EUROPA REPORT (Sebastián Cordero, 2013)

[tabuno]

Jumbled, disjointed. This chaotic but visually compelling sci fi movie is about a space attempt to one of Jupiter’s moons. Europa has the look and production value of 2001: A Space Odyssey and Alien and the more recent Love (2011) about survival in space. However it tries too hard being classy. The use of voice-over is unnecessary and excessive. Attempts at the Blair Witch Project documentary approach is uneasily combined with the more stark Kubrick photography. Finally the flash back and flash forwards leave the audience spinning in confusion and disorientation.

If only the director had just simplified and shot the movie in the traditional linear footage like the 50s Forbidden Planet or even First Space on Venus, this movie had the potential to be a great. It had the look some of the best space visuals of any sci fi movie to date. It had serious intention, but the sounds in space and no space-time lag in communications between the space craft and Mission control are real major technical flaws for a movie like this. It had had poor editing making it confusing almost to the point of being unwatchable. Some of the dialogue and space craft activity were penetrating and appealingly jargon-oriented really capturing the ambiance of real space exploration but at other times seemed just too banal, used for impressing an uneducated audience that in these days seems a pretty sad commentary of how the producers or director thought of its audience.
The non-linear, broken time flow made the movie into a hodge-podge of scenes that only made sense to the editor or director. The revealed reason for the communication lost, scenes that the audience was subjected to twice wouldn’t have been unpredictable as described, it would have been monitored and not unexpected. This seems to be just a convenient script device that only weakens the storyline. Another problem was the strangely edited debate scene about going out exploring which was literally broken in half and completed after another completely different scene was inserted. The approach landing scene was visually amazing, but there wasn’t enough of the close up of the landing to be brilliantly, dazzlingly and later one of the Mission specialists gets to look out at a close up of a fantastic landscape while the audience only get to see the specialist looking out the window and only later does the audience get to see what the specialist saw after the fact. Finally even as fantastic as the visual photography and set design and landscape design were, there were too many photographic style changes that prevented this movie from flowing smoothly nor allowing the story to become an intimate compelling close up personal story for the audience. Instead the photographic changes became a background distraction.

In one of the major crises scenes its power was taken away by too much previous random, almost pretentious space banter and not enough film time devoted to building up this crucial scene. Nevertheless it was one of the best scenes of the movie, well done both visually and sound wise. Another great scene was the disembarkation from the space craft that was so authentic and visceral, though too much of the 2001 movie helmet-face shot was used instead of allowing the audience to have an extended personal experience of wonderful out of this world landscape shots. Why there was only one space explorer out there seems odd too. Even this great sequence seemed off when there was a little amount of sample time left then suddenly became time to leave then mysteriously all the crew’s concern over radiation levels seems to disappear and miraculously there’s more time to explore further creating a bewildering sense of incongruity with the script plot outline overtaking the consistency and believability of the story. Even later there is a final face shot but not of what the astronaut was looking at creating more of a disconcerting unnecessary puzzle.
At some point two thirds the way through the movie the continuing anomalies that keep piling up in juxtaposition of the overall tone and presentation of this movie. The more authentic and believable, documentary tone of this movie is in contradiction to the number of calamities that befall this space voyage making it more of a stretch to suspend judgment of its theatrical veracity. Instead of focusing on extended scenes of great potency to captivate the audience, the script and director have chosen quantity over sustained quality, allowing the film’s integrity to grow dangerously thin. It’s almost as if there were at least two or more short films occurring in this movie. The film also eventually becomes more unclear as to what is supposedly recorded film that the audience is seeing and what is just the movie presentation itself that supposedly wasn’t recorded but was shot to help fill in important details for the audience, just more distracting, off-putting film experiences. 2010 (1984) a follow up to 2001 with its own voyage to Jupiter had similar events occur in respect to Europa Report but which Europa was able to exceed in the space adventure depiction of its story but also fell short compared to 2010 in its overall movie presentation and storyline coherence. Perhaps the greatest mistake was the use of the flashback technique which in fact became at least two different flashbacks destroying some of the mystery and unknown of first discovery as if the audience was really only getting a compilation of a report instead of being able to be apart of this amazing visually dazzling space adventure themselves.

