Jupiter Ascending

Jupiter Jones (Mila Kunis), the daughter of Russian immigrants, hates her life. Day in and day out, she must clean the apartments of Chicago's upper class before returning exhausted at night to the small room she shares with her mother (Maria Doyle Kennedy) and aunt. But as frustrating as her dreary daily routine may be, she soon longs for it to return. Because when she tries to sell some of her eggs to get some money, she is nearly killed by strange creatures in the clinic. At the last second, the mysterious Caine (Channing Tatum) saves her life. Now the young woman finds herself in the middle of an intergalactic war in which she seems to play a central role. Because supposedly her genetic makeup entitles her to an incredible inheritance, which some powerful rulers want to take away from her at any cost. And so, in alien worlds, she must fight not only for her own life, but for the lives of every single person on Earth, following a calling that has been preordained for her all her life.

With Jupiter Ascending, siblings Andy and Lana Wachowski return to the genre they once revolutionized with their Matrix trilogy. Their latest work is again a visually impressive science fiction fairy tale with more or less hidden socially critical undertones. And again, the focus is on an ordinary human who turns out to be the chosen one in an essential battle between good and evil. But a new revolution of the genre should rather not be expected here. Jupiter Ascending is entertaining by all means. But besides a few moments of wonderful self-irony and a few great effects, there are also quite a few moments of unintentional comedy and attempted eccentricity, which ensure that you leave the cinema with a very ambivalent feeling.

Whenever the action is in the foreground, the entertainment value noticeably skyrockets. During longer purely dramaturgical scenes, however, it becomes clear time and again that the Wachowskis have concentrated too much on dazzling costumes or making the aliens look as eccentric as possible, thereby losing sight of the actual story. Otherwise, the terrible dialogues (bees don't lie) and the half-baked elaboration of good ideas can hardly be explained. Because of the fact that the story is not very original, but at the same time there is a cramped attempt to be different by hook or by crook, a very unharmonious overall picture is created, where intention and result are very far apart.

This makes Jupiter Ascending, however, still far from being a bad film. The show values are very high in many moments and there are enough scenes in which this colorful science fiction opera is really fun to watch. But as it becomes clear in such moments, there is always a feeling of disappointment next to the pleasure. Because somehow one had hoped that the Wachowskis after some flops with this fantasy adventure finally got their act together again. But the film doesn't quite make you forget the unspeakable Speed Racer.

The actors deliver average to good performances. Channing Tatum, as a cross between a man and a dog, is reduced to doing bare-chested, fast-paced action sequences. Mila Kunis also gets to just look pretty in snazzy costumes, while Sean Bean and Eddie Redmayne can at least show a hint of really good acting. However, Redmayne overdoes it so much in some scenes that you want to deny him his well-deserved Oscar nomination for The Discovery of Infinity. All in all, no one really leaves a lasting impression here - neither in a positive nor in a negative way.

If you're just looking for a colorful effects spectacle for the eye and you like it a bit more unusual designs like elephant aliens or alien ladies with huge ears, you'll definitely have a lot of fun here. But if you're hoping for a really good and surprising genre contribution on the level of the first part of Matrix, you'll rather experience an unintentionally funny miracle of the disappointing kind with Jupiter Ascending. Therefore: neither really good, nor grottily bad and therefore with deductions definitely worth seeing!

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp