Jupiter Ascending and the evil of Balem Abrasax
primesuspect
Beepin n' BoopinDetroit, MI Icrontian
So I saw Jupiter Ascending last night. I wasn't super hot to see it because I've read a lot of bad reviews. I'm usually into character development and story and from what I had read, Mila Kunis as the titular Jupiter (heh, titular) was flat and uninteresting. No matter, I went to see it anyway because a couple of people (ahem @GnomeQueen @whiskeyinyrshoes) had recommended it despite the reviews.
I saw it last night and pretty much loved it. I'm going to see it again tonight.
It's not a brainy movie but it's fun in the sense that The Fifth Element was fun. Doesn't take itself too seriously but still delivers an incredible production. Sure the characters are trope-ish and everything is weird and nothing makes sense, but it doesn't make sense in a FUN way.
I would like to say that the main villain, Eddie Redmayne as the insane Balem Abrasax, is one of my new favorite sci-fi movie villains. @Cannonfodder and I took to arguing about who was creepier: Balem Abrasax or Gary Oldman as Jean-Baptiste Emmanuel Zorg.
I loved Zorg, but Zorg wasn't creepy. He was terrifying and unpredictable but I never got the impression he was psychotic or unhinged. A sociopath, sure, but he was actually quite put together; a dyed-in-the-wool killer. Cold blooded, clean, methodical and thorough 
Balem Abrasax was just plain crazy. Chaotic, childish, imperious, and utterly narcissistic. Unpredictable. I guess to me, that unpredictability combined with unlimited resources and pure narcissism is more terrifying than a very wealthy corporate warlord.
It's easy to see Zorg as a rags-to-riches villain: Born into poverty into a working class family and using his intelligence and capacity for evil to get to the top of his empire. Abrasax was born into a hundred thousand years of utterly detached royalty and has no connection with regular society. Zorg was never under any delusions. Balem screams, "I CREATE LIFE?!" as if even he realizes how ridiculous that sounds.
Comments
I saw Balem as petulant and unimaginative, where Zorg was cruel and calculating. Balem just assumed his minions would take care of X thing, where Zorg would have them do exactly what he wanted. Sure, both of them had galactic resources at their disposal. Balem just wasn't very imaginative or creative with them.
I also really liked the movie, and found the characters and story interesting enough to hold my attention. The action scenes were a little on the excessive side, though the cinematography was decent enough that I had no trouble telling what was happening. No shaky cam, woo!
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Character-wise, I wonder how Balem has kept his shit together as long as he has. "Chaotic, childish, imperious" are not characteristics that hold an empire together for long. It's easy to see how Zorg holds his together.
Actor-wise, ain't no one got shit on Gary Oldman. It took me a very long time to even recognize him in movies because he is such a fantastic actor.
Works for the Kim family in NK.
Our media portrays him as a Balem. I think GoT is a closer analog to that world.
He's chaotic, childish, and imperious, but he isn't dumb, and he's mostly just supremely delusional when he's getting his way. I'd argue that the chaotic/childish/stupid part of him may only come out when confronted with an epically huge threat: [spoiler] like his reincarnated mother-- and at that point, he does totally lose everything, so.
I just showed this to @UPSLynx and he haaaaaates it. I'm having a great time informing him of why he's wrong.
Movie was trash. So many unexplained holes. Fancy action scenes aint enough to fix that broken of a plot. Seriously, how are the Wachowski's so bad at filmmaking?
So many random plot points left unanswered, just brushed away like they didn't matter. Meanwhile, you've got this amazing, rich world that they've obviously thought up for sake of the film, and they just didn't bother exploring to deepen the story. There's SO MUCH in this world to work with, and pretty much none of it is. How is so much time in this film wasted on nothing when they could have spent that time developing this world that was obviously thought up with care?
Jupiter Jones was a boring character that couldn't manage to make me care about her, and Wise was just as bad. And their forced relationship was one of the biggest cringe inducing moments I've seen in recent cinema. Two lead characters with no real development. It was painful.
I dunno. I felt like I was supposed to love this film because lol so bad mirite? But it's just a painful reminder that the Wachowski's just can't make good films.
Also watched it recently and found it visually stunning, but otherwise fiercely mediocre. Everything about the acting and writing left me grateful I spent nothing.