Overall, this movie of really great potential and visual photographic power and narrative style is similar to Moon (2009) but became even more of a great disappointment with its poor editing and scene selection that only serve to create a massive jumble of confusion, difficult to follow and comprehend and enjoy. If only that director had stayed with a simple presentation this would have been a great cinematic achievement.

[Chris Knipp]

You're ahead of me on this. Been busy with the SF Jewish Film Festival previews. This opens Friday, so you must have seen a preview. I didn't get invited to one.


Magnet release schedule for Europe Report.

Opening
8/2/2013
DEBUT LOCATIONS:
New York, NY: Cinema Village
Washington, DC: E Street Cinema
West Hollywood, CA: Sundance Sunset Cinemas

8/9/2013
Atlanta, GA: Midtown Art Cinemas 8
Cambridge, MA: Kendall Square Cinema 9
Denver, CO: Esquire Theatre
Philadelphia, PA: Ritz at the Bourse
San Diego, CA: Ken Cinema
Seattle, WA: Varsity Theatre

8/16/2013
WHERE I CAN SEE IT:
Berkeley, CA: Shattuck Cinemas 10
Columbus, OH: Gateway Film Center 8
Minneapolis, MN: Lagoon Cinema
San Francisco, CA: Opera Plaza Cinemas 4
Santa Fe, NM: Jean Cocteau Cinema

9/15/2013
Gloucester, MA: Cape Ann Community Cinema

Metacritic rating based on only 7 reviews so far is mixed, some raves, some pans, average good: 64.

[tabuno]

On reflection, what really stands out is the acting, character performances if not for the technical distractions. The stereotypes and the traditional sexual overtones of most sci fi movies are avoided in this movie. Similar to Andromeda Strain (1971), Stranded (2011), Splice (2010) in style and characterization, Europa unfortunately deviates in its straight-forward presentation so much as to lose the audience with its back and forth shots of past, present, and future. The director didn't allow the story to just tell itself. Perhaps this was done out of a lack of confidence by the director or producers of the movie's simple but powerful story or maybe they wanted to show off their great ability using what they consider "great" directorial effects.

This is one of the few movies that a re-edited director's cut might actually result in big dividends. If the beginning scenes followed those introductory commentaries as found in Solaris (1972 and 2002), First Spaceship on Venus (1960), or 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) and then was edited in a straightforward manner as Alien (1979) along with the concluding remarks as used in the original, this movie might become one of the best sci fi movies of the year in the same fashion as Forbidden Planet (1956).

[Chris Knipp]

How did you see it, since it has not opened yet? Or did it preview in your town?

[tabuno]

Actually, I'm wondering how so many other people have seen this movie and posted comments already on IMDb.

Watching instant video download streaming at 1 megabyte per second really sucks because it stops every so many minutes and I have to reload which of course didn't help my viewing pleasure. It didn't help my frame of mind while writing my movie commentary.

[Chris Knipp]

How did you get it? Can you give the link giving the online address?

Isn't there a possibility of watching at less high def? That usually improves playback if you don't have a fast connection. Works for me with Vimeos.

[Chris Knipp]

So VOD preceded general theatrical release I guess as sometimes happens. Theatrical release begins in some venues August 2.

I see it opens in Cinema Village in NYC Friday. That is a very small venue, by the way, though an important one. It may come elsewhere in a week or two rolling out.

Magnet Releasing has a funny list. Turns out they are the "genre arm" of Magnolia Pictures. (I did not know this.) A lot of their titles look really scholocky. But it's fanboy, hhip schlock. Once in a while they have an art film if it fits their taste and genre -- Kitano, Miike, TROL HUNTER, BRONSON, DOWN TERRRACE, THE HOST. Some of these have turned out to be important. EUROPA REPORT may be.
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