Doing It For The Kids

It all began in 2005 with the publication of the first of the Twilight Books which tell the tale of some vampires and werewolves and their love for a normal human girl (at least that's what I think they're about based on the trailers I have seen for the movie adaptations, which for the record I have seen none of). What began I hear you ask? None other than the YA movement of course, though I should add that I am only referring to the most modern incarnation of all things YA (that's Young Adult for the uneducated) as it can actually be traced back to the 1920's (or even as far back as the early 1800's if you want to be as accurate as possible).

So if for the purposes of this review we consider Twilight the beginning of the modern age then I was 29 when the first novel was released which I think it's fair to say would disqualify me from the target audience which is fine as I much prefer my vampires to have a touch more bite if you catch my drift (and yes that pun was intended). Now at least it can be argued that there is a degree of originality within the Twilight franchise especially when you look at what was to come over the course of the next 10 years.

In 2008 we got the first of the Hunger Games novels, closely followed in 2009 by the debut of the Maze Runner series. Two years later the first Divergent novel hit shelves and then in 2013 publishers brought us the novel The 5th Wave. Now what do all of these YA series have in common? Yes they have all been turned into movies (actual franchises in every case except The 5th Wave which has only just debuted in the world of film) but they are also set in distopian worlds of one kind or another. In fact (and this may well be me showing my age) I couldn't necessarily differentiate between the various properties as they all pretty much blend into each other, yes I am being slightly factious but my point still stands. They all also appear to have been written by authors who have at some point in their lives seen the 2000 movie Battle Royale (itself adapted from a 1999 novel) as they have taken the main premise of that work (which is a fantastic film by the way) and twisted it everso slightly to make it their own.

So what is the point of this brief history of the YA phenomenom exactly? Well it all leads to the subject of this review which is the aforementioned newest kid on the block The 5th Wave. Written by Rick Yancey The 5th Wave is the first of a trilogy of novels (of course) and is a New York best seller which has recently been released in the form of a film by Sony (who are hoping for a hit as they run round like headless chickens following the debacle of the new Ghostbusters trailers that have caused outrage). Directed by Jonathan Blakeson (Pitch Perfect) the movie stars Chloe Grace Moretz as the lead character Cassie along with Nick Robinson and Liev Schrieber amoung others.

Cassie begins the film living with her parents and young brother Sam where everything seems normal until a whopping great UFO appears over the Earth which leads to mankind wondering just what their intentions may or may not be. Not to worry though as we soon find out that they most certainly have not come on peace as they fire an EMP which kills all technology on the planet, this is to be known as the 1st wave (see where this is going can't you). The 2nd wave sees the aliens (known as Others) drop a huge metal pole into the Earths fault lines which cause earthquakes and tsunamis to wipe out those unfortunate enough to be living on the coast. The 3rd wave has the Others kill off 97% of humanity with good old bird flu (remember when that was a thing) and then wave 4 involved the Others coming down to Earth disguised as humans to try and pick the rest of us off.

With all of that taking far too long that brings us to the 5th Wave which involves the Others (under the guise of US military bods) collecting as many children together as they can and tricking them into becoming an army of Other killers though unbeknownst to the children they are in actual fact killing human survivors due to the manner in which those pesky Others have got them all mixed up and armed to the teeth.

So Cassies mum is picked off by the 3rd wave whilst our heroine (plenty of strong female characters in the YA world), her dad and brother all end up in a camp with other survivors where they are then confronted by the military (remember they're not what they seem), who kill all the adults and take the kids off for training, all except for Cassie of course who gets seperated from the group and has to therefore has to try and get her young brother back.

The rest of the film is split into two plot threads, firstly we see Cassie on her journey to reconnect with Sam whilst we also get to see the young lad go through training along with all the other kidnapped children. So Cassie closes in whilst the small group of child soldiers that we are meant to care about figure out for themselves just what is going on and look to rebel against their alien overlords. They of course team up with Cassie and together they blow up the camp though not before the Others escape and make their merry way elsewhere to continue with their nefarious scheme whilst our now parentless heroes must now look out for themselves as they sit in the woods waiting for the inevitable sequel.

Well I say inevitable sequel but that may not be the case. You see the film has taken a bit of a caning from audiences scoring just 17% on Rotten Tomatoes (compared to 84% for the first Hunger Games, 40% for Divergent and 60% for Maze Runner) and has hardly set the box office on fire.

Moretz is OK but for me has still yet to escape the shadow of Kickass' Hit Girl and the rest of the cast are either hardly in the movie or are just by the numbers YA performers bringing nothing new or special to the table. As soon as Liev Schrieber shows up onscreen you just know that he will end up being the villain of the piece and the way the first four waves are skipped over you don't have the opportunity to connect with any of the characters on screen which leaves you not really caring about the fate of any of them.

As far as the special effects go they are hardly anything to write home about particularly when you compare them to those seen in the other YA movies I have mentioned and the whole film just comes across as thoroughly underwhelming. What I will say though is that the opening part of this film did interest me and had they shown more of the waves and how they impacted the Earth I may have enjoyed this a whole lot more. Unfortunately they quickly move away from what makes this film stand out in the YA crowd and turn it into just another by the numbers effort.

But as I've already mentioned these films are not made for me and I'm sure the argument will be that I just don't get 'it' which could very well be true as at almost 40 years of age the youth culture of the 21st century does at times leave me dazed and confused in equal measure. As I have done before I feel justified in scoring this film in two halves, the first (in which the aliens arrive and kick our asses) is really not bad and most definately deserving of a strong 7 out of 10. Alas the rest of the movie which is as dull as dishwater and drags the whole experience down is only worthy of a 3 out of 10 at best which gives The 5th Wave an aggregate score of 5 out of 10.

With that said however I have appointed myself a movie reviewer and so I try my best to watch films that might not be my cup of tea