There’s no shortage of visually-dazzling science fiction stories out there across film, television, and video games, but crafting a tale engaging enough to keep audiences invested throughout is an entirely different – and much more difficult – matter, one that 2016’s Native failed to master.
Co-writer and director Daniel Fitzsimmons deserves plenty of credit for building such a rich, vivid, and imaginative world on a budget that makes the film look and feel much more expansive and expensive than it is, but the desire to aim for thought-provoking existentialism and grandiose ideas eventually devolves into the over-familiar before too long, and things never quite recover.
The plot finds two scientists – played by Rupert Graves and Ellie Kendrick – tasked to undertake a mission across the universe in an effort to uncover the source of a distant transmission, one that could potentially even lead to the discovery of sentient life in the furthest reaches of the galaxy, but it’s inevitably the human side of the equation that ends up causing the most problems.
Lukewarm reviews from both critics and audiences ensured that Native fell far short of coming within distance of securing cult classic status, but it has at least re-orbited the atmosphere on streaming to end up as a surprise on-demand success story. Per FlixPatrol, not only has the film burned up on its way onto the Prime Video most-watched charts, but it’s also one of the 10 top-viewed flicks in the United Kingdom, even if the narrative steak doesn’t quite live up to the aesthetic sizzle.
Published: Apr 25, 2023 02:17 am