Starring Charlize Theron, Marton Csokas, Jonny Lee Miller, Sophie Okonedo, Frances McDormand, Pete Postlethwaite
Written By: Phil Hay, Matt Manfredi
Directed By: Karyn Kusama
Studio: Paramount
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Am I the only one who was deeply afraid of this cartoon? Not because of some female cartoon character kicking ass, no that’s not it all, actually that’s kind of hot! BUT anyway, I think the animation is what scared me about Aeon Flux. It reminded me of an anime style and I can’t stand anime plus it just looked really weird . I was more into watching bunny rabbits play tricks on pesky hunters than seeing jagged animation. But since I never saw this movie in theaters, I finally got to see this film on DVD. I thought the movie had some cool parts but overall was kind of bland.

The film takes place in the last city on Earth and is set 400 years later from the present day. After the population was wiped out from a virus, it’s supposedly a perfect society but citizens of the city keep disappearing mysteriously. Aeon Flux (Charlize Theron) is the rebel’s best assassin/hero/whatever you want to call her. Her mission is to take down the Goodchild regime but once she infiltrates the domain of Goodchild (Marton Csokas), she begins to learn of secrets of the regime and her fellow rebels. Since she knows of secrets and other things she isn’t suppose to know, her life is in danger. She has to team up with someone you wouldn’t think she would be teaming up with and they have to stop the evil regime from succeeding…or something.

I can’t really tell if this plot had anything to do with the MTV series or not. I tried to watch the cartoon like I said above, I just couldn’t get into it. Looked too damn weird. Thankfully this movie isn’t weird like that and I didn’t get creeped out. Pretty much the reason why people will be watching this movie is to watch Charlize Theron. She’s absolutely smoking hot in this movie, and I especially like her with the black hair. The blonde hair is okay but so many people have blonde hair these days. In a few scenes she’s basically wearing nothing so that should please some fans out there. But even though she’s hot and has some kick ass action scenes, I generally didn’t like this movie that much. I was in fact, bored by it. The action is sporadic and the stuff in between just didn’t do it for me. I didn’t really care about the characters at all, and didn’t care about the story either. It took forever for them to explain what the hell was going on and just left me scratching my head a lot. The acting really wasn’t that great, or I didn’t find anything special by it. I was surprised to see Marton Csokas actually play somewhat of a good guy this time around. He was pigeoned-holed as a bad guy or the main villain each film he has been since LOTR. I actually thought that was going to be the case for Aeon Flux but he actually turned out to be the good guy. Seeing Frances McDormand in this movie was so laughable. I guess she was trying to look like some cartoon character but she really looked ridiculous. I didn’t really have a problem with Charlize Theron’s acting in this, because I really paying to her acting if you know what I mean.

The special effects were pretty cool and held up well. When the action did happen that was fun to watch but there really wasn’t all that much. It was more plot driven and I think the movie took itself too seriously. I think the creators were trying to come off too smart or trying not to do a mindless action. I think going the mindless action route would have been the best way to go about something with this character. The film sort of felt like Equilibrium but minus the cool action. I think in the end, that’s what people want to see, including myself (well sometimes).

The bonus materials on the DVD were interesting to watch if you liked the movie. There were two sets of audio commentary, one by Charlize and the producer Gale Anne Hurd and then there is one with screenwriters Hay & Manfredi. I never saw the movie before so I didn’t listen to the commentary. The featurettes were cool because they were broken down into 5 categories. The stunts one is always fun to watch, and you get to see how hard Charlize worked on her training and butt kicking. Creating the World feature was all about the MTV show and blending stuff from that show into the film. Each featurette was about 15 minutes long and covered enough detail to leave you satisfied.

Overall, the movie had some interesting things to it but left me bored in the end. Maybe I have to see it again and see how I feel about it then. But for right now, I wish it was just some mindless action film that didn’t take itself too seriously.

Features:
Commentary by: Charlize Theron and producer Gale Anne Hurd,co-screenwriters Phil Hay and Matt Manfredi
Five featurettes:
Creating a World,
Locations,
Stunts,
Costume Design Workshop,
The Craft of the Set Photographer
Theatrical trailer

Audio:
English (Dolby Digital 5.1),
English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround),
French (Dolby Digital 5.1)

Video:
Widescreen 2.35:1

Subtitles:
English, Spanish

Favorite Scenes: I liked the action scenes, and when Aeon and that other chick were sneaking into the Goodchild place.
Rating: PG-13
Running Time: 92 minutes
Extras Rating:
Overall Rating: