A great many influences were drawn upon by Doug Liman in crafting
Edge of
Tomorrow, which is very loosely based on Hiroshi Sakurazaka's popular light
novel,
All You Need is Kill. More than just the simple "sci-fi
Groundhog
Day" it's most frequently described as, the satirical edginess will
have fans of Paul Verhoeven's
Starship Troopers chuckling, while the
hulking battle suits are pulled straight from Japanese anime, and there are
perhaps even hints of Deja Vu in there for good measure. But for all the
different styles thrown in to make for an exciting and surprisingly
light-footed action epic, the steadying influence is Tom Cruise, who at the age
of 51 seems to be getting his action hero groove back.
Like the time loop-stuck hero he plays in
Edge of Tomorrow, Cruise
keeps going to the sci-fi well over and over, fighting to try and replicate his
War of the Worlds success. And with a touch of slick humor, Doug Liman's energetic
direction, and a hint of the bizarre, this is easily Cruise's best crack at the
genre, despite a third act fail that threatens to kibosh the whole thing.
Cruise plays Major William Cage, a shady pro war spinmeister happy to stay far
in the background while others die for the cause. The world is under attack by
strange, liquid metal-ish creatures known as Mimics, and to combat them the
military has come up with weaponized battle suits capable of turning an
untrained soldier into a hero. The face of this PR campaign is the "Angel
of Verdun" Rita Vrataski (Emily Blunt), who turned the tide of battle when
all seemed lost. Posters of her are literally everywhere, inspiring others to
fight for the cause.
Well, inspiring everybody but Cage who refuses an order by his commander
(Brendan Gleeson) to embed with the front lines to cover an all-or-nothing
strike against the Mimics. Cowardly noting that he can't even stand the sight
of blood from a paper cut, Cage tries to blackmail his way out of it, only to
be knocked out, arrested, removed of rank, and shipped out to camp to prepare
for battle. There he's screamed at by an overzealous war-loving drill sergeant
(Bill Paxton), tossed into a misfit outfit, and dropped into a firefight that
echoes the beach storming of Normandy. Flopping around in a bulky metal suit,
Cage still manages to accidentally kill one of the larger Mimics, only to have
its acidic blood doused all over him, and in that moment of death he wakes up
at camp as if nothing happened.
From here the film follows the
Groundhog Day/
Source Code route
of Cage figuring out the parameters of his predicament. That means lots of
dying and waking up, greeted with a booming "On your feet, maggot!",
and to Liman's credit he manages to keep these scenes mostly free of repetition
for the audience. That involves lots of quick cuts, presenting some moments
from differing perspectives, and finding humor in the absurdity of Cage's
situation. Here's the least likely soldier ever forced into a Hellish scenario
in which he must be a soldier forever. But everything changes when he
encounters Rita on the field and her words, “Find me when you wake
up", hint that he's not alone in this. He and Rita were much the same
once, and with her help Cage must figure out a way to stop the Mimics and break
the cycle once and for all.
Liman keeps the pace moving briskly, even at times when it should come to a
screeching halt like in Cage's multiple training sequences. But these carry
weight because of the importance heaped upon them; if Cage can't get his act
together the whole world is doomed. And so it kind of makes you angry at him
when he stops training to hit on Rita (points for trying, though), or just
can't seem to get his timing straight. Of course, over time he begins to take
things more seriously and we see the crushing war fatigue plastered all over
his face. We've seen Cruise play this sort of character before, the
free-wheeling guy burdened with impossible responsibility, and he does it ease.
Frustration comes with Rita basically being reduced to Cage's sidekick when she
starts off as such a badass. Thankfully she never quite becomes a "damsel
in distress" and Blunt is capable of showing more layers to Rita than I
think were intended. She's shown to be more than capable of holding her own and
is a rare case of a strong female heroine in a genre dominated by guys. But
let's not mistake, this is Cruise's film and Cage makes for an interesting
enough character to root for. His initial sliminess marks him as more than just
a standard-issue hero, one who would rather be on the sidelines than the front
lines. His transformation into hardened soldier is, despite being cut short by
necessary montage, rendered in a believable way.
While Cruise and Blunt may be perfect casting on the screen and to the
studio bean counters hoping for a big box office, the compromise, or what I
call "The Cruise Compromise" comes on the creative end. There's no
real way to sugarcoat this: the ending is a complete disaster. It's the kind of
lazy, go-home-happy Hollywood ending you might imagine a bunch of studio execs
hammering out while "doing lunch". A more poignant conclusion was
clearly intended, sacrificed on the altar of popcorn entertainment and in the
process robbing the film of any chance to be memorable. It's the one lapse of
intelligence for a film that is far smarter than the summer generally requires,
and is worth reliving for a second time.
