After Earth

I have seen so many great movies with Will Smith since the 90´s. He is an actor with many skills, mostly in comedy, but actually works very well in the action genre also. And of course, he did do Wild Wild West, that most of us forgot over the years. One of my personal favourite movies with Will Smith is still Independence Day. The special effects may not look as great as they used to, but this is still a great sci fi action movie with great acting. I, Robot turned out to be a interesting view on technology about the future, that maybe robots is not the answer to all our problems. In 2006 we got to see Will Smith´s own son Jaden Smith in the drama motion picture The Pursuit Of Happyness. For a drama movie, this was actually pretty good, and for such a young age Jaden did very well. Now they are both back in a new movie together, After Earth, and it is directed by M Night Shyamalan, remember his classic The Sixth Sense ? With all these great names, mixed into a sci fi movie, is this finally a proof that M Night is a very talented director, or is this business as usual ?

Since humans had to leave Earth from an Alien invasion, they are forced to travel to a new world named Nova Prime. A thousand years later,  The Ranger Corps ( a peacekeeping organisation ) is commanded by General Cypher Raige ( Will Smith ). He fights aliens known as S´krell who are ready to invade Nova Prime. But with a powerful weapon known as Ursas ( large blind predator creatures ), The Rangers Corps manage to defeat the S´krells. Unfortunately Cypher´s daughter Senshi ( Zoe Kravitz ) is killed by a Ursa. Her brother Kitai Raige ( Jaden Smith ), blåmes himself for the death of Cypher, that he could not save her. As the years go by, Kitai is training to become a member of The Ranger Corps. But he is not good enough yet, so his teacher can´t let him continue training. Cypher tries to talk to Kitai, that he can become a soldier, if he continue to work hard. Cypher´s wife Faia ( Sophie Okonedo ), convinces Cypher to take Kitai with him on his last journey. However, the spacecraft is hit by an asteroid shower, and they are forced to crash land on Earth. Cypher is badly injured, so he order Kitai to continue on his own. Kitai needs to go inside the backup beacon, to send a signal home to Nova Prime. But out in the woods, Kitai is about to fight for his life.


It is a shame M Night Shyamalan have taken his skills, right down the drain, and left us with this garbage. After Earth may have lots of special effects, but the acting is really awful. Will Smith can be a great actor, so why does he do this ? Because he is a scientologist ? Most likely, but still this is nothing worth your time. After Earth is a sci fi movie, with no plot. Well, there is a story, but it´s just as thin as anus hair. What about Jaden Smith ? I enjoyed his performance in the reboot of Karate Kid, but here ? This is a big disgrace that so many talents wasted their time in this project. The action scenes are boring, the so called adventure is just about as exciting as picking your nose. I really hope M Night can recover from this, or i am throwing in a towel, i almost have had enough.

Rating: D