth, sacrifice, power, ambition, God, and science. But ultimately it's all too much. One two hour movie will never be able to be successful at exploring all these ideas while still delivering a science fiction film with a standard beginning, middle, and ending.
The movie shifts focus many times throughout the movie. Sometimes it is focused on David the android, and his ambiguous issues, then later we will focus on the faith of our main character Shaw's issues of faith, then later we will contemplate man's desire to meet his maker. None of these threads successfully mesh together and it's pretty disappointing because these ideas are all fascinating on their own but they all get glossed over so quickly. Director Ridley Scott and writer Damon Lindelof are definitely ambitious filmmakers. As I've explained already, Lindelof's script is incredibly ambitious. But Scott's visual eye is one of the best parts of the film. The production design, the visual effects, the magnificent vistas, and overall look of the film is all extraordinary. These aspects are certainly the best part of the movie, and even when movie turns into more of a standard sci-fi action movie, Scott's visual eye keep the movie at least somewhat interesting. This movie is honestly not very good, but it's one that I can't help but recommend because it's such a fascinating miss.
Grade: B-
