Directed by: Doug Liman
Starring: Tom Holland, Daisy Ridley, Mads Mikkelsen, Demian Bechir, Cynthia Erivo
Chaos Walking takes place on a distant planet in the distant future in which men's thoughts can be heard by others and materialize as multi-colored smoke above their heads. Some men have learned to control this, while others like teenager Todd Hewitt (Holland) still have work to do. Todd lives in a village populated only by men. Why? According to the town leader David Prentiss (Mikkelsen), all of the women were wiped out in a war with aliens. We know this is likely not the case. Todd doesn't remember his mother and hasn't set eyes on a woman. That changes when an alien spacecraft crashes on the planet and survivor Viola (Ridley) crosses paths with Todd in her quest to contact her family to return and rescue her.
The Noise, the name given to the phenomenon described earlier, is distracting and gimmicky. It plays a role in the events of the past and explains one character's villainous motives, but I grew weary of Todd's attempts to suppress his thoughts from being heard. The thoughts only seem to be audible when the plot or situation requires them. Holland and Ridley do their best with vanilla characters, but those thinking Todd and Viola will morph into Spider Man and Rey from Star Wars will be vastly disappointed.
Chaos Walking settles into a typical action plot with few surprises and a peculiar blandness. It isn't poorly made, it's just "there". Director Liman has made superior action films in the past, so we know he can make a fun movie with the right material. Chaos Walking doesn't give he or anyone else much to work with. I recall my reviews of The Hunger Games movies in which I lamented the characters having bizarre names on a futuristic Earth. It was as if the names Shawn, John, etc. were phased out over the generations. At least the characters in Chaos Walking don't have names like "Peeta". It has that going for it.
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