Transcendence is the unfortunate directorial debut from director Wally Pfister, who made a career as the trustable cinematographer for Christopher Nolan, shooting Nolan’s entire The Dark Knight Trilogy, The Prestige, Memento and Inception. While it’s hard to argue with some of the cinematic aspects of Transcendence, it’s about the only praise I can sing.
Depp plays a celebrated scientist named Will Caster, who believes that Artificial Intelligence is the way of the future, with transcendence as the ultimate dream goal. His vision scares a lot of people such as the anti-tech group known as R.I.F.T. (Revolutionary Independence From Technology), led by Bree (Kate Mara) who shoots Will with a bullet laced with radiation after one of his public panels. This obviously comes as heartbreak to Will’s wife Evelyn (Rebecca Hall), Will’s partner in life and science. She believes in his work and beliefs just as much as he does. The poison from the bullet gives Will just about a month to live, which provides the duo with just enough time to upload Will’s consciousness into a computer, putting his very theory of Transcendence to the test.
The loss of Will blinds Evelyn into believing that this version of Will is really him, and she soon gives herself up to his every order. The next thing you know, she ends up in a small town called Brightwood which Will has chosen as the place to build his technological colony. The whole situation gets out of hand, to the point where Evelyn has built a unstoppable machine that soon spirals out of control. She’s blinded by her love for Will, and mistakes this being for being her husband.
Jack Paglen script is indeed as ludicrous as it sounds, and it isn’t helped by the loose direction of Pfister. He provides some memorable visual moments, but not much else. Pfister gets absolutely nothing from the sluggish Depp, who seemed as disconnected to the film as his character was to the real world. Rebecca Hall is likable as always, but her efforts are wasted in this dull film, and it doesn’t help that the love story with Will becomes unbelievable and tedious by its end. Paul Bettany, Cillian Murphy, Morgan Freeman and Kate Mara are all in this film, but are completely wasted.
There was some cool sci-fi potential in Transcendence, but it resulting a nonsensical mess that failed to captivate at any point of its two hour run-time. Things just seem to happen because the script called for it, not because it made sense. If you can get over these numerous faults and questions, maybe you can find something for you within Transcendence, but it was a big fat disappointment that didn’t do much of anything from me except disappoint.
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