Nov 19, 2007

[Movies] Aeon Flux

Aeon FluxI've been feeling a major hankering to see the original Aeon Flux series again - you know, the animated shorts that appeared as part of MTV's Liquid Television series. I can't seem to find decently seeded torrents for the show so I settled for watching the 2005 movie on HBO.

While the movie doesn't stand up well against the original, almost discordant brilliance of the animated series, it still remains interesting with some pretty good action despite the, well, plot that makes sense but not satisfactorily so.

What always made the original series so amazingly brilliant for me was the amazing visuals, the near impossible feats Aeon gets herself into and of course the wanton violence. There was clearly an attempt to capture some of that in the making of this film, however they felt overly obligated to put in place an actual plot, something that never really carried across well in the original series. In many ways, it was fun how the cartoon was next to impossible to understand at times unless you started rearranging the episodes in your head until you find an order that makes sense to you since the original broadcast order took some liberties.

Charlize Theron did a pretty decent job of trying to bring Aeo to life, I'll give her that. The original Aeon in the cartoon was just ridiculously thin so I had long ago accepted the fact that any real-life depiction of her would be a little more fully bodied. I wish they had captured her outfits and weapons a bit better, but then it's the best they could do given the circumstances, I suppose.

The action was pretty good with a healthy dose of the kinds of acrobatic stunts the series has long become associated with. I know in an old review I did for Ultraviolet I compared the two movies somewhat given they both featured interesting visuals, good action / fight sequences and had plots that just didn't go down well. I'll still hold true to that, although I'll admit that Aeon Flux ranks a notch or two higher than Ultraviolet does, for what it's worth.

The movie acts as something to tide you over in the absence of access to the original series, if ever. Not quite as satisfying, but it'll do for now until I can manage to find a decent download.

No comments:

Post a Comment